Convention Report: The GOP's make-believe biggish tent, George W. WHO?, the Horse-Dancing Lady, nutjob NJ intruder, plus platform funnies

The Onion reports: "According to numerous sociologists and political experts, things that should never under any circumstance be spoken aloud in modern society will be said no fewer than 1,400 times this week at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, FL."

"Mitt Romney is like you or me -- he puts his pants on one leg at a time. Oh, wait. He has a fellow who does that for him. My bad."

-- Ann "The Horse-Dancing Lady" Romney,
quoted in The Borowitz Report (see below)

by Ken

In my Convention Report last night ("OMG, it's Willard!"), I asked:

Hmm, what's wrong with this picture?

No, I wasn't thinking of the phenomenon of an apparently sizable number of people holding up signs that say "MITT!" This is pretty peculiar, I admit, especially for people who show no obvious signs of being either drugged or blackmailed or paid. (But then, would there be visible signs in the event of blackmailing or payoffs?)

UPDATE: Looking at the picture again, I'm not so sure there are no visible signs of drugging. Actually, don't all those people look to be on something?

Nor was I thinking particularly of the content of those signs, though I do wonder if there isn't something more to be said about the man of the hour. Okay, nothing springs to my mind either, at least nothing good -- and true. I'm guessing that the Willard campaign wouldn't be enhanced by placards reading "MITT! IT'S ALIVE!"

No, what I was thinking of was the dazzlingly prominent presence of those two joyful African-American Willard-lovers right smack in front of the camera -- with, um, well, no others that I can see. Let's see, if this proportion of Highly Visible African-American Willard-Lovers were extrapolated to the entire Republican National Convention, the result would be . . . oh, for goodness' sake, let's not be dense. There's no extrapolating to be done at the Republican convention. In fact, there's probably a party platform plank that prohibits it.

What we see here is, of course, that finely honed right-wing sense of optics. You can ignore and even revile people all year long, but then there are those rare moments when it's of strategic value to fake a show of inclusiveness, diversity, whatever you want to call it. And when party duty calls, nobody can fake a show of inclusiveness like Republican Party faithful.


THE FOLKS AT THE ONION HAVE ALSO BEEN
PONDERING THE GOP VERSION OF A BIG TENT

You don't have to struggle quite so hard to stage-manage the wimmins into Republican-convention photo oppery. There are, after all, Republican wimmins all over the joint, smiling and cheering and cussing Obama and generally making sure they don't interfere in any way with what passes for "thinking" at the shindig.

In The Onion's "GOP Convention To Feature Strong Lineup Of Conservative Women Listeners" we're told by "RNC communications director Sean Spicer": “A veritable who’s who of conservative women are scheduled to stand on the convention floor and listen attentively to what each male speaker has to say about the major issues facing our country.” This Spicer, we learn,

confirm[ed] that an impressive variety of blond, smiling women with perfectly maintained hair and jewelry will be on prominent display and seated near television cameras. “I would say this is one of the most impressive rosters of dead-silent female Republicans wearing nice dresses that we’ve ever had at the convention.” Spicer also reassured convention-goers that the solid roster of women listeners had all been informed not to get in the way too much and, if possible, to show slightly more cleavage.

AMONG THE GOP-ers YOU WON'T FIND
HAUNTING THE RNC: GEORGE W. WHO?

Over at HuffPost our colleague Sam Stein takes a long look at another curious phenomenon at a convention that admittedly is almost nothing but a collection of curious phenomena: the surreal nonpresence of the Republican Party's last president, a two-termer who left the White House not even four years ago, who for at least five or six years out of his eight in office was regarded by all his party's faithful as a god among men, so lofty a personage that the mere utterance of an unkind word constituted a crime against humanity called "bashing," which was punishable by, well, extreme measures. OK, I'm stalling because I can't remember his name either. It has been expunged from the historical record, or at any rate from the minds of his fellow R's. "George W. Bush: The President Who Must Not Be Named At Republican Convention" is the head on Sam's piece.

"The Bush name and legacy are noticeably absent from the 2012 Republican convention," Sam notes, and among the many people he talks to, hardly anybody seems to think it's peculiar. For example:

"I think it is best for the whole party for him to step aside," said Christine Sutton, 62, of Honolulu. "The candidate we have now doesn't need support from anybody else and why should a former president or a vice president appear. ... Bush did his thing and he was a wonderful president, a wonderful president. We will talk about him, but he's not the issue now. The issue is to get our candidate elected."

See, those GOP wimmins have something to say after all. Sort of.


IT WOULD HARDLY BE A CONVENTION REPORT
WITHOUT A TRIBUTE TO THE FIRST LADY-TO-BE

Luckily, the Borowitz Report has this angle covered:

Romney Hailed as Regular Guy by Woman with Horse in Olympics
POSTED BY ANDY BOROWITZ

TAMPA (The Borowitz Report) -- On the opening night of the 2012 Republican National Convention, the Presidential nominee Mitt Romney received fulsome praise for being a "regular, down-to-earth guy" from his wife, Ann, whose dressage horse, Rafalca, competed in the London Olympics.

"Mitt has never let his success go to his head," Mrs. Romney said. "Take away the seven-thousand-square-foot house in La Jolla and the bank account in the Caymans, he’s still the same fun-loving boy who pinned a gay kid to the ground and cut off his hair."

Mrs. Romney adopted an intimate tone as she attempted to describe "the Mitt only I know."

"Every now and then, Mitt will give me this devilish smile of his, and I know that can only mean one thing," she said, flushing slightly. "He just fired someone."

In a small flub that many delegates found endearing, Mrs. Romney said, "Mitt Romney is like you or me -- he puts his pants on one leg at a time. Oh, wait. He has a fellow who does that for him. My bad."

But the nominee’s wife brought the convention audience to its feet with her closing endorsement of her husband: "I promise you that if you elect Mitt President of the United States, he will never give less than thirteen per cent."

CREDIT THE BOROWITZ REPORT
WITH ANOTHER CONVENTION SCOOP

"Disturbed Man Gets Past Convention Security, Gives Keynote Address"


FOR FURTHER CONVENTION READING:
HOW ABOUT THE REPUBLICAN PLATFORM?

I doubt you've read the full Republican platform, have you? Brad Plumer has, and has posted "The 10 oddest items in the GOP platform" on Ezra Klein's Wonkblog on washingtonpost.com.

You probably won't be surprised by, say, Brad's no. 7, "Step up the war against pornography," or his no. 9, "Reconsider the gold standard." Perhaps more unexpected is his no. 4, "End our dependence on foreign . . . fertilizer?" And then there's this:

2) Police the universities for liberal bias. “Ideological bias is deeply entrenched within the current university system. Whatever the solution in private institutions may be, in State institutions the trustees have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their enormous investment is not abused for political indoctrination. We call on State officials to ensure that our public colleges and universities be places of learning and the exchange of ideas, not zones of intellectual intolerance favoring the Left.”

As usual with right-wing divinations of "liberal bias," the source of the problem is generally contact with reality, which is forbidden on the Right, on penalty of incorporation into the Republican platform in an unflattering way.

Left unmentioned, however, is the tireless crusade actually being waged in legislatures and school boards in all 50 states to transform the public schools into indoctrination centers for every variety of anti-factual insanity and delusion currently in vogue among the thugs and delusionals of the Right.

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