Watching the events in Cleveland this week at the Republican National Convention you realize there are two stories unfolding. The first is in the convention hall itself where the strangest and most frightening political event of all is unravelling. While outside the convention, three trigger-happy armies parade and there is a danger of collision.
But for those who love politics, the scene inside the convention centre is more frightening. We expect at any time for the ghost of the late Ethel Merman to come to the podium and belt out her classic There’s No Business Like Show Business. It should be obvious to all that this is not your usual political convention. Only the pathetic balloons in the rafters of the hall carry any political history.
But why is Trump trying so hard to be something he is not? At this point he is proving that he is no impresario. His production is dragging. He has no stars. The audience is only responding to Trump—and not all in a positive way. He cannot even get actor-director Clint Eastwood to come back to talk to an empty chair as he did in the last gathering of the Grand Old Party. And Trump’s wife cannot even read a plagiarized speech.
The convention is designed to confirm and launch the party’s candidate into the race for the presidency. It is supposed to include party business, the basics of the party’s campaign platform, the socializing of delegates from all the states and territories. The convention is supposed to be vibrant, entertaining, well planned and smooth running.
And what is happening is enough to make you wonder how the hell this party ever produced any presidents?
Political events such as this convention are best built around a theme, an idea that you want every delegate to take back home to their state and build into a strong campaign for every level of the party.
The convention is supposed to be unifying. Instead we are getting a paranoid Trump against the whole damn world. There is a visceral hatred being promoted for Trump’s Democratic opponent. There could be more than 50 million television viewers watching Trump speak on Thursday night. Not all of those people will be cheering.
In our book My American Mother, there is a scene set at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1932 that explains how FDR’s acceptance speech was used to announce the New Deal and how that speech was likely to have been crafted by Roosevelt’s team.
Mr. Trump has no such team and no idea of what he needs to say.
It will be interesting.
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Copyright 2016 © Peter Lowry
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