I'm still trying to wrap my head around the cross-dressing pro-choice former mayor of New York City railing against "cosmopolitans," millionaire Harvard alum Mittens Romney railing against "northeastern elites" and Sarah Palin, former mayor of Wasilla, jibing Obama for "inexperience" so I'm gonna let some others take the floor.
Steve Benen, on the surreal unreality of the RNC:
At one point last night, Romney argued, "We need change all right -- change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington!" It was a fairly common sentiment. I have this nagging urge to put a post-it note on the convention podium that reads, "Psst, Republicans, you've controlled the White House for eight years, and Congress for six of the last eight years. You've humiliated yourselves and discredited the conservative governing philosophy forever. Love, Steve."
Matthew Yglesias, on Palin's abject dishonesty:
I understand that Sarah Palin's fans find her critics loathesome and our motives dubious, but I wonder how they feel about the fact that her two national appearances have been so packed full of lies. To site the most obvious example, the story she's now told in both of her appearances before national audiences about how “I told the Congress ‘thanks, but no thanks,' for that Bridge to Nowhere” is an enormously appealing story. But to me, the appeal wore off when I learned it wasn't true.
Josh Marshall, on Republicans' Orwellian message of "reform":
Starting tomorrow, the Democrats can and must come back hard on this issue of "reform". McCain/Palin reform is just ... well, there's nothing. It's an overused phrase but it is all rhetoric. Not only has their party been in power for 8 years. But every policy pushed by John McCain is the one embraced by George Bush. Economic policy, tax policy, Iraq policy, social issues, Bush style politicking, everything. I'm not sure how many people agree with me. But I think the rhetorical 'reform' of McCain/Palin is like a big, imposing and very brittle vase. A few good hits and it'll break apart in a thousand pieces.
Andrew Sullivan, on Rudy Giuliani's "small town values":
The one moment that stays with me tonight, oddly enough, was not Palin's speech. It was a line from Giuliani, a New York mayor with a young second third wife and gay friends, mocking a "cosmopolitan" who was brought up by a single mother. It was that Barack Obama's rise could "only happen in America." And it was designed to mock him, the first African-American candidate for the presidency of the United States.
Jesse Taylor, on the camerawork:
“How DARE they make this election about her children and use them for political gain? Cut to them right now, people! Right now!”
Well, who doesn't have fond memories of getting their head licked?
Ezra Klein, on the convention in general:
Nowhere did we hear of the great things John McCain would do, Instead, we heard, over and over, of the agonies John McCain endured. The presidency was presented tonight as if it were the Medal of Honor, or a purple heart. As if it is only a quirk of our political process that stops us from simply finding the longest serving prisoner of war and gifting him the keys to the office. On a rhetorical level, it was effective, if only because McCain's story is so powerful. But it is not, fundamentally, a sustainable approach to this campaign. If McCain is more appealing for what he did than what he will do, he will lose the election. It is, after all, only during the convention that you get to tell your story. Throughout the rest of the campaign, you have to argue with your opponent. And tonight, Palin added very little to that argument.
John McCain was a POW?
--A. Serwer
