McCain Arrives

He may very well have been on the premises before I was! I have taken to walking over to the Xcel Center as opposed to taking the shuttles that are provided for the delegations. It takes a little longer, but it allows me to pass through downtown. It is really impressive to see the security. I'll try to put together a post pulling together some loose ends that haven't been addressed.

McCain's speech was sincere. It was natural. It wasn't flashy. It was him.

The speech was interrupted several times in the very beginning. They were presumed to be Ron Paul supporters. It is unclear, other than disruption, what there motivation was. The strategy to deal with disruptions was discussed at one of the delegation breakfasts earlier in the week. The response would be to stand up and start chanting "U-S-A." The idea is that standing up would visually make it difficult for cameras to identify the protester. The chant would be to drown out their message.

The interruptions and the chants speckled the beginning of the speech.

The crowd was alive and obviously excited to finally see the candidate for whom they'd been cheering all week.

After the speeches there is the traditional confetti and balloon drop. It sounds cheesy, but when the electricity is added to the mix it is a real special experience.

If the opportunity ever arises to go to a convention, whether Republican or Democrat, I do recommend you take advantage of it.

Running Late...

I am running late to get over to the Xcel Center. Tonight may very well be the most exciting night of the convention. I just looked down the list of speakers for the evening. Governor Tim Pawlenty from Minnesota, Senator Sam Brownback (KS), Senator Lindsay Graham (SC), Joe Gibbs of Redskins fame, and of course the nominee himself, Senator John McCain.

There is quite a buzz about town and security has been beefed up more than what has passed as normal this week.

One word of advice, watch tonight on C-SPAN and see what you think without a talking head/pundit spewing their opinions quickly after the speech ends so that you can develop your own opinion.

Palin Turns on the Northern Lights

The crowd in the convention hall has been hungry for close to a week to see the newest star of the party, Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska. While the cheers for Senator John McCain have been loud, those for Governor Palin have been downright boisterous.

It seems like the more the media has tried to lampoon her nomination this week, the more the crowd has stridently made known that they absolutely love her. There is a palpable feeling that every attack on her is an attack on one of us, because her profile matches up very well with most Americans.

What I liked about her speech was her ability to speak directly to the viewers at home while marinating electricity within the convention hall. She had the ability to be humorous as evidenced by the delivery of some of her jokes. She had the ability to slice without being caustic. She showed the independence known to be characteristic among westerners. She was endearing. She was able to let people know that she was tough and showed the kind of personality that is needed to make a difference.

The interesting thing to note is that this week the media has portrayed her as being in way over her head and not ready for the task. They spent the last five days doing everything to make her selection look like an absolute mistake. This seems to have backfired though. As this attention only stirred curiosity in this candidate, and convinced them to tune in on Wednesday night and see this train wreck of a VP pick.

What the folks saw at home was something remarkably different. By not just surpassing the low expectations that had been set by the media, but by blowing them completely out of the water, she has cemented herself as a major asset for John McCain and the Democrats worst Nightmare personified: A strong, independent, humorous woman, who isn't shrill, who is grave enough to dispel any fear that she isn't up to the task of serving as Vice-President.

The cheering was wild, and it may sound funny, but I believe it could be louder.

In order to keep the evenings at the convention running smoothly, there are handlers within the crowd that try and control the length of applause. The try and curtail it so that that the evening runs on time, and so that speeches aren't interrupted, so much as to lose the almighty 10pm-11pm EST time slot.

I believe that Palin's speech would have gone much longer had it not been for the handlers.

There Are Malls and Then There Are Malls

The delegation was scheduled to go to view an authentic American Indian Pow-Wow this afternoon. However, there's not much time left in this trip to Minnesota. I can't return home without going to The Mall of America. It is not because I want to go shopping. It's more not to have to say "no" every time I am asked, "Hey, so you were in Minneapolis-St. Paul, did you go to The Mall of America?"

The place is huge.

Some quick facts.

1. It has over 4 million square feet of space with a Phase 2 project that will more than double the size of the mall to over 10 million square feet.
   
2. There is no heating system beyond the use of lighting and the body temperature of the mass of people in the mall on a daily basis.
3. The mall is built on the site of the former Metropolitan Stadium where the Twins played before the construction of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome. The location of where homeplate was is commemorated by plaque.
4. A little over 60% of the refuse is recycled.
   
5. The vegetable oil from the fryers of the restaurants within the mall is processed into biodiesel to power the malls fleet.
6. Leftover food is separated from the trash by a staff of over 10 people and then is pasteurized and sold to a local hog farmer.
7. The mall welcomes 40 million visitors a year and after the expansion the number will jump to about 60 million.
8. The average expenditure by a local is $150 and by a tourist, $350 a visit.

This is only what I can remember from what one of the mall's representatives told both Mike Pappas and myself. It's an amazing facility, and was full of people at 1pm on a Thursday in September.

When Don Murphy Says Wake Up, Wake Up

The hours of the convention days are long early morning breakfasts kick off a full day that doesn't end until a few hours after the gavel falls in the convention hall. This morning is a bit different. Last night ended and I went to bed shortly after 2am, but I had to wake up by 4:30 am. I am not typically an early riser, so 4;30 am comes rather quickly.

Why would someone do this to themselves? It's because when former Maryland State Delegate and Chairman of the Maryland Delegation to the Republican National Convention says it may be a good idea to so, it probably is. Murphy's idea was to walk a few blocks from the hotel to Key's Cafe, from which MSNBC's "Morning Joe" show with Joe Scarborough would be broadcasting. The whole idea was to watch it and have breakfast while doing so. The problem is that the show comes on at 6 am EST, and since that is 5 am CST, I had to wake up at 4:30.

The only problem with this was that when we got there at 5am, the door was still locked. A staffer let us in and we proceeded to sit down at the table closest to the door. Dave Lissing of Hedgehogreport.com was also with us. The whole idea to get there so early was predicated on the notion that there would be a line at the door and that it would be the only way we'd have a chance to sit down. Needless to say, beyond the show's staff there was nobody else in the cafe other than the restaurant workers and ourselves.

By 6am this had changed. By this time Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty (R) had come in. Pawlenty, who until the announcement of Sarah Palin, was considered to have the inside edge in the Veep sweepstakes came in and we were still pretty much alone within the cafe. Murphy recognized himself immediately, and both Lissing and I quickly followed. The governor was quite agreeable. Since we did not have a confirmed speaker this morning, Murphy quickly asked the governor if he'd be free to come over and speak to the Maryland delegation around 8:45am.

Murphy and Pawlenty's advanceman talked over the details and we got a pretty firm commitment that the governor would be there for breakfast. Murphy potentially had pulled a rabbit out of a hat. Two hours later, it became reality as Pawlenty grabbed the mic at our breakfast.

After Pawlenty, people began to filter in and out: Rudy Giuliani, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson (TX-R,) Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan. I managed to get a picture with all three.

Murphy tried his magic with Hutchingson too. She may be eating breakfast with us tomorrow!

Thompson Feeds the Base the Red Meat

Finally, the concern over Hurricane Gustav has passed, and now the convention can actually go back to being a convention. The schedules have all been jockeyed and speakers that were supposed to present on Monday night have been shifted to other slots throughout the week.

The sacred hour for both conventions is 10pm-11pm EST. There was a time where the networks would cover the conventions for more than just one hour a night, but with the explosion of other media outlets like FOXNEWS and CNN covering the conventions, and even C-SPAN providing unfiltered coverage gavel to gavel, there is no need for the major networks to hand over more than that one hour of prime time.

The conventions then save their major star power for that one hour. Tonight's speakers were Fred Thompson and Joe Lieberman, in that order.

Thompson came out with the speech that the convention hall had been waiting two days to hear. He came out with red meat under both arms for the delegations to feast on and that's exactly what they did. He spoke about Governor Sarah Palin, taxes, life among other subjects.

The commentary on the taxation of businesses was probably the most cleverly articulated lines I have yet heard. To paraphrase, taxes on businesses won't hurt you as long as you don't buy anything from a business, sell anything to a business, are employed by a business or employ others through your own business. If you don't fit into any of these categories, taxes on businesses do not affect you.

The crowd ate this up.

Without mentioning Barack Obama once, he clearly outlined the strengths of John McCain and in doing so effectively contrasted the two.

It was a different Fred Thompson than the one I saw last summer, when he hemmed and hawed his way from being the presidential front runner and perceived savior of the party to dropping out of the race after a early primary defeats in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. His aimless fall doomed his campaign, but tonight he was resolute.

His speech also gave the prime-time audience a real understanding of John McCain. He gave viewers at home a biography of a man who really has life experience. I have to admit, while I am familiar with a good number of the anecdotes relating to McCain, I hadn't heard until tonight some of the most impressive ones. I knew he had resisted the beatings of the Viet Cong but for five and half years. This takes an amazing amount of will.

When Thompson declared, "It's pretty clear there are two questions we will never have to ask ourselves, 'Who is this man?' and 'Can we trust this man with the Presidency?,'" it was clear exactly how the McCain campaign would continue this them throughout the convention and into the fall.

Lieberman finished with a call for independents and Democrats to think beyond party and consider which course is better for the country. He said that after asking himself this very question, it was clear his allegiance was to John McCain. The arrangement of the two speeches seems to have gotten some flack. The stronger presentation from Thompson would have been the better to close the evening.

I disagree. You can't have a partisan speech like that come after a request by Lieberman to cross party lines.

Before the two prime-time speeches, there were a series of people from different times in the lives of both John and Cindy McCain. They each told the delegations how the pair and dramatically impacted their lives, from former POW's who served with McCain, to a father and his daughter from Bangladesh, whom he adopted through Cindy McCain.

These testimonies added an overall depth to the evening.

The Importance of Being as Close to the Convention Hall as Possible

The importance of being close to the convention hall is that the surrogates from the campaign are more likely to present to multiple delegations and to do so they must be close together. We are close to the Xcel Center because our Republican National Committeeman Louis Pope was chairman of the Hospitality Committee for the convenitnon. This committee assigns the delegations to the various hotels. Delegations of lesser standing can be sent as far as 30 miles away. Maryland's is right here in St. Paul while most others are about 15 miles away in Minneapolis.

Our mornings start pretty much the same way every day. Breakfast is served between about 7am and 9am. By about 8:30, there is typically a speaker. The best speakers are usually reserved for the delegations from key swing states. This historically has left Maryland out in the cold. Today was a different story all together.

This morning's collection of presenters was pretty impressive. Former Secretaty of Health and Human Services and Former Governor of Wisconsin Tommy Thompson, Arizona's junior senator, John Kyl, Former Iraqi Freedom POW, Ron Young, Doug McCain who is John McCain's son, and Everett Alvarez. Alvarez was one of the longest imprisoned POW's in the history of the United States.

What an impressive group of speakers!

The Decadence of Fried Cheese Curds

With no plans last night, a few of us from the Maryland Delegation headed out to the Minnesota State Fair, which is about a fifteen minute drive from the hotel. As I have been told by locals since I got here, the Minnesota State Fair is the largest in the country. I told a Texan I had bumped into at the convention that I thought I'd be heading there and what I had heard about its size; he told me it probably wasn't as big as the Texas State Fair. Of course, everything is bigger in Texas.

As many of you well know eating to me is practically a religious experience, and I am willing to go far and wide to enjoy new sacraments. Locals had mentioned a few of the must have delicacies at the state fair. There were a few things that came up time and again: deep fried cheese curd and pork chop on a stick. These were very high on my list.

Joining me on this all-consuming expedition was Mike Pappas, member of the Baltimore County Central Committee and Alternate Delegate to the convention.

Below you'll find a list assembled in order of consumption.

1. Fried Cheese Curd: From what I was told by trusted Minnesotans, all cheese is curd before it is aged, so these tasted very much like Fried Mozzarella Sticks but much fresher. They were to be enjoyed with a Lingonberry Dipping Sauce.
2. Pork Chop on a stick: Minnesotans say that just about anything you'd ever want to eat on a stick you'll find at the state fair. These were skewered seasoned with a rub and grilled. They weren't dried at all which is a typical concern with grilled pork.
3. Fried Spam and Cheese Curd: Pappas was more excited about this than me. I tried one or two but that was enough.
4. Roast Corn: This was corn roasted in husk which was then pulled back as the ear was dipped in melted butter. A complete no-brainer. It was delicious.
5. Sweet Martha's Cookie Jar Chocolate Chip Cookies: A bucket of four dozen right out of the oven cookies. They were delicious and were enjoyed by the group as a whole, but not even a dent was made and the bucket is now sittting in the hotel room
6. Footlong Corn Dog: I couldn't keep up with Pappas on this one as I retired for the evening. It looked delicious, but If I ate anymore I would have burst!

Worth mentioning but not enjoyed was the chocolate-covered bacon: This was on the wish list, but apparently it is so good that it had sold out by the time we had bellied up to the counter. The scotch egg stand was noticed by the time we were full, but sounded delicious.

The state fair is a culinary experience and highly reccommended, however my stomach is still hurting!

Gustav Keeps Us Guessing

So, a perfect storm? Hurricane Gustav appeared as though it would land earlier today in New Orleans. The delegations had been told to be flexible as the schedules were to be in flux all day long. Former Maryland State Delegate and current Maryland Parole Commissioner Carmen Amedori, who is also keeping a blog for The Sun, and I entered the Xcel Center around 3pm and proceeded to Radio Row.

As one can imagine, the convention is a media circus. Between TV, Radio, Print, Blogs, and Vloggers there seems to be nearly a one to one ratio between journalists and convention attendees. They all are looking for original content for their respective medium.

Parts of the convention hall have been set aside for different media outlets. One wide hall has been dubbed Radio Row from where the personalities can broadcast their shows. This area is swamped with pols and convention attendees. I saw Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas giving an interview. Some of these pols will go from mic to mic right down Radio Row for interviews hitting dozens of media markets within an hour.

Carmen was interviewed by Baltimore local talk show host Les Kinsolving. I was interviewed by video journalists from the "The Weekly Standard" online, YouTube, and also gave my first bilingual interview to Channel 24 in Buenos Aires, Argentina!

The business of the convention began shortly before 3pm. While the proceedings were shortened and the typical evening pageantry was cut, there was actually business to be done. Every four years, the convention provides the national party an opportunity to revise the platform which has been cut from 40,000 words to 20,000. The goal was to make it more readable and accessible for a voter that wants to learn exactly what the party believes.

Also, the rules that the party uses to govern itself are also reviewed, amended and approved every four years. This may not sound that interesting, but Presidential primaries are under the purview of the committee. The scheduling of primaries has huge implications and is of major importance to the party and its members.

So, both the rules and the platform among a few other items had to be approved. Committees composed of delegates from each state work on these matters discussion in the days leading up to the convention. They approve their revisions and vote to send them to floor of the convention. Once their reports reach the floor they receive rubber stamp approval by the delegations.

After this, Both Laura Bush and Lynn Cheney addressed the convention this afternoon along with the Gulf Coast Governors, who had taped and delivered their short speeches about the readiness of their respective states as they geared up for the landfall of Gustav.

As I left the Xcel center, I passed through the hall where print media is located. Reuters, AP, The New York Times, Tribune Company among other outlets were there. They all had created newsrooms to report on the happenings complete with televisions and catering stations. The interesting thing was that every single one of the tv's was tuned into CNN with the exception of three and those three were sitting next to a tv that was tuned to none other than CNN. Sure, there's no such thing as a liberal media echo chamber!

There is nothing scheduled for the evening so we can fill our schedules as we please.

You Never Know Who You'll Bump Into

When you come to a convention you expect evenings filled with speakers that represent the all the star power the party has to offer. Several friends also attending the convention have called it the "Super Bowl," the "Oscars," the "All-Star Game" all rolled into one. I think the Super Bowl is probably one of the best analogies.

Just like the Super Bowl, The Republican National Convention brings out current stars and the stars of yesteryear. You see them at local pubs, walking down the street, standing for interviews, or catching up with old pol buddies.

Late last night sitting in our hotel pub happened to be Pat Buchanan, now on MSNBC in the morning, but known for his improbable win over President George H.W. Bush in the 1992 New Hampshire primary. There he was enjoying himself with friends. As he got up to leave, I rushed over and introduced myself. The guy has one of the strongest handshakes I have ever encountered. After nearly crushing my hand we both turned towards the camera. I am guessing he was thinking he would have looked more appropriate for the picture if he had been wearing a Hawaiin Shirt!

Arriving at the Convention

I have never flown on an airplane as a conventioneer, so sharing the plane with other Republicans headed to the convention was quite a spectacle. I took some McCain stickers with me to Dulles and thought it would be fun to offer them to the other passengers on the plane. As we boarded there were probably 80% of the passengers tagged with McCain stickers. The flight attendants and the pilots all made a mention of it. Coming from Maryland, it's a great feeling to get on a plane with a bunch of like-minded Republicans!

Alex from Hagerstown is a freshman at American University and a contributor for www.race42008.com. He was enthusiastic about the trip saying it was his first time on an airplane as an adult. On his own dime, he is coming out to Minnesota to blog for the website.

The Maryland delegation is staying about 10 blocks from the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul. The nice thing about this is that we can walk to the center and that we aren't in outer Mongolia, (See Bloomington, MN.) Shortly after having unpacking and going down to the lobby, I bumped into a few from the delegation that were headed to the convention center in Minneapolis to see a screening of "An American Carol."

The funny thing about conventions is that you do well by going with the flow, being extremely flexible and recognize that a window for opportunity is only open for a few minutes before it closes. I jumped in the cab with the other Marylanders and headed to Minneapolis.

The convention center seemed like it contained more volunteers than attendees. They ushered us into a hall in which Lee Greenwood, of “Proud to be an American” fame, was already singing. There were folks from all parts of the country and all are happy to chat with other Republicans. They're willing to engage and talk politics. To a one, everyone I talked with was excited about the selection of Governor Palin. We were ushered into the auditorium afterwards and the movie was screened for us. There was an introduction of a few of the actors in the film afterwards and among them was Jon Voight.

After the screening, CivicFest was opened up to the attendees. A grand collection of memorabilia and historical items has been amassed to complete the exhibit. Among other things included in the exhibit are the front half of Nixon's Airforce One, a scale model of the White House, Reagan's Limousine, and FDR's wheelchair accessible Cadillac Limousine. This was the last event of the evening and after a shuttle returned us to the hotel. Tomorrow is a big day.


With Hurricane Gustav headed towards New Orleans threats to the cancel the convention all together have been downgraded to curtailing the evening's presentations. Since President Bush and Vice-President Cheney were to be attending to hurricane preparation, they won't be able to participate in tomorrow evening’s activities. It looks like a little flexibility will come in handy tomorrow.

Republican National Convention Preview

With the elevation of Barack Obama to the status of Democratic Nominee last week in Denver behind us, I am glad that I am going to Minneapolis-St. Paul this week for the Republican National Convention. I had the good fortune to go to New York in 2004 to the National Convention and knew that coming to this one would be a top priority.

The announcement of Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska this last Friday seems to have electrified the base. Numerous phone calls from both family and friends came in between Friday and Saturday to discuss her addition to the ticket.

What was most amusing about the calls was that while more conservative folks uniformly loved her, more left leaning friends and family were "concerned" about her, about her lack experience, that she was "being used by McCain". Whenever someone that is supporting an opponent expresses a concern that "McCain may have overplayed his hand," I have to wonder whether there concern is really based upon the fear that it is a very good choice. Why would they really be concerned about her inexperience otherwise?

There will be an electricity at the convention because of her. The Republican base is excited, and the country will see why the party regulars are so completely enthused by her on Wednesday night when she is scheduled to speak after accepting the nomination.