Am I the only one who noticed a strange disconnect between McCain and the audience at the convention?
They cheered loudly and for a long time in the beginning, and throughout the speech. But McCain was never ready – and they were a beat behind him when he paused for cheers. Obama, Clinton, and other politicians usually “ride” the applause and cheers. McCain seems discomfited. And the crowd seemed determined to follow McCain’s lead. It was just that McCain was an awkward partner, and the crowd was too eager.
Of course, McCain did say that Governor Palin worked with her “hands and her nose”. So, it’s always hard to figure out what to do with that.
Worse were the ham-handed attacks on Obama that had nothing to do with the plans Obama is actually proposing and everything to do with the stereotypes of what liberals do. How would Obama’s health care plan prevent patient from keeping their doctors and socialize medicine if it allows everyone to maintain their current coverage? McCain’s health care plan is the one that would force people to change health care plans because it would remove incentives for employers to offer health care. McCain said that Obama would raise “your taxes” – yet Obama would cut taxes for 95% of Americans – and would cut taxes more than McCain for 90% of Americans. McCain says that Obama will be fiscally irresponsible – yet McCain’s proposals, when evaluated by independent tax policy experts, are deemed to leave America with a greater deficit.
And those are just the false attacks on policy.
On a positive note, McCain did have some gracious words for Obama and only called into question his character a few times. Compared with Giuliani and Romney and Palin, McCain was a model of class.
Overall, though, the Republican convention was much more focused on Obama than the Democratic convetion was on McCain – and the Republican convention had many more personal attacks on Obama than the Democratic convention had on McCain.
We’ll have to wait to see how all this plays out.