I managed to snag a credential to walk around the Xcel Center where the Republicans are holding their convention. Most political conventions are designed around glitter and glitz, and a nagging feeling that there's a backroom you have to get into where important decisions are being made. Credentials are highly sought after, and the sense of history is palpable. But this one feels different. The glitz and glamor is half-assed, the Republican themselves seem mostly irrelevant, and there are probably more security guards than delegates and spectators. It feels like a funeral, or the scene of a disgraced CEO returning to his company to clean out his desk. The sense I get here is... embarrassment.
Now McCain's decision-making skills are appalling, which makes planning impossible. There's no clear message, but even beyond message, they hadn't even announced the speaking lineup until a few hours ago. This is basic nuts and bolts stuff, and the pros are obviously elsewhere. Given three days of messaging to the public, the McCain campaign has chosen to articulate nothing, leaving a void where Palin is the only topic of conversation. There isn't even a controversial hit piece on Obama of some sort. It's a joke.
This is compounded by other factors, a sort of system-wide collapse of the Republican elite class. There aren't very many good Republican Congressional candidates this cycle, and many of the incumbents aren't showing up. This means that lobbyists and donors have no reason to be here, and they aren't. I'm told by Republican friends that Gustav caused lots of people to cancel their travel plans and parties, but my guess is that Gustav gave people an excuse to cancel their plans. It's dinner time, and there are very few people buying concessions.
It's so deserted that there aren't even the sleazy people that you find at every political convention, and the lunatics didn't bother to show up. The protesters are here to wrestle with the police in riot gear, and the media is despondent about how empty and sad it all seems.
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