The difference between "pretend unity" and the real thing

It appears there is considerable resistance to having Hillary Clinton's name placed in nomination at the Democratic Convention.  The thinking apparently is that, if Hillary were to be nominated, she might get a lot of votes and that would undermine "unity."  Therefore, the Obama campaign and the DNC feel it would be better to avoid having a roll call because, without it, nobody would remember that the nomination was fiercely contested and the outcome quite narrow. 

This reminds me of a priest friend of mine who says that the Catholic church really does change.  "We sort of stop doing things one way, and start doing things a different way, and then pretend that we've been doing them that way all along."  If we don't have a roll call vote, the Obama campaign and the DNC think that we can then pretend that every Democrat has been for Obama all along.  No one will notice!  They'll totally buy it! 

Some reporter at the Wall Street Journal says there hasn't been a roll call vote at a convention since the 1976 Republican convention.  Funny, I can remember a roll call vote at every convention since I first started watching in 1960.  Without a roll call vote, not only do we miss out on a traditional and essential feature of American political life, we would also be deprived of states intoning their virtues on national television.  In fact, absent a roll call, what's the point of even having a convention at all?

Here's what would really sink the whole "unity schtick":  Let them try to get rid of the roll call vote.  There are hundreds of people who would howl in protest right there on national TV.  How do you think that would look?

Comments

[lillianjane]

...and the roll call is nostalgic. I half expect people to use words like zip and zowie and pep and by gum. It's one of the few entertaining parts of the convention. The Obama people certainly have chutzpah--first moving the DNC, now trying to make him the only candidate.
That photo of John Lennon is one of my favorites.

[gormenghast]

I was at the 1984 and 1988 democratic conventions - did I just imagine the roll call votes?

[Deborah Sampson]

Dating myself as pre-historic, I remember watching the roll call on TV when we only had 3 channels or so. I mean I watched it from both parties! Now days, you may catch some of the roll call if you intensely search the dial, but the networks don't really cover it and if the networks don't cover it, does it really happen? Personally, I'd rather see the roll call than an Invesco Field acceptance speech! And that's something coming from a political junkie like me who even watches some Bush speeches!
Speaking of Bush speeches, is anyone else more concerned about their financial future now than before his speech yesterday?

[John Petty]

Yeah, the roll call is the best part. I don't know what the WSJ reporter had in mind when she said there hadn't been a roll call vote since the GOP convention in 1976. Maybe she meant "closely contested" roll call vote. By that measure, there have been very few roll call votes ever.

[redrabbit]

I enjoyed the roll-call drama when I was a kid, (always got a kick out of seeing the hometown delegation—the great state of New Mexico!—look foolish on national television) but have paid less attention to the conventions since I moved to Chicago. I agree that it's a mistake to marginalize HRC and the Dems who voted for her by cutting her out of the picture. But the hubris of Barack knows no bounds.

Hey gormenghast-- I LOVED the first book of that trilogy, and didn't get around to the other two, but I rarely meet anyone who's even heard of it. Anyway...

Yes, we're keeping an eye on our TIAA-CREF very closely.

My daughter is finishing her third year of med-school and she called last night to say Bank of America, who finances her studies (along with yours-truly and a nice scholarship from Baylor), is suddenly dropping out of the student loan bizness, along with two other lenders.

I'm not finding comfort in anything being said by either candidate.