RNC 2012: Ryan finishes off a powerful second night
TAMPA — Wednesday night at the Republican National Convention was drifting along unremarkably for a couple of hours. For Georgians, even Attorney General Sam Olens’ speech — the only one this week by someone from our state — suffered from his pairing with his Floridian counterpart, Pam Bondi; the tag-team format just didn’t work all that well. Speeches from Sen. John Thune, the South Dakotan whose name was bandied about (inexplicably, I’d say tonight) as a potential presidential candidate, and Sen. John McCain, the 2008 nominee, were flat.
Then came the wave.
It started with Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and 2008 presidential candidate. To be honest, I wasn’t able to catch much of his speech, but I could tell that the crowd responded to it with much more energy than any of the earlier speakers generated.
Then came Condoleezza Rice. The former secretary of state is highly regarded for her intellect and experience, but I don’t know anyone who expected a set-piece speech from her like the one she gave tonight. She’s obviously known as a foreign-policy expert, but her topics ran the gamut: immigration, education and school choice (which Rice, who grew up in Jim Crow Birmingham, called “the civil rights issue of our day”), and the federal debt. She was powerful on the moral aspects of American leadership in the world and the threat that our finances pose to our ability to exercise it: “There is no country, not even a rising China, that can do more harm to us than we can do to ourselves if we do not do the hard work at home.” She was firm in speaking against the “narrative of grievance and entitlement,” which she described as alien to America. She was wholly impressive and utterly convincing as a future politician (though she’s served in government, she’s never run for office).
New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez followed Rice and, having never heard her speak before, I wasn’t sure about the wisdom of putting her between such a powerful speech by Rice and the night’s headliner, Paul Ryan. But Martinez was very impressive. She spoke of her upbringing in a family with its own small security business — and of working, at age 18, as an armed guard for it. She had one of the lines of the night, describing her surprised reaction after she and her husband met with Republicans trying to convince her to switch to their party years ago: “I’ll be damned. We’re Republicans!”
But Ryan, of course, was every bit the closer the GOP wanted this night. He took on President Obama directly and forcefully, as the vice presidential nominee traditionally is expected to do. He spoke of wasted stimulus money that went to companies “like Solyndra, with their gold-plated connections, subsidized jobs and make-believe markets.” He welcomed the confrontation with Democrats over Medicare: “Our nation needs this debate, we [Romney and Ryan] want this debate, and we will win this debate.” He described the Obama campaign as “a ship trying to sail on yesterday’s wind.”
He defined himself as the youthful candidate on the ticket and in the race, playfully comparing Romney’s songs, which he’s heard “on the campaign bus and in many hotel elevators” with his own playlist, which “starts with AC/DC and ends with Zeppelin.” But more importantly, he made a play for young voters with the line of the convention, maybe the campaign, so far: “College graduates should not have to live out their 20s in their childhood bedrooms, staring up at fading Obama posters and wondering when they can move out and get going with life.”
Two nights in, this campaign is taking a shape that it sorely lacked before Ryan joined the ticket and, to some degree, even until this week. It will be interesting to see not only how Romney closes it out Thursday, but how the Democrats react in Charlotte next week.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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318 comments Add your comment
@@
August 30th, 2012
3:27 pm
one of the black rep reported no blacks were anywhere in the RNC.
That reporter must’ve been color blind.
Should we have put them on display?
Naahhhhh, that would’ve been…well
.
.
.
tacky?
Jefferson
August 30th, 2012
3:27 pm
1st officer on the Titantic to Captain : “I’ve hit an iceburg, you take over”
Captain : “Thanks for telling me, I guess its mine now eh”
….the president inherited a bad economy (Ryan)
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
3:28 pm
Spend billions on weapons
Cause there are soooooo many enemies out there that could beat us, right?
Like having a military base in Italy – they might throw spaghetti at us ! Run for your lives!
Lil' Barry Bailout - Vote American
August 30th, 2012
3:29 pm
Obama’s GM bailout, which is now widely credited with saving the company and the industry.
——–
Thank heavens for that bailout, otherwise we wouldn’t have cars to drive!
The “fact checkers” need some checking of their own. It’s clear they’re working hard for the Democrats.
Jefferson
August 30th, 2012
3:38 pm
lbb is full
Robert
August 30th, 2012
3:51 pm
Where are all my right wing GOP/tea party lovers? Just like I thought. Cowards!!!
td
August 30th, 2012
3:54 pm
Robert
August 30th, 2012
3:39 pm
Stop plagiarizing others work. At least put quotes around the material if you are not going to link the WApost.
Michael H. Smith
August 30th, 2012
3:54 pm
Yeah, Ryan… Kinda makes you feel sympathy for obama’s running mate joe The Gaffenator.
Well, I did say kinda…. but not reeeeeally(sic) sympathetic.
Nice article Kyle and I can’t close without saying how taken I was with Condoleezza Rice last night. She increasingly impresses me the more I hear her speak. Now we know why she was always seemingly in the background… as not to dwarf those whom she served.
Robert
August 30th, 2012
3:57 pm
The American People who live in the deep, deep, South (NC,SC,GA,FL, etc.) need someone to give them facts and the Washington Post – FactChecker is unbiased. No plagerism just reporting the real news not reported south of the mason-dixon line. That is a Fact.
@@
August 30th, 2012
3:58 pm
Where are all my right wing GOP/tea party lovers? Just like I thought. Cowards!!!
Probably waiting for someone a little more worthy than you?
Kyle Wingfield
August 30th, 2012
3:59 pm
I haven’t had time to respond to all the comments about Ryan’s speech, but Robert @ 3:23 summed up enough of them I’m going to reply to him.
1. “Ryan said Obama promised to keep a GM plant in Janesville, Wisconsin open…” No, he didn’t say that. He acknowledged right off the bat the town already was “about to lose a major factory,” and he said Obama went to the factory and said, “I believe that if our government is there to support you, this plant will be here for another hundred years.” He concluded by pointing out the factory closed and then saying “And that’s how it is in so many towns today, where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight.” The point was not about a broken promise, but the poor recovery.
2. “But Ryan himself was on the commission and voted against the Simpson-Bowles plan.” True. But, unlike Obama, he has presented an alternative. This was Obama’s own commission, and he ignored its report and has not offered any other solution.
3. “Obama’s cuts to Medicare do not reduce benefits to seniors. They reduce future reimbursement rates to hospitals and insurance plans.” This is a distinction without a difference. What do you think hospitals and insurance plans provide when it comes to Medicare? Benefits to seniors, of course. Bonus un-true “truth”: “Ryan’s Medicare plan reduces spending on the program more than Obama did.” No, they both would spend about 3.25% of GDP on Medicare. The difference is Ryan makes the changes for future beneficiaries to bring federal spending under control. Obama takes the money from current beneficiaries and spends it elsewhere (Obamacare), leaving us no better off budget-wise.
4. “S&P blamed Republicans in Congress…” This is a textbook example of cherry-picking. S&P’s downgrade report discussed both revenues and spending, particularly on entitlements, and explicitly stated, “Standard & Poor’s takes no position on the mix of spending and revenue measures that Congress and the Administration might conclude is appropriate for putting the U.S.’s finances on a sustainable footing.” And there were multiple reports at the time that House Republicans had agreed to a “grand bargain,” only for President Obama to try to change the deal and raise taxes even more.
Even the quote from Newhouse is misleading, since it suggests the campaign has something against “facts” as opposed to “fact-checkers” whose analyses often leave something to be desired.
Kyle Wingfield
August 30th, 2012
4:01 pm
Robert @ 3:39: You cannot simply cut and paste an entire article from another source and post it here. Among other things, that’s a potential copyright violation. Provide an excerpt, an attribution and a link.
Kyle Wingfield
August 30th, 2012
4:01 pm
And please provide attribution and a link to the material you copied @ 3:23, too.
Michael H. Smith
August 30th, 2012
4:02 pm
The WP unbiased ?!
That one was so ripe I’ll be back tomorrow after the AJC sanitation crew disinfects this blog.
Goodnight all.
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
4:04 pm
Even the Gilded Age robber barons, despite their unapologetic efforts to keep workers from getting any rights at all, built America in spite of themselves, erecting railroads and oil wells and telegraph wires. And from the time the monopolists were reined in with antitrust laws through the days when men like Mitt Romney’s dad exited center stage in our economy, the American social contract was pretty consistent: The rich got to stay rich, often filthy rich, but they paid taxes and a living wage and everyone else rose at least a little bit along with them. But under Romney’s business model, leveraging other people’s debt means you can carve out big profits for yourself and leave everyone else holding the bag.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/greed-and-debt-the-true-story-of-mitt-romney-and-bain-capital-20120829#ixzz253tBw8VH
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
4:05 pm
Like that!
td
August 30th, 2012
4:06 pm
Robert
August 30th, 2012
3:57 pm
The Washington Post fact checker has been proven to be biased to the left wing positions.
Now if you want to see the fact checker checked then go below:
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2012/08/30/obama_camp_melts_down_over_ryans_speech
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
4:11 pm
Calling it the national convention Costanza effect — that is, “it’s not a lie, if you believe it,” as the notoriously deceitful “Seinfeld” character played by Jason Alexander quipped — the Obama-Biden speechwriting team decided to spike its original speech draft and replace it with a new version, which Salon has obtained from a campaign insider.
http://www.salon.com/2012/08/30/if_obama_lied_like_ryan/
td
August 30th, 2012
4:18 pm
Finn McCool (The System isn’t Broken; It’s Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
4:11 pm
Salon.com again. OMG you can not get further to the left.
Finn McCool (The System isn't Broken; It's Fixed)
August 30th, 2012
4:20 pm
td,
what is your point?
Steve
August 30th, 2012
4:27 pm
So sick of the lies from the GOP. Bash Obama and lie, no real plans with any “details” – just all talk. The GOP is dying, thank God.
Dusty
August 30th, 2012
4:31 pm
How good it is to realize that we have a very fine group of Republicans ready to lead our country. The Convention gives us hope.
Speakers come forth with honesty, clarity, intelligence and leadership.They are neither bombastic nor vendictive showing the good character they possess.
Romney, a quiet man, will bring us to a dedicated goal tonight. That is, of course, getting this country back in a stable economic position and appreciating the inherent goodness of America.
My thanks to Kyle for giving us an accurate and forthright version of this convention when we couldn’t be there ourselves.
That’s right, Kyle. Now come on home before we run wild!
MarkV
August 30th, 2012
4:31 pm
The Medicare arguments used by Ryan, Kyle and the Republicans are some of the worst examples of distortion and hypocrisy. They bemoan the Medicare expenses as unsupportable, and when Obama puts in place savings, they attack it as robbing Medicare. Kyle’s argument that reducing payment to hospitals and insurance plans means reducing the benefits to seniors is patently false. The benefits are given by the Medicare rules, not by what insurance plans and hospitals are being paid, and the purpose of the changes is to make the system more effective, about making the hospitals to find ways to use more effective procedures. Kyle, Ryan and others pretend that using the savings for Obamacare somehow means they will not be used for the care for seniors, ignoring such things as elimination of the “doughnut hole” in prescription payments..
independent thinker
August 30th, 2012
4:35 pm
OK assuming everything that Ryan said last night was true and he has devoted his Congressional career to job creation and fiscal restraint and has not wasted time passing nonsensical abortion bills with Todd Aiken, can anyone tell me what Ryan said that made Mitt Romney qualified to be president that we did not already know???
Did he once refer to Romneycare?
I can only remember what he said about his Momma
What plan did he lay out that will magically create twelve million jobs??????????????
Sure would like to know.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
4:39 pm
“The Convention gives us hope”
You need a convention to give you hope?
amazing
Hope from a political convention. just WOW
Karl Rove
August 30th, 2012
4:42 pm
Great job boys – my man Ryan got everyone so confused about that GM bailout, either way Obama screwed up. If he did not do the bailout then he broke a promise to keep that Wisconsin plant open. Since he did do the bailout we can accuse him of wasting gov’ment money on a bunch of lazy union workers who are only interested in employment benefits and he should have looked at for his friend’s district and reopened that plant even if it was wasting money since he knows nothing about operating a business. Keep em confused and they will vote for just about anyone if you advertise a few lies long enough.
Just remember about passing gas in a crowded room – blame the other guy.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
4:52 pm
I am confident that the Democratic convention will suffer the same fate as they run their infomercials next week.
http://tinyurl.com/8tngurk
Where is the love?
Outside of the core bases for both parties, people are not impressed with Rs or Ds.
@@
August 30th, 2012
4:58 pm
One thing’s for sure. If Romney wins, the left is gonna hate him every bit as much as they hated Bush when he stepped into the Oval Office.
How far back does this lib hatred go?
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:03 pm
@@
And maybe as much as the hate many right leaning folks express on this very blog for Obama
Hypocrisy and irony much?
You must put them both on everything.
From your peaches to your casseroles
Dusty
August 30th, 2012
5:03 pm
MarkV
Your vision is limited. If medical expenses are cut, that will help the overall economy that is ridden with government debt.
If the economy is better there will be less people depending on the government.
Government healthcare is already predicted to go broke in the near future.Medicare being one of them.
We cannot go on with uncontrolled government expenditures of any kind. Obama’s poorly constructed program is destined to raise heathcare expenditures no matter how you plan to add the expense of people by the millions. There are no cuts that can equal that cost.
USA credit will not last that long. You need to worry about everybody, not just seniors.
Dusty
August 30th, 2012
5:08 pm
They both suck 4:39
I’m not a blind pessimist like you. That’s how I can hope when I see responsible politicians making sensible plans..
TRUTH
August 30th, 2012
5:08 pm
Was there an ounce of truth in Ryan’s speech?? Just an ounce? Ohhhh, that’s right, the GOP don’t need no dang fact checking…..
I think we see what the GOP is all about…..Yup, I think we see….
OBAMA/BIDEN 2012
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:10 pm
Dusty
So except for rhetoric, which both parties provide during convention, exactly what “plan” has been laid out and by which speaker.
Generalities and warm fuzzie buzz words are not plans in the real world.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:11 pm
Dusty
The Democrats will be just as guilty next week
So again, what exactly are those “plans”?
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:12 pm
And if you opened that link, which was taken from Drudge, you will see that “we” shrunk by 17 million last night from 08
hahahahahaha
@@
August 30th, 2012
5:19 pm
TBs:
I don’t hate Obama. I do question his ability to lead, his understanding of economic issues, AND within the first year, his willingness to compromise.
I remember his keynote address at the 2004 convention. I was impressed. When he announced his intentions to run for president…naturally, I became curious.
Checking into his background, I discovered he was deeply rooted in the Chicago machine. It was at that point that he became less appealing.
He pulled some pretty under-handed stunts to get elected Senator. Left the housing projects in his district to become rat infested sinkholes.
Bottom line. I was among the first to say “This guy is in over his head.”
He went from being a big fish in a little pond to being a little fish in a vast ocean of complex issues. Unprepared to be CiC.
I would have preferred Hillary. She, at least, had experience.
He, on the other hand, is making it up as he goes along. Following an ideology with which I cannot agree.
Dusty
August 30th, 2012
5:23 pm
They BOTH Suck,
I gather that you cannot read or listen. Republican plans are laid out most anywhere you want to look. Try using your computer instead of running around like a blind mouse in a cage.
It’s a big world out there. Look around. Stop griping. Anybody can do THAT.
Same goes for the Democratic Convention. Find your own way in the gathering. .
killerj
August 30th, 2012
5:32 pm
I,ll make it short and sweet,anyone for a beer?,by by bum.
independent thinker
August 30th, 2012
5:32 pm
Just what I thought, no one can remember anything new Ryan told us about Romney’s qualifications.
And no one has a clue how Romney will create twelve million jobs. Maybe he will pass that stimulus plan he was advocating in December 2008 in Nation magazine. But it was a thrilling speech .
MarkV
August 30th, 2012
5:39 pm
Dusty @ 5:03 pm
“If medical expenses are cut, that will help the overall economy that is ridden with government debt. “Government healthcare is already predicted to go broke in the near future. Medicare being one of them.”
Is that not what I said? The 716 billion Kyle, Ryan and the Republicans are attacking Obama for are savings in Medicare, and they are extending the solvency of Medicare.
“Obama’s poorly constructed program is destined to raise heathcare expenditures no matter how you plan to add the expense of people by the millions.”
Here we are at the basic disagreement. For you, adding people to the rolls of insured is a waste. For me, it is the decent thing to do. As for “poorly constructed,” I might agree, but you should consider how such programs are developed. It was not written by Obama, it was written by professionals and voted on by our representatives in Congress.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:40 pm
Dusty
You gripe and moan on this board every day. Wake the f up and look in the mirror.
Pot calling the kettle much?
_________________________________
@@
You many not hate him and thanks for the reply. With that said anyone can read and hear the vitriol that is spit at Obama every day on these blogs as well as from the right leaning pundits.
I must add that vitriol was also spit at Bush for numerous years.
It is a two way street. This had been going on since the 1st campaign for President in our nation. It is just more in our face because of 24 hour news (OPINION) programming and the internet.
And of course, each side says the other is worse than their side. They will overlook the same exact thing that they will cry about when said about their guy or gal
Tough being in big boy politics. Very dirty game and no one has clean hands
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:43 pm
Dusty
Explain exactly how consumer demand will increase if Romney is elected?
You will not only need to put that in context of the average consumer debt level, but also take into account the economic issues around the world. We do live in a global economy, if you haven’t heard or read about it.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:46 pm
Dusty
To help get you started, consumer spending accounts for roughly 70% of our economy. Just so you know.
Glad I could assist
Take care now
kelly
August 30th, 2012
5:50 pm
Kyle, read your piece very quickly but didn’t notice if you mentioned that Ryan lied several times. As I’m sure you know, the medial has been calling him out on his lies all day; both left and right media. Is this how the republicans plan to win the election? Lies and misrepresentations? Even a fair minded guy like you must have cringed when Ryan lied about, among other things, the Janesville GM plant.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
5:57 pm
kelly
To be “fair and balanced”, there will be some big whoppers told next week at the Democratic convention.
Just as this week, some of the accusations will be false and some dead on. Each Party will parse words when needed to deflect the criticism of a lie and of course at other times, provide the information that will show the accusation to be false.
After all, it is politics. Nothing new.
Rafe Hollister, suffering through Oblamer's ineptocracy
August 30th, 2012
6:01 pm
Lib world (common sense outlawed there)
Removing money from an underfunded Medicare program, which is adding new participants everyday is going to improve Medicare.
Sticking your bucket under a free flowing faucet of federal dollars, to grab some for your state, is worse than watching them flow down the gutter. If you voted against wasting the dollars, you are not allowed to try to salvage some of them as they are frittered away, or Libs call you a hypocrite.
If you had any part in approving deficits of a few hundred billion, you can’t wake up, and denounce 1.5 Trillion dollar deficits.
Economic models that produced the largest peace time periods of growth in American history are now passe. We can’t go back to those models, because those economies did not work for everyone.
If only the rich would pay their fair share, others would not have to give up anything.
Increasing regulations and bad mouthing business is good for the economy.
marko
August 30th, 2012
6:04 pm
The Wisconsin Republican Liberty Caucus found Ryan’s credentials, as a budget hawk, hard to swallow given his voting record. Now this, from Fox News contributor Sally Kohn, “Ryan’s speech was an attempt to set the world record for blatant lies”.Isn’t it nice to know that the truth and five bucks will still get you a cup of coffee at Starbucks.
They BOTH suck
August 30th, 2012
6:06 pm
Rafe
You mean like denouncing the stimulus, saying you didn’t accept any, yet being proven a LIAR for accepting stimulus money.
Is that of which you speak of and the VP nominee?
md
August 30th, 2012
6:29 pm
Kelly…you may want to peruse the previous posts prior to posting in order to not look so silly……
@@
August 30th, 2012
6:58 pm
TBs:
This had been going on since the 1st campaign for President in our nation.
And yet, here we are. Survived ‘em all. This time around there’s been efforts to implement too much change in a short period of time.
Oh! And by the by…
Dusty
You gripe and moan on this board every day. Wake the f up and look in the mirror.
Totally uncalled for. A little vitriol of your own?