This is a huge event for the Republican Party. It’s huge for the news media. And, it is a really huge event for the city of Tampa, which has been preparing for the RNC for many months.
There are some billboards up to welcome the RNC to the area, and to remind everyone that Tampa has a Democratic mayor and City Council. Still, Tampa hotels and restaurants — even those who are owned and run by Democrats — are happy for the extra business that the RNC means to the area.
Tropical Storm Isaac delayed the start of the convention by a day, but, trust me, they’ve got plenty of time to do what they set out to do.
For instance, just hours ago, Mitt Romney was officially named Republican Candidate for the 2012 election. No surprise there.
Support for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan is not unanimous. I was a little surprised at how many convention attendees and convention protestors are still voicing preference for Ron Paul, the only former Republican candidate for nomination not to endorse Romney. They still want Ron Paul and will not settle for Rom-Paul, as the currently nominated team might be called.
Most of the convention attendees will do their best to show their support for Romney and Ryan. They will try to put on an enthusiastic face and a positive smile to help their candidate and their party win.
How sincere is this shining enthusiasm? I think — not so much.
For one thing, Romney has not shown the charisma or the sparkle or the friendliness that past Republican candidates have displayed. He has tried to become one of the guys, but it is very difficult to appear an everyman when you own multiple residences, bank accounts in the Cayman Islands and Switzerland, and when your wife owns a horse that danced in the Olympics.
Romney has shown no solid budget plan, but his running-mate has, and the Ryan budget is a ruinous threat on the political horizon. It would raise taxes on the middle-class, lower taxes for the wealthy, and not bring in a balanced budget until sometime around 2040. It would increase military spending, in spite of the fact that the United States currently spends more than the next five largest-spending nations combined. It would shred the social safety net and cut education. In short, the closest thing we have to a plan for Romney-Ryan is not something in the best interest of the vast majority of Americans. Nevertheless, they will try to sell their plan to that vast majority — or at least enough of it to put them over the top.
And they might succeed. They might pull it off.
Here in Florida, a large percentage of our television advertising has been paid political ads. I imagine it is the same in many other states, but this is definitely true of the battle-ground or swing states. The ads are frequent, nasty, and repeated often. Sometimes they are full of out-right lies, but Karl Rove and company have learned that, if you repeat a lie often enough, people will start to believe it.
The money for the attack ads is almost limitless since the Citizens United Supreme Court Decision of last year. The Koch brothers have a lot to gain with a Republican victory and they will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to increase the odds of that victory.
Should Republicans be worried about having such a lackluster candidate?
I think they should be. I base this on the experience of the Democratic candidates of years past.
I would argue that Walter Mondale had a better plan for America than did Ronald Reagan in 1984 and that Michael Dukakis was more qualified to be president in 1988 than George H. W. Bush. You might disagree with one or both of these statements, or you just might not care. My point is that the Democrats lost because their candidates lacked the charisma to beat their opponents.
Almost everyone in the Tampa Convention Center tonight is pretending that Romney is their candidate of choice, that he is the one to go into the fray and beat President Obama in November.
I am not saying that we should vote for Obama because he is the candidate we would most like to have a beer with. Some pundits insist that George W. Bush beat Al Gore because of this gut-level likability. That is setting the bar for the most important job in the nation much too low. However, a candidate for President of the Unites States should at least come across as someone who cares about people — both in the aggregate and as individuals, not as a last-resort who was hastily assembled in a back room a few minutes before being switched on to make a speech.
Romney does not seem comfortable in front of a bunch of commoners. Oh, he tries very hard to come across as a regular guy, a working man, just like you and me. But, he is not very good at pulling off the deception.
Obama has had some great successes as president, and could have done so much more, had the Republicans not make it their mission to make him fail at all costs. He speaks well, speaks to Americans as the intelligent people he believes us to be, and has nothing to hide.
Romney has had more flip-flops than the shoe department at Wal-Mart. He doesn’t seem comfortable in his own skin, let along in from of the average people of the nation. He refuses to reveal his tax returns beyond those for the last couple of years. Even his own father went on the record as saying that the revelation of past tax returns are a must for a presidential candidate.
And, you can bet there are other things he’ll refuse to talk about too, as the campaign heats up.
I, for one, am looking forward to the debates.
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