Salon.com > Republican convention

Will Obama get a real bounce?

Fri, 07 Sep 2012 11:45:00 +0000

With apologies to Joe Biden, the next few days could literally determine whether political conventions as we’ve come to know them will endure through the next presidential election cycle.

The old purpose of conventions – to choose a candidate by bringing together delegates loyal to local, state and regional power brokers in a days-long process that often required multiple ballots to settle – gave way to modern, tightly scripted infomercial model a generation or two ago. The lack of suspense led broadcast networks to scale back their coverage, but the conventions continued to serve a valuable purpose for the parties, often producing significant polling bumps.

But in this same time, the parties have also sorted themselves out ideologically, creating more partisan polarization and fewer voters who might actually be swayed by what they see and hear during a convention. Mitt Romney’s failure to generate anything more than a very modest – at best – polling bounce from the GOP’s Tampa festivities last week spoke to the possibility that the electorate is now so thoroughly polarized that there’s nothing left for either party to gain from these quadrennial gatherings. It also fed talk that the conventions might be severely trimmed or otherwise overhauled starting in 2016.

Worst jokes from the RNC

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 14:46:00 +0000

Not really a spoiler alert: Some of the zingers within refer to how much golf Obama plays:

Paul Ryan: The definitive fact-check

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 14:22:00 +0000

Paul Ryan delivered a blistering assessment of President Obama aided by a casual disregard for facts. Many, including Salon’s Joan Walsh and Steve Kornacki, have already pointed out the speech’s mendacity, but here is a comprehensive guide of every single lie, misrepresentation or omission from the speech, in the order they were delivered:

GM plant -- Ryan: blamed Obama for the closing of GM plant in his hometown of Janesville, Wis. Truth: One of the biggest whoppers of the night; the plant closed before Obama was even sworn into office. His position also contradicts the Republicans’ position of opposing President Obama’s auto rescue.

Clint Eastwood steals the RNC

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 05:23:00 +0000

When it leaked earlier today that Clint Eastwood would be the “surprise” guest at the Republican National Convention, it seemed predictable that a bunch of white people in patriotic hats would shortly be chanting “Make my day” on national television. This cacophonous “Make my day” did, in fact, come to pass, but only after the 82-year-old Eastwood babbled, went blue and inadvertently insulted Mitt Romney, the guy he was allegedly there to support, all while speaking to an empty chair occupied by an imaginary Obama. Look, it is not every night that a national political convention transforms itself into a surrealist farce after being hijacked by a madcap octogenarian, but tonight it happened, and we have Clint Eastwood to thank for that. Once an entertainer, always an entertainer, right?

The theatrics of Ann Romney

Wed, 29 Aug 2012 12:57:00 +0000

The Republican National Convention is a strange piece of theater, a grand production meant to rally the base and simultaneously entice the undecided, to entertain all those frenzied delegates experimenting with silly hats in an enormous, ungainly arena and those watching from home, in close-up. The RNC made plain just how difficult pleasing these two groups can be during Chris Christie’s speech, as it let the background behind him hazily, lazily swirl about like some vertigo-inducing screen saver, just to ply the in-house crowd with something to look at, other than Chris Christie and his magenta tie. But when it came to playing to both crowds, Ann Romney made it look easy, catering to the room as well as the camera like a charismatic pro. She may never be first lady, but if she wants a career as a talk show host, she’s sure got her cadences down.

Tampa: America’s hottest mess

Sat, 18 Aug 2012 16:00:00 +0000

Poke around the White House website and you can still find the hopeful "fact sheet" for a 324-mile high-speed rail line linking Miami, Orlando and Tampa.

No such system exists, of course -- it was killed by Florida Gov. Rick Scott. Today, there's a 40-acre vacant lot where the Tampa terminal would have stood. And when Republicans arrive for their national convention in about a week and catch a glimpse of it, they'll likely see a big win. In fact, the GOP will find a lot of things in Tampa that exemplify their commitment to not investing in the future.

"The trend [in Tampa] today is to say, 'We don't need it -- no new taxes -- we are not going to invest anymore,'" former Pinellas County Commissioner Ronnie Duncan recently told Tampa Bay Online. "And that message resonates from not only the constituents, but the leadership of the Republican Party." You could fairly call the GOP vision for the country the Tampafication of America.