By 8:30 a.m., the café was filled with more than 100 folks — everyone had come to listen to the host of her own Air America radio talk show (heard locally on AM 950) who, just last month, scored the post-Keith Olbermann slot on MSNBC. In effect, Maddow will be taking over for Dan Abrams. She is the first openly gay political commentator to host her own prime-time show, which premieres Sept. 8.

Just before 9 a.m., when the tall and lean Maddow took her place on the café’s stairwell, the crowd clapped fiercely.

“That big round of applause was really nice — it makes me feel like I did something to deserve it,” said Maddow, with signature humility. Although she is known for being charming and bubbly, her voice is unusually soft among broadcasters working outside the public radio biz. In fact, after more than a week on the convention trail, Maddow had started to go hoarse.

‘Impulse buyer’s remorse’?
“Is Palin staying in?” shouted a female voice this morning.

“If the Republicans have buyer’s remorse, it’s not even buyer’s remorse — it’s impulse buyer’s remorse,” joked Maddow. But if Palin were to drop out, she guessed, it would probably happen in advance of this evening’s big speech by the Alaskan governor.

A rumpled fellow — earlier, he’d arrived by motorcycle — asked why Republicans always insist the media are against them.

“It’s worked for them every year since Nixon,” said Maddow, without missing a beat. “But for John McCain to say the media is against me is hilarious.”

“How are you able to stay so gracious when you’re sitting next to Pat Buchanan?” asked another fan.

“When Pat is on TV saying something outrageous — you know how you yell at the TV? Well, I get to yell at the TV and it hears me,” said Maddow.

There was less than an hour of this, but Maddow stuck around for another full hour to mingle with fans. At this time, a couple of celebrity politicians even dropped by — including former Congressman Bill Luther and U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who counts herself among Maddow’s fans.

“I just like her — she has an honest manner,” said Klobuchar, waving a hand in front of her eyes as if to indicate that Maddow’s pretty face, with its long, dark eyelashes, exposed the integrity within.  

A few seconds later, Maddow and Klobuchar were shaking hands. “When you said you spent more time vetting some of your law clerks than John McCain spent on his VP candidate, I said ‘I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy,’ ” said Maddow. She lifted her elbows in the air and pretended to bow.  

“I love you — I listen, I watch you every day,” shouted a woman with wild, curly gray hair as she walked out the door.

Afterward, Maddow chomped on a bowl of split-pea cilantro soup before she had to rush back to the Xcel Energy Center. But she was happy to pause in-between bites to answer a few questions:

How does she like Minneapolis/St. Paul? “There’s something magical about these cities. ... It’s like North Hampton on the Mississippi,” she said.

On Keith Olbermann: “He is an absolute mentor and inspiration — his show is better than anything else on TV by miles.”

On the mounting tensions between the old-school reporters at NBC News and the increasingly liberal flavor of MSNBC: “It’s kind of a drag, but I don’t know anything about media. I have a lot of opinions about news and politics.”

On McCain: “You’ve got a guy who’s on a hair-trigger at the top of the ticket, and all of a sudden really surprising stuff is happening — so it’s scary for the country, but fun for the coverage."