Pretty miserable convention so far

The GOP couldn't help the hurricane.  They could have helped what they said about it though, such as when they had prayer teams praying that the hurricane's course be dissauded from Tampa, and claimed victory when it did.  

This seemed both self-centered--"It didn't hit us so everything's OK!"--and pharisaical--Matthew 6:6.

It cost them the first day, but the first day of any national convention is usually the least interesting day anyway.  The campaign wants the passion to build from a flicker of a spark at the beginning, then ratchet up each night all the way to its joyous climax at the end, The Acceptance Speech.

All political conventions of both parties have been this way for the past 40 years.  Conventions used to do actual business.  That could get messy, however, and didn't look good on television.  The Democrats fought in the streets in 1968 and it cost them.  A unifying convention might have gotten them the .4% of the vote that gave the election to Richard Nixon.

For the past 40 years, the fighting has all been done in primaries and caucuses so that, by the time of the convention, the issues are settled and the party has four days of prime time to make its best case.  

This makes the conventions both less interesting and more useful, less interesting because who doesn't love a good convention fight, but more useful because each major political party is able to make a sustained case to the nation.

The GOP is having a tough time all around.  The weather dealt them a blow, which they couldn't help, but which cast something of a pall over the proceedings.  On top of that, the Romney campaign doesn't quite control the thing, and Ron Paul keeps sniping at them and disrupting the process.

Meanwhile, on the podium at podium last night, it seemed that all the speakers, save for Ann Romney, were either campaigning for 2016 or trying to shore up their own positions in their home states.

None of this matters too much if the campaign manages a good final night.  If Ryan and Romney make effective speeches that connect with people--unlikely, but possible--then the convention might still be said to be a success.  You couldn't say that so far. 

 

Comments

[Hypatia]

Or, put another way, parties reduced the conventions to infomercials because floor fights didn't look good on TV and now TV, except for cable, is no longer interested in running the infomercials. One hour of prime time is not a lot and the audiences are dropping off.

C-SPAN used to show the old conventions. Those were fun. I liked the Goldwater ladies screaming at Nelson Rockefeller and Eugene McCarthy's barnburner of a speech nominating Stevenson in 1960. Where was that guy in 1968, anyway?

[John Petty]

Wish I'd been able to catch that. I watched the Kennedy/Nixon debates on C-Span about 5-6 years ago. I was stunned at how articulate and smart they both were--hard to imagine today's candidates being able to do the same.