Good, Bad, and Ugly

Mitt Romney was good. Not great, just good. He was somewhat successful at humanizing himself (though Ann Romney did a better job of that Tuesday), but vague on policy details. Which likely doesn't matter; the thin sliver of undecideds aren't looking for position papers. I still think this election will be a land war of getting out the base vote, rather than an air war of persuading a nonesistent middle.

Paul Ryan was bad. As in bad cop, the traditional attack-dog running mate role. Which can be done without playing as fast and loose with the truth as he did.



And Clint Eastwood? Just plain ugly. A brief, scripted speech could have been powerful, but instead he embarrassed both the campaign and himself. And speaking of empty chairs, O. Kay reports there were quite a few in the Ron Paul dominated Iowa delegation Thursday.

Other than that, we saw a parade of rising stars and barely restrained 2016 hopefuls who focused on their own messages and shoehorned the name Romney in somewhere toward the end of their speeches.

For me, though, the important part of the convention was the rules and calendar fight. Republican rules have a ripple effect into the Democratic calendar as Iowa fights to stay first. For now at least, the GOP is protecting the quartet of designated early states: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina. Iowa Republicans and Ron Paul supporters are bothered by the new requirements that delegates be awarded in proportion to vote, but Iowa Democrats already had that rule in place.