The Republican convention

Let's see now.

1.  Tropical storm Isaac cancelled out the first day, leaving The Donald and others on the cutting room floor.

2.  According to some, Ann Romney rocked the hall with her 'humanizing Mitt' speech.  But a (liberal) friend of mine said it was embarrassingly superficial, that she came across looking like a silly school girl.  So take your pick.

3.  Chris Christie, the designated keynote speaker, reportedly said "I" 37 times and "Romney" barely 6 times.   Consensus seems to be he came across as a self-promoting braggard, probably an embarrassment for the Republicans.

4.  Ryan's big moment has been marred by the widespread criticism of his "lies and distortions," enumerated by the Fox News columnist Sally Kohn, among others, and excerpted in my previous post.

5.  And tonight, the big buildup over the "mystery speaker" turned out to be a coup best not couped.   They had snagged Clint Eastwood to give a bit of excitement to the crowd.  Instead, it was a cringe-inducing bad choice.   He went off script, rambled, had a mock conversation with Barack Obama (aka an empty chair), and made a couple of big gaffes (criticized Obama for the plan to draw down troops in Afghanistan, a timetable endorsed by Romney;  and said he thought it wasn't a good idea for lawyers to be president (supposedly meaning Obama) -- but Romney is a lawyer himself -- a Harvard Law School grad, just like Obama.

Rachel Carson said, live on TV, "that was the wierdest thing I have seen at a political convention in my entire life."

And an Obama campaign spokesman tweeted:  "Referring all questions on this to Salvadore Dali."

Well, I didn't watch any of this.   And I am not watching Romney's speech, which is going on as I write this.   Just didn't have the stomach to watch thousands of people eating up all this blather and distortion, not to mention the outright lies.

Ralph

PS:  Just read this dog-whistle from The Speech.   At least the way it was quoted in the internet, Romney said "I wish President Obama had succeeded because I want American to succeed."   Then later, and I'm not sure how much gap there was in between, but he then said:

"When the world needs someone to do the really big stuff, you need an American."

Is that a coded, covert way of saying Obama is not an American?

Of course not, they will say.   But we all know there are ways of saying things directly, and there are ways of saying things that the listener will hear, even if you didn't actually say them.  This is one of those.  That's why we call it a dog whistle -- too high pitched to make a sound, but loud and clear to those whose ears are attuned.