Republican National Convention: Gov. Palin Delivers to Base

Tonight’s line up of guests was an attack dog spectacle that pandered to and for the Republican base but not much of anybody else. Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee delivered although Mitt Romney faltered in believability. Once again the night centered on John McCain’s record of service with pointed jabs at Sen. Obama and the fact that he has completely surrendered to the Republican base. Gov. Palin arrived to thunderous applause and added her own two cents; long on the same rhetoric but short on her own introduction. Unfortunately, Rudy Giuliani spoke excessively long causing the RNC to nix the Sarah Palin biographic video, which I was really interested in seeing, and caused her speech to run past prime time. Maybe they will show it tomorrow.

It was strange to watch a set of people reach back to Ronald Reagan, bypassing both Presidents Bush entirely and completely, and with straight or actually condescending faces act like none of the problems that they were denouncing was caused by their very own party. No matter how much we all want to dismiss it; we have had a Republican President for the past 8 years with a Republican Congress for all but 2 of those years. Blaming big government; largely expanded by President Bush, blaming the democrats for wanting to quit the Iraq War; a War that Bush started and blaming Obama and the democrats/liberals for all the current ills as if the Republican’s had nothing to do with it. It felt very odd and cold to us watching from home but played very well inside the stadium.

The speakers simply did not reach out to any other folk other than to pretend that the last 8 years didn’t happen and that a decorated hero of a 40 yr old war who has spent the last 26 years in the Senate was the best bet for America going forward; that the party that has created this current mess and given us a President with the lowest approval rating, who they now take great pains to distance themselves from, is the choice to get us out of it because they will bring us back to a conservative 1950s America with a twist; an ambitious woman will be Vice President. Yet we Americans also fear the Democratic alternative. We can choose more of an even frightening version of the same or take a leap of faith; in truth it can't be any worse than the last 8 years.