1. Peggy Noonan clarifies her "It's over" off-mic commentary. She says the "it's over" didn't refer to the McCain campaign, and so on and so forth. Having listened to the audio, this is plausible, given the mumbling.
2. Mitt Romney's speech was horrible. Wait, I can't say that for sure, because I turned it off after a few minutes. The very rich former governor of Massachusetts began by attacking East Coast elites. It went downhill from there.
3. Mike Huckabee's speech was pretty mediocre too (and not carried by Fox, oddly enough). Huck was my candidate, you'll remember, but I have no idea what that lengthy school desk story was about, and the whole thing kind of rambled. He did get in one great line, though:
"I'm not a Republican because I'm rich. I'm a Republican because I didn't want to spend my life poor waiting for the government to rescue me."
4. Well, he also had a great line about Sarah Palin getting more votes as mayor of Wasilla than Joe Biden did running for president this year.
5. Rudy Giuliani is speaking now, and it's a ho-hum speech as well. Good grief, this is the Mayor of 9/11, and he sounds like a carnival barker and, well, a self-satisfied jerk. What an unappealing man he is tonight. McCain's whole set up is that he's got the heroic character to lead this nation at a perilous time in its history. And here's Giuliani out here sounding like a cheap warm-up act. Boy, are we lucky this isn't his nominating convention.
6. UPDATE.1 OK, Rudy's gotten much better, in a red meat kind of way. He's getting super-snarky with Obama for making fun of Palin's experience as mayor of a small town. It was a delightful bit of demagoguery, with Rudy sneering, "Maybe they're not" -- pregnant pause -- "cosmopolitan enough.
"I'm sorry Obama," Rudy said. "Maybe they cling to religion there." Ooooh! You'll remember these remarks Obama made earlier this year in San Francisco, about small-town and rural conservatives:
And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
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sigaliris: I second, third, fourth, and fifth you!
I watched Tuesday and last night. The sea of white faces made me feel like I was in a time warp. BTW, this Republican National Convention has the fewest African-American delegates in 40 years (only 36 out of 2,380) per today's Washington Post. That's pathetic. The article also said the McCain Campaign has virtually written off attracting the African-American vote in this election.
Rudy Giuliani seemed to be in his element, mocking Barack Obama last night. It's easy to mock the "community organizer" thing - it sounds so 60's and grassroots and small time. But, the truth is, there is a thinness to some portions of Obama's resume that makes me believe that the mockery by Giuliani and Palin may hurt Obama.
If I were Obama, I would not be afraid of learning from Giuliani's and Palin's attacks, and not be afraid of talking more about the areas of his resume where he appears to be most lacking.
I actually liked portions of Giuliani's speech, but when he promised that John McCain would be able to protect us in any natural- or man-made disaster, I laughed out loud. That's a promise that is impossible to keep, since no one can forsee what will happen. Compared to that, promising to end our dependence on foreign oil in 10 years, as Obama did, is a very realistic goal.
Rod,
Your comments were spot-on especially re: Romney and Huckabee, neither of whom had their best night. The Hawaiian Governor (Linda Lingle) was a pleasant surprise as was GOPAC chair (and former MD Lt. Gov) Michael Steele, who got the crowd going.
However, you were way off on your assessment of Rudy, who spoke the way "urban folk" understand. Folks in places like NY and NJ and Cleveland and Detroit, etc. can especially appreciate his "in your face" style and his humorous command of mocking gestures. When he described Obama's administrative/executive experience as "zero, nothing, na-da" that last word ("na-da") certainly was the tip-off that this guy knows his way around Brooklyn. All the folks out there who watch "The Sopranos" and have seen "The Godfather" films (for the 20th time) and who heard Rudy last night definitely "got it."
The GOP were smart to schedule (during the "free" one-hour network slot) the "big-city Catholic" (Guiliani) to set up and precede the "small-town evangelical" (Palin).
BTW, sigalis wrote: "I think when you're the ex-mayor of New York, you probably would do well to avoid the phrase 'machine politics.' "
Sigaliris, guess you don't know much about NYC politics but we're not Chicago and, besides, Giuliani ran and governed as an outsider here and fought all the rackets here -- whether the racket was the mob or the teachers union.
I believe Peggy's explanation because I know her. But frankly I doubt that others who lack that advantage will react similarly. This will damage her severely and for a very long time. Damn. She has so much to offer, and now millions won't listen. I'm sick at heart.
By the way, the words "cling" and "bitter"--used by Obama--are directly taken from Alinsky's text "Rules for Radicals" when Alinsky describes the middle class...
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