Convening...

I will admit to being less excited than I was at this time four years ago, but the political junkie in me won't let me totally skip the conventions, so I have watched quite a bit of the last two nights after the girls have gone to bed. As I am sure you all suspect...I have some opinions;-)

First of all, this whole thing seems like it is done in anticipation of losing. I don't know whether it is an unwillingness to accept Romney, or a feeling that Obama is just going to talk his way through the election pretty easily, or what...but there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of passion in this convention. I am not totally sure that I am even know what makes me think this, but the whole building seems to be full of people who just don't believe that they are going to win.

None of the speakers have really been very good, either. I thought Ann Romney was terrible...fake and overly bubbly and not the least bit likeable. Chris Christie was OK, but he spoke too fast and the message was sort of scattered...a little bit about what is wrong with Obama, a little bit about how we could be better, and a little bit about why Romney is the guy, but none of it really seemed to tie together.

Condi Rice was pretty good, she is just not quite as comfortable in that forum as the other speakers. And they don't really know what to do with her...everyone likes her, but she seems a little bit too connected to W, and the GOP isn't quite ready to remember him just yet.

Paul Ryan...I don't know...he didn't quite do it for me, but it was close. I thought he had a really hard time with the pacing and the applause lines, and especially early on he just seemed really young. He started to get to a good message: "I had as much hope as everyone else did four years ago, but when can we all admit that Barack Obama is a terrible President?", but he didn't really hit that as much as I thought he could have. His opening line included the part about never seeing an incumbent want to talk less about his record, which should have been a great start...but then he didn't talk as much about that record as he should have.

And the entirety of the two nights has been completely devoid of any actual content...which is a problem...

So, I dunno...blah, I guess. I certainly didn't see anything that makes me think any differently than I did a week ago. When November gets here, we will hold out noses and re-elect the same President we did last time.