The Blog Formerly Known As Vote '08

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Above: John McCain giving a speech on June 3rd, 2008, in front of a green screen that was universally panned, especially among Republicans, who may have seen their greatest moment of worry on this date.

In addition to the fact that the crowd was sparse, & McCain’s speaking style was flat, the color green rarely makes anyone look good.

You may be aware of this, but a green screen is what the Storm Track 9 team uses here at the NewsChannel to help deliver their weather report. It’s a green wall, & the weather maps are magically ‘projected’ behind the meteorologist.

That technology provided a ton of parodies of the McCain speech, especially after comedian Stephen Colbert called for viewers to submit their ideas:

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You get the idea. Yes, many of them are funny. There are hundreds, maybe thousands more by searching the terms “green screen challenge” at the YouTube site.

But obviously this is not something the McCain people should never let happen again.

Which makes the 1st ten minutes of McCain’s speech last night so perplexing - make that mystifying. Scroll down to the speech clip two posts down & watch for yourself. An entirely green background, opening the candidate up for more parodies. The Stephen Colbert show staff must have been ecstatic.

It’s because of the (in my view, amazing) huge TV screen that for most of the week provided some pretty stunning backdrops of American scenes.

As you can see from the wide shot above, the picture is of a large home, & the green was from the grass at the bottom of the picture. Unfortunately this made the tight shot of McCain look, frankly, awful. Green reared its ugly head.

What’s the picture of? You suspect that some in the TV audience suspected it was one of McCain’s mansions.

Talking Points Memo says it’s of Walter Reed Middle School, in Los Angeles.

But consider this, from the same site:

“several readers have suggested that perhaps one of the tech geeks charged with setting up the audio/visual bells and whistles for the evening was tasked with getting pictures of Walter Reed Army Medical Center but goofed and got this instead. At first I thought, No, that’s ridiculous. This is a major political party with big time professionals putting this together. Nothing is left to chance. I mean, is this the RNC or a scene out Spinal Tap or Waiting for Guffman? I still have a bit of a hard time believing they’re quite that incompetent. But when you figure in what appears to be the utter lack of any logic for this school being behind McCain and the fact that it has ‘Walter Reed’ in its name, I’m really not sure you can discount this possibility.“

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A good speech. I don’t believe it fulfilled what was required of him, though.

Full disclosure: I’ve been a longtime fan of John McCain the presidential candidate. I’ve followed his career since he surprised everyone with a huge win in New Hampshire in the 2000 primary. So for me, it was exciting to see the man who I think is the best Republican candidate since Ronald Reagan to finally get his due.

This man certainly has earned the right to be at the top of his ticket.

But this year, he has not only faced the challenge of running against the best Democratic presidential candidates in years, he’s also had to run against the status quo.

Here are some of what I think are the highlights of the speech above:

“Finally, a word to Senator Obama and his supporters. We’ll go at it over the next two months. That’s the nature of these contests, and there are big differences between us. But you have my respect and admiration. Despite our differences, much more unites us than divides us. We are fellow Americans, an association that means more to me than any other. We’re dedicated to the proposition that all people are created equal and endowed by our Creator with inalienable rights. No country ever had a greater cause than that. And I wouldn’t be an American worthy of the name if I didn’t honor Senator Obama and his supporters for their achievement. “

Classy, especially since the tone of Obama’s speech was largely one of confrontation & criticism of McCain.

“I’m not in the habit of breaking promises to my country and neither is Governor Palin. And when we tell you we’re going to change Washington, and stop leaving our country’s problems for some unluckier generation to fix, you can count on it.”

Translation: take that, status quo.

I fight to restore the pride and principles of our party. We were elected to change Washington, and we let Washington change us. We lost the trust of the American people when some Republicans gave in to the temptations of corruption. We lost their trust when rather than reform government, both parties made it bigger. We lost their trust when instead of freeing ourselves from a dangerous dependence on foreign oil, both parties and Senator Obama passed another corporate welfare bill for oil companies. We lost their trust, when we valued our power over our principles.

We’re going to change that. We’re going to recover the people’s trust by standing up again for the values Americans admire. The party of Lincoln, Roosevelt and Reagan is going to get back to basics.

Taking on his party here, a line that definitely helps with independents/disaffected Dems. Unfortunately, I believe it wasn’t enough (more on that in a moment).

“We face many threats in this dangerous world, but I’m not afraid of them. I’m prepared for them. I know how the military works, what it can do, what it can do better, and what it should not do. “

Is this a veiled reference to being anti-torture? I hope so. Again, more on this in a moment.

“The constant partisan rancor that stops us from solving these problems isn’t a cause, it’s a symptom. It’s what happens when people go to Washington to work for themselves and not you.

Again and again, I’ve worked with members of both parties to fix problems that need to be fixed. That’s how I will govern as President. I will reach out my hand to anyone to help me get this country moving again. I have that record and the scars to prove it. Senator Obama does not.

Instead of rejecting good ideas because we didn’t think of them first, let’s use the best ideas from both sides. Instead of fighting over who gets the credit, let’s try sharing it. This amazing country can do anything we put our minds to. I will ask Democrats and Independents to serve with me. And my administration will set a new standard for transparency and accountability.

We’re going to finally start getting things done for the people who are counting on us, and I won’t care who gets the credit.”

If you’ve read this blog regularly, you know that this statement gets my (pardon the cliche) full-throated endorsement.

“On an October morning, in the Gulf of Tonkin, I prepared for my 23rd mission over North Vietnam. I hadn’t any worry I wouldn’t come back safe and sound. I thought I was tougher than anyone. I was pretty independent then, too. I liked to bend a few rules, and pick a few fights for the fun of it. But I did it for my own pleasure; my own pride. I didn’t think there was a cause more important than me.

Then I found myself falling toward the middle of a small lake in the city of Hanoi, with two broken arms, a broken leg, and an angry crowd waiting to greet me. I was dumped in a dark cell, and left to die. I didn’t feel so tough anymore. When they discovered my father was an admiral, they took me to a hospital. They couldn’t set my bones properly, so they just slapped a cast on me. When I didn’t get better, and was down to about a hundred pounds, they put me in a cell with two other Americans. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t even feed myself. They did it for me. I was beginning to learn the limits of my selfish independence. Those men saved my life.

I was in solitary confinement when my captors offered to release me. I knew why. If I went home, they would use it as propaganda to demoralize my fellow prisoners. Our Code said we could only go home in the order of our capture, and there were men who had been shot down before me. I thought about it, though. I wasn’t in great shape, and I missed everything about America. But I turned it down.

A lot of prisoners had it worse than I did. I’d been mistreated before, but not as badly as others. I always liked to strut a little after I’d been roughed up to show the other guys I was tough enough to take it. But after I turned down their offer, they worked me over harder than they ever had before. For a long time. And they broke me.

When they brought me back to my cell, I was hurt and ashamed, and I didn’t know how I could face my fellow prisoners. The good man in the cell next door, my friend, Bob Craner, saved me. Through taps on a wall he told me I had fought as hard as I could. No man can always stand alone. And then he told me to get back up and fight again for our country and for the men I had the honor to serve with. Because every day they fought for me.

I fell in love with my country when I was a prisoner in someone else’s. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for. I was never the same again. I wasn’t my own man anymore. I was my country’s.

I’m not running for president because I think I’m blessed with such personal greatness that history has anointed me to save our country in its hour of need. My country saved me. My country saved me, and I cannot forget it. And I will fight for her for as long as I draw breath, so help me God.

I think this was probably the most effective part of the speech. Granted, many voters are looking more for how McCain as president would help improve their lives, but the way he framed his transformation to glorification of self to glorification of country was pretty well-done.

“If you find faults with our country, make it a better one. If you’re disappointed with the mistakes of government, join its ranks and work to correct them. Enlist in our Armed Forces. Become a teacher. Enter the ministry. Run for public office. Feed a hungry child. Teach an illiterate adult to read. Comfort the afflicted. Defend the rights of the oppressed. Our country will be the better, and you will be the happier. Because nothing brings greater happiness in life than to serve a cause greater than yourself. “

You know what? Strike my last comment. This was the best part of the speech for me. McCain goes a long way here in busting the stereotype (one that does exist within the party, truth be told) that Republicans are concerned only with “getting theirs” & not interested in anyone else.

For whatever reason, since 9/11, George W. Bush has never made a statement like this, & I’ve always been baffled as to why. It’s refreshing to hear, coming from the party’s new standard-bearer.

& finally, I thought he did a good job of working up the crowd at the very end of the speech.

Now, other thoughts:

-DISRUPTIONS: Code Pink, what the heck are you doing? (In case you didn’t see, McCain was disrupted by protesters, & the crowd’s reaction to the protesters, at least 3 times). If you are leaning to the left, I highly recommend that you think long & hard about how well something like this would play to the rest of the country, & make your side look. Let the man speak. It’s his moment. You only make your cause worse off. & to the crowd who shouted them down with “U!S!A!,” I would point them to this Vote08 post which shows just how well McCain can dispatch protesters with aplomb. They should have sat on their hands & let him handle it.

-DELIVERY: Not so good. In terms of McCain’s past teleprompter speeches, it’s probably the best he’s ever done. But he still lacks oratorical skills. I don’t mean this disrespectfully, it’s just simply the truth.

-CONTENT: Not as substantive as he needed to be. The crowd watching him last night, when polled, gave President Bush an 80% approval rating. Nationwide, that number has hovered around 30% for almost the majority of Bush’s 2nd term. What was needed here was an attempt to craft daylight between McCain & the President. Not mentioning his name was not enough.

What I was expecting was a line or two that would have caused an audible gasp in the crowd. It would have played well in middle America.

Also, after an entire week of talk about McCain’s treatment & torture as a prisoner of war, I was hoping that McCain would say something to the effect of, “My friends, as a victim of torture, I want you to know that that is not an American value, & you have my word that it will not happen on my watch.” The closest he got to this is “I know how the military works, what it can do, what it can do better, and what it should not do.”

Another part of McCain’s principles (at least up until the last couple of months) has been the need to address climate change. Again, a line talking about how real the problem is & the need to address it with the rest of the world would not have gone over well in the crowd, but played well with independent voters who have realized what’s at stake.

More thoughts later on this, so check back.

Did you watch, & what did you think? Post a comment now!

FURTHER READING: FactCheck.org fact checks the speech.

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First up: Veepstakes runner up Tim Pawlenty. I think it is a good thing this man was not chosen (I had written him off as a candidate back during the drama of last week). He does a miserable job of trying to get the crowd to say “Put. Country. First.” with him.

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South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham was next. Graham was an advocate of Joe Lieberman (read more about that here). In this speech, he deftly llifted Obama’s line about “it’s not that he doesn’t care, it’s that he doesn’t get it” from his acceptance speech.
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Next up, Tom Ridge, former Homeland Security Director. He was also on McCain’s short list, but was considered a “no” by many because of his stance on abortion rights.

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Former Tennessee Senator Bill Frist gave what I thought was the best speech of the night, other than McCain’s. Frist advocated increased medical aid to poor countries where terrorists breed, & said  “you don’t go to war with someone who’s saved your life.” It seemed like the crowd didn’t react as warmly to his call for a broader internationalism & diplomacy.

& then came Cindy McCain:

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I can’t seem to find a clip of the bio film of her on the YouTubes; it was good.

But I don’t think that it was good she chose to speak without the lectern. If you do that, then you had better move around a bit. She didn’t. In fact the way she walked it appeared that her dress was hampering her movement (I am of the male persuasion so wearing dresses is is something with which I have no expertise on, so correct me, ladies, if you think I’m incorrect). I also think in terms of her delivery she sounded a lot like our current First Lady, Laura Bush.

So what did you think of any of these speakers? Post a comment & let us know!

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This biographical video of Sarah Palin was supposed to air before her speech last night but got bumped for time reasons. Now you can watch.

Let me know what you think!

From “The Swamp” blog:

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was a huge magnet for TV viewers, attracting nearly as many eyeballs as Sen. Barack Obama did on the last day of the Democratic convention, according to Nielsen, the audience-measurement agency.

Here’s a thumbnail provided by Nielsen:

The Sarah Palin speech generated 37.2 million viewers, just 1.1 million viewers short of Barack Obama’s record-breaking speech on Day 4 of the Democratic Convention. The Palin speech was carried on only six networks while the Obama speech was carried on ten (including BET, TV One, Univision and Telemundo).

Palin attracted a large female audience (19.5 million women, or 4.9 million more than Day 3 of the Democratic Convention).

Ratings for viewers 55+ (25.2) continue to be about ten times higher than for teens (2.2)
Day 3 for the GOP attracted more Hispanic viewers (1.4 million) than Day 3 of the Democratic Convention (1.2 million), even though Univision and Telemundo did not carry the speech.

The question now is: will Sen. John McCain be able to come anywhere close to Palin and Obama’s viewership tonight when he accepts the Republican presidential nomination here in St. Paul, Minn.?

Excellent question! What say you, Vote08 readers? Who gets better ratings in St. Paul? Make your prediction now!

ALSO:

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) - A new Gallup poll suggests Barack Obama’s lead over John McCain is virtually unchanged since the GOP convention began.
The poll is based on interviews conducted Monday through yesterday. It shows the Democrat leading among respondents 49 to 42 percent. All but a few of the interviews were conducted before Sarah Palin gave her speech last night.
Obama led by 6 percentage points in a Gallup survey conducted last weekend, prior to the start of the Republican gathering.

(this post originally appeared on March 31st)

Continuing our sports tie-ins today. Let’s say the character in this picture is “John McCain,” & the person holding the ball is “the NFL.”

It looks like -for one night, at least- the NFL will compete for the attention of some of the voters John McCain is counting on in the fall.

The league has scheduled its first game of the season on September 4th.

Why’s that a problem?
It’s the same night that McCain will accept his party’s nomination for president.

Not to mention the fact that it’s the Giants vs the Redskins. Big game.

The NFL has scheduled a start that’s 90 minutes earlier because of the convention [**update: the game's been moved to a start time of 7:00]

Still, as Johnathan Martin at Politico puts it, “Republicans can’t be happy about what will inevitably distract attention from the penultimate night of their convention.”

TODAY’S UPDATE: McCain will reportedly -wisely- wait until the game ends before he starts speaking.

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Can’t play the clip at work? Read the transcript here. 

First impressions: yes, it was a good speech. There were many lines in this speech that she said word-for-word at her debut last Friday.. but then again, I realize I’m watching this race a lot closer than many in the American electorate.

She certainly demonstrated her charisma. But I still believe that the high inflections of her voice may prove to be more a liability than an asset.

Let us know what you think! All opinions are welcome.

p.s. You had to laugh when the camera caught Piper Palin using saliva to tamp down her brother’s hair.

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You may have thought you were watching the Republican National Convention for the 2008 election last night.

& that’s mostly true.

But under the surface, the three speakers leading up to Sarah Palin’s featured three men who no doubt had the next-time-around’s primaries squarely in mind.

Let’s start with Mitt Romney, who made it clear that he’s trying to stake a claim in the farthest rightward corner of the Republican party:

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Rowr! Goodness, the man hates liberals, doesn’t he? It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to call the current U.S. Supreme Court a liberal one. Hadn’t heard that claim before.

The speech was extremely reminiscent of Pat Buchanan’s 1992 speech, which was the 1st time that the phrase “culture war” was used:

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Buchanan’s speech did not go over well with middle America, because it was seen as far too harsh. It may be in part the reason Mitt didn’t give his speech in prime time last night.

Onward. Mike Huckabee, the winner of the Tennessee primary, gave what I thought was the best speech out of the three former primary candidates featured last night:

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The best thing he could have done - for his party, that is - was to recognize the economic difficulties experienced by ordinary Americans. I haven’t seen much empathy in this regard at this convention this week. Good & well-crafted speech, Mike.

& then finally, Rudy Giuliani. He did so poorly at the polls this time around that I wonder if he really will run again in 2012.. but let’s assume he is until we learn otherwise:

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After a relatively tame night, the gloves were certainly off against Barack Obama in these three speeches. What do you think? Were they effective? Which of the three men who spoke do you think has the best shot at running for the presidency again? Post a comment & let the world know!

[addendum: by saying they candidates have 2012 in their sights, I am in no way implying that John McCain will lose this year. If he wins, then just substitute "2016" for "2012" above.]

Do you know how close this man came to becoming the Republican nominee for Vice President of the United States?

It’s been widely reported this week that rather than Sarah Palin, Joe Lieberman, Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate in 2000, who has since declared himself an Independent, was John McCain’s top choice for a running mate this year:

For weeks, advisers close to the campaign said, McCain had wanted to name as his running mate his good friend Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, the Democrat turned independent. But by the end of last weekend, the outrage from Christian conservatives over the possibility that McCain would fill out the Republican ticket with Lieberman, a supporter of abortion rights, had become too intense to be ignored.

…

it was not until the last few weeks that McCain winnowed his list to five or six finalists. They included, a McCain adviser said, Pawlenty, Romney, Lieberman, Palin and Tom Ridge, the former governor of Pennsylvania who also supports abortion rights. Palin, unlike the others, was barely mentioned in news media speculation.

The finalists, including Palin, were vetted, a campaign adviser said, and McCain then asked his inner circle — Salter, Rick Davis, Steve Schmidt and Charlie Black — to provide him with assessments of each. “He said, ‘Give me plusses and minuses on each of these people,’ ” Black said.

One of McCain’s closest friends, Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, weighed in as well, pushing so hard for Lieberman — McCain, Graham and Lieberman are longtime traveling companions — that he vexed some of the other advisers. Others in the inner circle favored Pawlenty or Romney. Palin had no strong advocates in the group, an outside adviser said, but she had no detractors, either.

Despite being McCain’s top choice, if he were to pick Lieberman you would likely to be watching the convention this week through your fingers. There would have been a bloody floor fight fighting the choice, mainly because other than foreign policy issues, Senator Joe Lieberman votes with Democrats most of the time.

So consider that as you watch his speech (which, for some strange reason, followed the vastly superior orator Fred Thompson, making it ever-so-anticlimactic):

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With what I spelled out above, it makes these lines from the speech particularly ironic:

“And dear friends, I am here tonight here because John McCain’s whole life testifies to a great truth: Being a Democrat or a Republican is important.

But it is nowhere near as important as being an American.

…

It shouldn’t take a natural disaster to teach us that the American people don’t care much if you have an “R” or a “D” after your name.

What they care about is, are we solving the problems that they’re against every day?

The crowd applauded - but if they weren’t so concerned about that “D” voting record, they would have embraced Lieberman as a chance to prove one’s post-partisan mettle.

I’m not saying choosing Lieberman would have been the right choice; for one thing, he’s already lost on a presidential ticket .. something the notoriously superstitious McCain did well to avoid repeating. & also, his delivery style? Not one that’s gonna win the masses over. Seriously.

But it’s all interesting, no?

What do you think?

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Where was this guy back in late 2007?

With the strange schedule of the convention - thanks to Hurricane Gustav - I’m not sure this can be described as a keynote speech.

But in many ways it’s the speech that the GOP has been dying to hear since it was clear McCain was the nominee. [Also: note that he never says the words "Barack" or "Obama."]

Face it, the man (McCain) has an absolutely gripping biography. Listen to this whole speech if you are not familiar with McCain’s five years as a POW - it’s powerful stuff. & it leaves little room for doubt that this is a worthy candidate of President of the United States. I would hazard a guess that more people than not realize that McCain’s father was commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific during the Vietnam War, & that McCain himself was seen as a ‘prize.’ I also suspect that many people don’t know that that status was why his captors offered him an early release - an offer that McCain refused to even consider.

But back to Fred.

Michael Crowley of the (liberal) New Republic praises the speech, & its delivery:

“I must say, Fred Thompson gave quite a powerful speech–about as effective a case as you make for John McCain, at least without offending the party base. Thompson was a pitiably bad presidential candidate, of course: bizarrely unable to channel the qualities that make him a good actor into selling himself. But watching him tell John McCain’s story–with skilled solemnity, emphasis, and dramatic pauses–it’s hard to imagine who would have done this better. Perhaps like many actors Thompson is most comfortable in someone else’s skin. I’m not sure which speech in this muddled schedule qualifies as a keynote but Thompson’s has de facto filled that role.

Thompson made a fascinating reference to McCain’s opposition to Reagan’s troop deployment in Lebanon. The last thing you expect to hear at a GOP convention is a Republican bragging on his disagreements with the Gipper. It’s a reminder to Americans that McCain hasn’t always been a reflexive hawk–although it’s certainly been a long time since we saw that side of him.

BUT —

And it was more than a little rich to hear Thompson implicitly trash Obama as a star of the Washington cocktail circuit. Thompson lives in the tony GOP suburban enclave of McLean, Virginia. And Obama has done very little socializing around DC.”

Meanwhile over at the (conservative) National Review Online, Ramesh Ponnuru simply writes

“This Guy should have run for president.”

What do you think?

FURTHER READING: What’s Fred up to these days? He’s created a PAC (Political Action Committee). Read more here.

ALSO: Fred mentioned that Palin was the only candidate - with the possible exception of Theodore Roosevelt - who knows how to field dress a moose. (in fact, one co-worker tells me she switched the channel when she heard him say this). Here are instructions on how to field dress a moose.

First up last night, First Lady Laura Bush introduced her husband & outlined the President’s legacy:

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& then, the man himself spoke - though it was from 1000 miles away at the White House:

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It felt odd. You can certainly tell that Bush is disappointed he was not able to address the crowd that helped send him to the White House twice. Hurricane Gustav certainly did the McCain camp a favor - it kept away one of the biggest criticisms on the other side, that President Bush & John McCain are joined at the hip.

Bush was correct to bring up this, his greatest moment as president, on September 14th, 2001, in New York City. Watch:

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Many are calling him the worst president in history, & in many ways one could describe this president as a failure. I hope to get more into this later, but I consider his biggest mistake to be one that former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan outlined in his book - that the administration never got outside of what McClellan called “the permanent campaign.” Bush governed as if he had a mandate from the country (by a large margin, he didn’t). Nearly every single act as president was designed to please half of the country without being anywhere close to empathetic for the concerns of the other side.

But there are bright spots to the Bush presidency, & Fareed Zakaria of Newsweek magazine spells them out in a recent edition of Newsweek. Before you banish President Bush to the dustbin of history as a failure, read this excellent piece to recognize that things aren’t so much black & white as they are shades of gray.

What do you think?

If nothing else, John McCain successfully kept Barack Obama’s post-convention bounce to a minimum by changing the conversation to “Who is Sarah Palin?”

Read more on the latest Gallup poll here.

UPDATE: Frank Newport of Gallup has more on the “bounce:”

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Above: Roll call from 1948. It was the last year we had a Presidential candidate with a mustache, Thomas Dewey. Truman was widely expected to lose.. but ended up pulling the most stunning upset of the modern presidential era.

Don’t have a clip from the 1952 GOP convention which nominated Ike, but there is this from 1956, for his & Nixon’s re-election:

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The 1960 GOP convention was notable because of the speech given by former President Herbert Hoover (above), for whom this presidential election was his last.

Below: highlights from the rest of the ‘60 convention:

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Another president (this time, a future one) appeared at the 1964 convention, the one that nominated Barry Goldwater. This clip is a long one, but interesting for historical reasons. Reagan had been a Republican for less than a decade at this point in his career.

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Here’s more about Goldwater & the behind-the-scenes stuff from that year.

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There’s so much on the YouTubes on the 1968 Democratic convention; & none I could find on the one that nominated Nixon. Here’s an ad Nixon aired that year:

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Can't find anything from the 1972 GOP convention.

In 1976 the GOP saw one of their most exciting conventions; in fact, this may be the last time a GOP convention had as much anarchy as this. Reagan tried to win the nomination that Ford ultimately got; the two made nice, & Reagan made this impromptu speech from the podium:

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Here’s President Ford’s convention speech:

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Reagan just had to wait 4 years for his turn. Here’s an excerpt of his acceptance speech in 1980:

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Reagan was riding high as a popular incumbent in 1984. Here’s his acceptance speech from Texas that year.

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There were a lot of famous faces that year. See whom you can spot in this clip:

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1988? You can pretty much watch this brief clip to get the gist of what kind of history was made there:

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As we all know, President Bush had to go back on this pledge, & many say that cost him re-election in 1992.

By the way here’s a look at future president George W. Bush at that convention in 1988, being interviewed by Connie Chung about Dan Quayle’s national guard service:

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Here’s a clip featuring photos & audio of George H.W. Bush’s 1992 convention acceptance speech:

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& by the way, it was a shortened convention last night, but here’s Laura Bush & Cindy McCain asking folks for hurricane Gustav donations:

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I hope you enjoyed the GOP convention time-traveling! If you have any impressions or lessons from conventions past that the GOP should learn for this year, please weigh in with a comment!

EARLIER: Time-Traveling to Democratic Conventions Past

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I’m keeping track of Hurricane Gustav on the Storm Track 9 Blog. Are you? Also while you’re there, check out David Glenn’s account of Hurricane Katrina - he was covering it in Mobile when it hit. 

From the AP:

   ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) - Because of Hurricane Gustav, the Republican convention gets under way this afternoon with a more solemn atmosphere.
Cindy McCain is expected to speak, and discuss opportunities to donate money for hurricane relief. Convention parties scheduled throughout the week will also double as hurricane fundraisers.
But today’s seven-hour program has been otherwise cut to roughly three, all of it strictly business and none of it in prime time. Most of the other speeches, including a prime-time address from President Bush, have been canceled.
The party’s chairman says that by law, the convention has to be called to order today. In addition, a quorum of at least half plus one of the 2,400 delegates is needed to conduct business.

I have no problem with the convention being underway this week (I’m sure there are many in the GOP who do, but that’s beside the point).

I do caution against overdoing the rollback, though. I think this once-in-four-years chance to outline your party’s vision for the future in four prime time nights in a row should not be squandered. So while I believe that it’s right to cancel the big parties, the speeches from the podium in St. Paul should continue. 

Rich Lowry of the National Review agrees with me:

It’s certainly not the most important thing about the storm that could wreak havoc on the Gulf Coast, but Gustav is an irresistible metaphor for all that John McCain has to overcome this convention week.

McCain has to transcend:

* A president of his own party who was decisively tuned out by the public after his botched response to Hurricane Katrina.

* His party’s loss of its reputation for competence, shredded by Katrina and mistakes in the Iraq war.

* And the sourness of a public that, partly in light of all of the above, thinks in huge numbers that the country is on the wrong track.

And he has to do it while splitting the screen with a monster hurricane and its aftermath.

…

In pure political terms, Gustav probably freezes the race. With the Palin announcement on Friday, McCain appears to have capped Obama’s bounce. The Democrat had been out to an 8-point lead in the Gallup tracking poll at the end of last week, but was back down to 6 yesterday. Now, unable to attack Obama at all or as harshly as they would’ve otherwise these next two days, Republicans lose the opportunity to drag his lead down further.

There has been talk of McCain giving his acceptance speech somewhere on the Gulf Coast; I think this is a BAD idea. He should not divert police & rescue crews from doing their jobs saving lives in order to carry out political theater.

This week represents a golden opportunity for McCain to do something absolutely essential if he wants to win this election; distance himself from George Bush, specifically in how he responded so poorly to the Katrina disaster.

& don’t get me wrong - there is plenty of blame to go around on all sides. Mayor Ray Nagin & then-Governor Kathleen Blanco also demonstrated failures of leadership during the crisis.

But forget for a moment about whether or not the levees were adequately prepared (or if they are now) - or whether Bush did more for Mississippi because it had Republican leadership, etc.

Ever since it happened Katrina has sent a chill down my spine, & should yours, too, for this reason: like it or not, we have to prepare our cities for a terrorist attack. What you witnessed in August & September of 2005 was a dry run at how the federal government would respond if that ever happens. It does not make me feel at ease.

What do you think?

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Watch above or read the transcript here. I’ll have much more of my thoughts & others’ throughout the day right here, so check back.

Most effective lines:

“let there be no doubt. The Republican nominee, John McCain, has worn the uniform of our country with bravery and distinction, and for that we owe him our gratitude and our respect. And next week, we’ll also hear about those occasions when he’s broken with his party as evidence that he can deliver the change that we need. But the record’s clear: John McCain has voted with George Bush 90 percent of the time. Senator McCain likes to talk about judgment, but, really, what does it say about your judgment when you think George Bush has been right more than 90 percent of the time? I don’t know about you, but I am not ready to take a 10 percent chance on change.”

“..when one of his chief advisers, the man who wrote his economic plan, was talking about the anxieties that Americans are feeling, he said that we were just suffering from a mental recession and that we’ve become, and I quote, “a nation of whiners.” A nation of whiners? Tell that to the proud auto workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing, kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made. Tell that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as they watch their loved ones leave for their third, or fourth, or fifth tour of duty. These are not whiners. They work hard, and they give back, and they keep going without complaint. These are the Americans I know. Now, I don’t believe that Senator McCain doesn’t care what’s going on in the lives of Americans; I just think he doesn’t know….It’s not because John McCain doesn’t care; it’s because John McCain doesn’t get it.”

“I’ll eliminate capital gains taxes for the small businesses and start-ups that will create the high-wage, high-tech jobs of tomorrow.”

“I will cut taxes — cut taxes — for 95 percent of all working families, because, in an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle class.”

“I’ll recruit an army of new teachers, and pay them higher salaries, and give them more support. And in exchange, I’ll ask for higher standards and more accountability.”

[these last three - capital gains taxes & tax cuts & teacher accountability - are major Republican issues. In many ways, Obama went after McCain's strengths last night instead of his weaknesses - something that's been a part of the Republican playbook for at least a decade. The teachers unions probably squirmed a bit at that last line]

“Now, many of these plans will cost money, which is why I’ve laid out how I’ll pay for every dime: by closing corporate loopholes and tax havens that don’t help America grow. But I will also go through the federal budget line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less, because we cannot meet 21st-century challenges with a 20th-century bureaucracy.”

“But we must also admit that programs alone can’t replace parents, that government can’t turn off the television and make a child do her homework, that fathers must take more responsibility to provide love and guidance to their children.”

[again, he's taking what's perceived as a longtime Republican talking points, here - the inefficacy of government, & the perceived "liberal" tenet that government should try to fix everyone's problems. Also, the last line about fathers will likely be one of the most psychoanalyzed parts of the speech by the media]

“If John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament and judgment to serve as the next commander-in-chief, that’s a debate I’m ready to have…. You know, John McCain likes to say that he’ll follow bin Laden to the gates of Hell, but he won’t even follow him to the cave where he lives.”

[eschewing the longtime Democratic presidential candidate practice (see: Kerry, John) of not taking on your opponents' biggest attack line.]

“You don’t defeat — you don’t defeat a terrorist network that operates in 80 countries by occupying Iraq. You don’t protect Israel and deter Iran just by talking tough in Washington. You can’t truly stand up for Georgia when you’ve strained our oldest alliances…. We are the party of Roosevelt. We are the party of Kennedy. So don’t tell me that Democrats won’t defend this country. Don’t tell me that Democrats won’t keep us safe.”

[Once again he's trying to break his party free of the perception fueled in part by the GOP that Democrats are soft on terror. I do take away points here for not mentioning Truman, who arguably kept our country as safe as the other two presidents mentioned.]

“But what I will not do is suggest that the senator takes his positions for political purposes, because one of the things that we have to change in our politics is the idea that people cannot disagree without challenging each other’s character and each other’s patriotism. The times are too serious, the stakes are too high for this same partisan playbook. So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this country, and so do you, and so does John McCain. The men and women who serve in our battlefields may be Democrats and Republicans and independents, but they have fought together, and bled together, and some died together under the same proud flag. They have not served a red America or a blue America; they have served the United States of America. So I’ve got news for you, John McCain: We all put our country first.”

[More than any other part of the speech, it's this quote above that I hope you take to heart. I am sick & tired of people who think one party is more patriotic than the other. We can disagree without being disagreeable.]

“I get it. I realize that I am not the likeliest candidate for this office. I don’t fit the typical pedigree, and I haven’t spent my career in the halls of Washington.

But I stand before you tonight because all across America something is stirring. What the naysayers don’t understand is that this election has never been about me; it’s about you.”

[Once again, confronting head-on the biggest issue in voters' minds - whether he's ready to be president. Regardless of which party you belong (or don't belong) to, you have to acknowledge that this takes guts.]

So all in all, the speech was a success in my mind. He made some good points, effective ones that we’re not used to seeing in a Democratic nominee for president.

But as you can see above, this speech didn’t happen in a vacuum. While he was effective in his rhetoric, the underlying “elephant” in the room, one whose effect remains to be seen, is the fact that here is a man with a huge crowd cheering him on. Will that play well or for ill with middle heartland America? I’m not so sure. Phil Bredesen warned that “he needs to talk to people he hasn’t convinced yet.” We will see in the coming days whether or not middle America will be able to filter his message through the noise of the pomp & ceremony of this huge rally.

What’s your take? Post a comment right now!

(from Craigslist)

(photo from Yahoo news)

From Randy Neal (who’s in Denver) of the KnoxViews blog:

“In case you missed the photo above, the final Tennessee tally was Obama 51 v. Clinton 32. If I’m not mistaken, this means two delegates did not vote. Also if I’m not mistaken, Clinton came out of the primary with 40 pledged district delegates. This means only eight delegates changed their vote.

Every Clinton delegate I spoke to said they would vote for Clinton because that’s what voters in their district elected them to do, but they would support Obama in the general election.”

Two delegates did not vote? You spent a lot of money going all the way to Denver to represent your district & you end up sitting on your hands?? Hard to conceive. I’m sure there were reasons, but..

UPDATE: More from the Nashville City Paper:

“A breakfast for the Tennessee delegation to the Democratic National Convention had its own moment of angst over delegate loyalties Wednesday.

Just after a delegation breakfast, Tennessee’s Hillary delegates convened to discuss their options for the roll call vote. That is when things got heated.

Tennessee Hillary delegate whip Betsy Reid said that Clinton was going to speak to her delegates about how they should vote during the roll call.

Reid then said that, after hearing Clinton’s speech last night, she would be voting for Barack Obama. As soon as she finished that sentence, there were calls from other Hillary Tennessee delegates for her to immediately resign as a whip.

Reid said she would not do so, which was countered by various delegates saying they would not forget her switching her vote after all the promises made during the primary season.

Former State Rep. Bill Owen, also a Hillary whip, jumped to the podium and said that each person should vote their conscience and that he was still going to vote for Hillary. Interestingly, Owen said the day after the last primary in June at a gathering of Democrats at Swett’s Restaurant that he and all the Clinton supporters would be throwing all their weight behind Obama.

As he was speaking, one unidentified delegate rose and interrupted Owen to say that they were all Democrats, that they all need to support the Democratic ticket, and that they need to be united.

“This is an open meeting and it’s being recorded,” the delegate added, a reference to the presence of press in the room. “

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Great dramatic moment of the convention here. Hillary makes Obama’s nomination official.

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Like his wife Tuesday night, Bill Clinton gave one of the best speeches of his political career, & said the 7 words Hillary apparently couldn’t bring herself to say:  “Barack Obama is ready to be President.”

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John Kerry gave a pretty good speech, too - settling some old scores & having some fun with the phrase that got him into trouble “I was for it before I was against it.” He also paid tribute to Barack Obama’s uncle, who helped liberate the camps at Buchenwald in World War II, who was sitting next to Michelle in the audience.

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There was  a very stirring tribute to the nation’s veterans - both from Iraq/Afghanistan & previous wars - directed by Steven Spielberg & featuring Tom Hanks (it begins at about 1:26 in this clip). Very moving tribute to our fighting men & women.

& then came Joe Biden’s turn to introduce himself to America. His son Beau, Delaware’s Attorney General who’s about to ship out to Iraq. His introduction was quite emotional:

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& then Biden took the stage.

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He was effective, though at times he made a few prompter flubs - saying “150″ instead of “150,000,” saying “McCain wants to give $100 million in taxes to corporations” instead of “tax cuts.” This “prompter problem” will be something to watch over the next 68 days.. but let me say, without naming names, that as a tv newscast producer these happen quite more often than you might think.

One of the highlights of the speech was when he paid tribute to his mother, who was in the crowd. I felt the speech kind of ended rather abruptly. I also thought it was kind of awkward near the end of this clip when Obama took the stage — this is supposed to be Joe’s night!

All in all, by far the best night of the convention for the Democrats thus far. On to Invesco field.

What do you think?

PBS.

Reasons:

1. ABC, the network for whom I work, only goes on for an hour, at 10pm. No way I could do this blog just watching that. PBS goes from 7pm - 11pm-ish.

2. No commercials.

3. No busy crawls at the bottom.

4. Love the main panel of Jim Lehrer, Mark Shields & David Brooks.

5. Love Gwen Ifill & Judy Woodruff.

6. Love the presidential panel which includes Michael Beschloss & Richard North Smith.

7. The speeches, while not comprehensive, are generally unfiltered.

8. No (covert) agendas either for or against the party having the convention.

9. The coverage is low key, not hyperactive.

10. Nothing like this ever happens:

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