The RNC Convention through Mainstream Media Eyes
I’m one of those rare few who don’t believe in paying for television or radio, so most of my updates on the RNC convention came via network news, public television, public radio and a smattering of Liberal-leaning websites. Since it’s unlikely that most here frequent these “news” sources, I thought that I would share my takeaway from the Left’s point of view this week:
Monday – Apparently nobody gave speeches on Monday if you get your news from the Left. Coverage revolved around all the people carrying guns and all the police in and around the convention center. Since the two never clashed, the Leftist media were totally disappointed. They turned to their new darling, one of my favorites – Jonah Goldberg from NRO. They’re only interested in Jonah because he hates Trump with a passion. Actually Trump mentions Goldberg as one of the people who motivated him to jump into the race just to prove him wrong. NPR seems to think that Jonah gives them credibility and balance but in this one circumstance he confirms them instead. If they have Jonah on air to discuss his opinions of Hillary during the DNC convention, then I’ll believe that their intentions are balanced reporting. Of course, Jonah is there on this day not to comment on the speakers but to draw a connection between Trump and the only other story of the day/night – convention-goers suffering from a norovirus. So Day One Wrap Up – Lots of crazies with guns. Lots of police with guns and body armor. Nobody was shot. Lots of people got sick. Nobody important enough to care about hit the stage.
Tuesday – Day two consisted of only one speaker worth merit and apparently she gave the first two sentence speech in the history of political conventions. And those two sentences were taken verbatim from Michelle Obama. A Benghazi mom blamed Hillary for lying to her about her son’s death, which enflamed the Lefties online to no end – one at GQ asking for her to be literally killed for dissing their girl. The pesky Turks stole the headlines leading up to the convention except for Trump’s tweet saying his prayers and concerns go out to his many friends in Turkey. Apparently they wanted him to say something about blowing the sh*t out of somebody and this tweet was a sign of his weakness on foreign affairs. Only the Leftist media could spin genuine thoughtful concern as a bad thing – when done by a Republican.
Wednesday – Gingrich gave a great speech that nobody heard, apparently. Pence accepted the nomination without any speech worth talking about. Still nobody killed. Melania’s two sentence speech is still dominating the analysts’ conversations. Cruz gave a fantastic speech, which is only memorable for what he did not say. I’m reminded of Bernie’s speech a couple weeks back where he said he would support Hillary but he never really endorsed her if you listen to it closely. They speculate endlessly that Cruz is setting up for 2020 never considering the fact that the Republican establishment hates him more than Trump. NPR interviews people in a small west Pennsylvania steel town that are supporting Trump in force despite being lifelong union loving Democrats who have never voted for any Republican ever. The mayor pointed to all the Trump signs and said that in the past a house with a Republican sign in the yard would be covered with eggs. I heard the same message a couple weeks ago in a small Ohio town. They all gave reasons why they were voting for Trump but what was left out conveniently was why they weren’t voting for Hillary. I’m sure those comments are sitting on the cutting room floor. Hats off to NPR though, that they aired anything at all.
Thursday – The Left was disappointed yet again. I’m not sure, but it’s possible that only one person actually did talk. If anybody else did, you would never know it. Trump reportedly talked for longer than anybody else ever which I don’t believe, having lived through endless drivel from Obama. They had nothing to say about what he said, only commenting that it was dark, negative and he never seemed to go off script. Which means no Trump-isms to report on endlessly. Their disappointment continued since nobody was killed, the protesters never really showed up in force like they hoped and there was no fireworks on the floor between the never-Trumpers and his supporters. Huh? Maybe that Great Divide in the Republican Party they keep reporting about doesn’t exist. They’ll never admit it. Even Jonah Goldberg went silent.
So in the end it was a terrible convention for the Leftist media because all the things they had cameras and microphones ready to record never happened. The speeches weren’t worth reporting on, which means they were all very good if you’re a Republican, a concerned and informed independent or a new Trump Democrat from Ohio or Pennsylvania. They were offended that the Republicans and Trump were so negative about Hillary but they seem to forget how the DNC spewed endless vitriol at Bush in 2004. If I remember correctly, they were calling for GW to go to jail too. Melania’s plagiarism is less of a topic of conversation after the flood of Obama and Biden plagiarism videos started trending on YouTube. We’re left with claims that Trump is a KKK Grand Poo Ba, a Nazi or Hitler, which I consider a political “jump the shark” moment. If you can’t find any logical criticism of a political candidate, you pull the Hitler card – and they did.
With nothing else to report the conversation has already changed to the DNC convention. Maybe it’ll be more memorable and worthy of meaningful coverage. NPR yesterday morning did bring up the first controversy in the making. Hillary is having three to five mothers of black children killed by police give speeches (I read five but they said three). I can’t even imagine how these moms represent the face of the Dem Party and what they would say on the big stage but I’m sure it will be covered ad nauseum. There are no mothers of police killed by children of black mothers invited to talk, though. There is no good explanation for this decision, so the Leftist media cannot ignore it. Especially, since Obama hasn’t really come out and supported the police. He found time to go to funerals of black criminals killed but not police funerals. Obama refused to put blue lights on our White House in honor of the fallen men in blue too. Clearly the Dems are the anti-police platform.
Hillary announced Tim Kaine as her running mate on Friday. Since Julio Castro from San Antonio can’t speak Spanish and Kaine is fluent, it makes him a better choice to appeal to Latinos (?). Pence may be relatively unknown but he’ll be Trump’s Biden. Say what you want about Biden, but when Obama came into office he had no experience dealing with anybody in Washington (he still doesn’t) and Biden’s experience filled the gap at least on paper. Pence has that as well as experience running a large government bureaucracy.
Kaine on the other hand won’t show up Clinton in any way at all. As a candidate for governor of Virginia he showed that, like Hillary, he’ll say anything to get elected. When he sat in the big chair in Richmond he managed to renege on everything he said he believed in on the campaign trail.
A perfect fit!