Was jogging but had my Sony Walkman radio on to hear the speeches.
The Arnold's speech really pumped up the crowd. His immigrant story, his explaination of what Republicans are about and his humor was all right on target. Will people start pushing for an amendment to the Constitution? Like the Mayor the night before, he has a stage presence that is impossible to ignore.
The bit with Jenna and Barbara was a little hokey. Their humor at times seems a little forced and they seemed a little antsy. But, afterall, they are twenty-two years old and have hardly been on the national stage so I'm not going to nit-pick them any more. I'm sure after the campaign is over they will return to trying to live out of the spotlight and go onto relatively normal lives. I will say the litany of how they were trying to find a role in the WH and campaign but ran into various people was cute and did underscore a serious point: Bush has assembled an incredible team around him.
The First Lady's speech was earnest and a bit longer on policy than I expected. Mrs. Bush quickly listed off some of the accomplishments of the first term and then moved into the very moving part about 9/11 and the war on the terrorists. She put a very human face on the issue by citing stories from real life people the Bush's have met. I don't know how it looked on tv but on radio Mrs. Bush comes across as quite sincere though not the smoothest speaker.
UPDATE:
Bevan at RCP seems to feel similarly though he is much harder on the Jenna and Barbara. I think his being on the convention floor heightened the different reactions to Arnold and Mrs. Bush. Clearly, the Govenator was there to fire up the crowd and to appeal to the small percentage of undecided voters who haven't decided in TV land. I'm sure on the floor the reaction difference to him and Mrs. Bush would be extremely obvious. I could sense it over the radio too. However, Mrs. Bush's job wasn't to rally the troops. I think her job was to re-assure wavering Bush supporters and to reach women undecideds as such she didn't have to give a rah-rah bring them to their feet kind of speech.
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