John Heller, Post-Gazette
	A throng of 3,000 lined up to board the Cookie Cruise.

End of summer? Time to start campaigning seriously for November races. Thinking about two years from now, or even four? Get in line. Maybe you want to develop a commercial real estate project, build a racetrack, secure government funding, find a job, make friends and influence people, be seen as a player, be seen, period. Bob O'Connor's Cookie Cruise is the place for all that and more.

Now in its 14th year, this annual boat ride began as a fund-raiser when O'Connor was running for City Council. Now he directs Gov. Ed Rendell's office for southwestern Pennsylvania, and the cruise has taken on a life of its own. Wednesday the crowd surpassed 3,000, requiring a third boat to hold all the Democrats who poured through the gates to participate in this political rite of passage. If there is any doubt that Pittsburgh remains a Democratic stronghold, the Cookie Cruise is proof that the life of the party continues to center around the politicians who worked the crowd like movie stars on Oscar night.

O'Connor anchored the gangplank, surrounded by candidates Joe Hoeffel (U.S. Senate), Bob Casey Jr. (state treasurer), Jim Eisenhower (attorney general and the late president's cousin) and Jack Wagner (auditor general). Rendell arrived later, cutting a jovial swath through the crowd and, once on board, mixing casually with the guests. From all the ladies of every ethnicity who bake the cookies for the traditional cookie table (albeit an enormous one!) to priests, rabbis, union reps, office workers, businessmen, friends, family, supporters and numerous elected officials, they stood in line to pay their respects to the Bob, whose amazing stamina testifies to years of experience on the hand-shaking circuit.

	John Heller, Post-Gazette
	Billy Rudolph and Rabbi Yisroel Rosenfeld greet Bob O'Connor. That's Joe Hoeffel on the left.

Sampling the picnic dinner of fried chicken and corn on the cob were Bob's wife, Judy, sons the Rev. Terry O'Connor and Corey and daughter Heidy with husband Rich Garth.

Saying ahoy there, matey, were Congressman Mike Doyle, County Executive Dan Onorato, state Sen. Jay Costa and brother Guy Costa, DA Stephen Zappala with Mary, City Council president Gene Ricciardi and members Doug Shields, Sala Udin, Alan Hertzberg, Len Bodack and Luke Ravenstahl, county treasurer John Weinstein, state Democratic Party director Don Morabito, Sheriff Pete DeFazio and his brother, county councilman John De Fazio, county council president Rich Fitzgerald, state Rep. Don Walko, Recorder of Deeds Valerie McDonald Roberts, Gateway Clipper Fleet president Terry Wirginis, former Steelers Dwayne Woodruff and L.C. Greenwood, David O'Loughlin, Jim Rogal, Bill Isler, Damian Soffer, Murry Gerber, Jamie and Melinda Edwards with son John (who's off to Princeton), Ed Dunlap, Wayne Gerhold, Rich Talarico, Diane Greco, Ed Friedman, Wayne Fontana, Tom O'Shea, Leslie McCoombs, Marty Marks, Jim O'Brien, Billy Rudolph and the indispensable Connie Sukernek and Marlene Cassidy