CRISPE crew posing with Uncle Sam.

 Donald Tenn of F4J in front of the Straw Pole entrance.

Larry Kerkman, President of CRISPE speaking to Mitt Romney about 50/50 EQUAL Parenting.

CRISPE Crew in front of the CRISPE Bus.

There were two big winners in Sunday’s Iowa presidential straw poll, Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and the CRISPE crew. That’s right the Children Rights Initiative for Sharing Parents Equally coach and crew scored BIG!

But while CRISPE was rolling down Highway 39 in Illinois headed for Iowa, Harry Crouch (CRISPE-2) received a telephone call in the San Diego office from an Arkansas grandmother heading for Missouri. She and her son had been the sole caregivers for her grandson for five-years. The mother abandoned her family eventually tuning up in Texas, where she filed for custody apparently because she needed money, albeit it child support seemed an easy hit. One-day officials showed up at the grandmother’s home with a Texas court order and took the grandchild. Though the Texas court order, according to the grandmother, was never served on her son. Now Texas wants roughly $18,000 in arrears and $600 per month child support! $18,000 in arrears for when the grandchild was in the care of his father and grandmother! It gets worse. The mother recently accused the father of raping her in Texas, raping her when the man was physically in Arkansas… So, Harry asked the grandmother how she knew about CRISPE. She said she was following the CRISPE coach and it was right in front of her on the highway! Amazing. Harry gave her Larry Kerkman’s (CRISPE-1 or “Mr. CRISPE”) cell phone number and encouraged her to immediately call him, which she did. Then, after both she and the CRISPE bus pulled over and stopped, William Wagner of On Second Thought Television who is traveling with CRISPE, interviewed the grandmother. Absolutely extraordinary!

The CRISPE coach arrived in Des Moines Iowa, just in time for the state parade. Donald Tenn, Fathers 4 Justice, smelled smoke. When Larry stopped and got out of the coach fuel was draining on the pavement. CRISPE was stranded while the parade marched on, which, Larry and the CRISPE crew were able to watch and enjoy. After the parade Larry and Crew figured out that the CRISPE coach had a broken fuel-injector line! By then it was too late to find a mechanic. They spent the night in Des Moines.

With a new fuel-injector line securely in place, the next day they headed for the Polk County Court House for a rally.

Then Larry and Crew headed for the Iowa State Fair where they managed to park the CRISPE coach right in front of the main entrance. Tens of thousands of people saw the CRISPE coach. It was truly exciting and Larry and Crew spoke with many of the candidates for President stumping for votes. In fact Larry conducted a short interview with Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and spoke with Kansas Senator Sam Brownback. Others spoke with Former Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson and Texas Congressman Ron Paul. Many People approached the CRISPE guys asking what CRISPE was about, since they were wearing bright purple CRISPE shirts and were hard to miss.

The Straw Poll is taken the last day of the fair. The CRISPE coach once again got front row parking to be seen by even more people. Larry was invited to spend time with Governor Mike Huckabee on his custom coach. Though Huckabee said, "I heard your bus was nicer than mine". So word was out about the Big Purple Crispe Coach. Huckabee is well aware of the problems with the family court system and fully supports equal shared parenting. Unfortunately, he was unaware of the corruption within the child support system, but said he would look into it.

William Wagner did a great interview with Congressmen Ron Paul who said that he believes in equal shared parenting.

Iowa Senator David Hartsuch, not Huckabee as earlier reported, joined Larry and Crew on the CRISPE coach to escape the sweltering heat and air sucking humidity. He is apparently a huge advocate of equal shared parenting and offered pointers about what needs to be done to facilitate equal shared parenting. Hucksuch, not Huckabee, said that “everyone” (meaning legislators) knows about the problems associated with inequitable child custody laws. But he said without a coordinated grassroots effort legislators are disinclined to change things. Which means all of us have to start saying “we” instead of “me”.

After cooling off in the CRISPE coach Hartsuch introduced Larry, CRISPE crew, and several other shared parenting advocates to several influential people; like, Mrs. Duncan Hunter, some of Huckabee's staff, some of Tommy Thompson's staff, and several other such people.

It was an excellent and productive day including Donald Tenn from Father4Justice hanging a large nobody-can-miss F4J banner on one of the walkways in the middle of the event. All that was needed for a true F4J stunt was a guy in a Superman suit hanging from a crane just above the stage. Though the sign was a hard to miss attention getter all by itself.