Well, by my standards, at least, the Democratic Convention was a roaring success. The way I see it, any of these quadrennial affairs in which the Dems don’t come across as totally out of touch, not just with mainstream America, but with each other as well, is cause, if not for celebration at least for thanks that a potential disaster has been averted. It’s true enough that Barack Obama played second fiddle to the Billarys (or speculation pertaining thereto) for three-fourths of the affair, and what was supposed to be Senator C’s “get-on-board” speech on Tuesday seemed more of an invite to join her cruise than his. Her references to Oby were scant and when they came, they conveyed roughly the same level of enthusiasm that I typically feel for my annual prostate exam. Hillary did manage to sound almost convincing on Wednesday, however, when she entered a choreographed motion to have the guy who screwed up the Billary blueprint for eternal world domination nominated by acclamation. As for ol’ Bubba, well, his lips are still pooched out on account of not getting what he wanted and expected and knows he by-God deserved, but since he hates the folks who tried to impeach him almost as much as he hates Oby, he flung most of his sour grapes at the Repubs. It was no surprise that Oby came through with a stem-winder of an acceptance speech, although some people thought the idea of doing it in a football stadium with a backdrop of imposing Doric columns was a bit grandiose. (What happened to the billowing fog? Somebody forget the dry ice?)
Actually, I think it’s a good thing if the Dems are finally catching on to what the Repubs have understood for a long time. Conventions are not really held for the enjoyment or enlightenment of the party faithful. They are spectacles, ideally controlled ones, that represent the campaign’s greatest single opportunity to court those who are not committed to the party or sold on its candidates. The target audience, therefore, isn’t particularly interested in seeing a bunch of pimply, pencil-necked zealots arguing about the precise wording in a platform plank or about much of anything else, for that matter. I mean, if all the folks in the party can’t buy into the party line, what can they expect from a bunch of folks who just tuned in only because they couldn’t stand to watch another “CSI” rerun. The basic problem with Democratic Conventions in recent years has been that they’ve too darned democratic. The Republicans, on the other hand, understand that differences are not meant to be aired (especially in prime time) but played down, or better yet, put down if at all possible. When they strayed from this core principle back in 1992 and 1996 by allowing the lunatic fringe to take the podium in prime time, they scared the sovereign voters so badly that they wound up electing Bill Clinton.
I liked Oby’s choice of Joe Biden as his running mate, if for no other reason that Joltin’ Joe will not shrink from giving the GOP attack machine as good (or bad) as it dishes out. Joe’s also good for a gaffe or two sufficient to send the media into an absolute tizzy.
Meanwhile, Johnny Mac is grinning like the proverbial jackass eating briars after stealing Oby’s post-convention thunder by announcing Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his VP choice. I don't know John Boy, Palin may turn out to be an absolutely brilliant pick, but from a purely tactical standpoint, I have to confess I just can’t see it.
There’s really no need to rehash the downside here, but what the heck? Let’s do it anyway. In an effort to address concerns that he looks and acts like Methuselah’s older brother, McCain gave repeated assurances that he would take extraordinary care in selecting the best qualified person possible to step in if he happened to choke on a prune pit or go all apoplectic and blow out a major artery while trying to turn on his computer. So after the extensive vetting process he promised, he decides that the best possible person to succeed one of the oldest and certainly not one of the healthiest people to hold the most powerful position in the world is someone who built her political resume as the mayor of Mayberry North? My memory hardly serves much better than McCain’s these days, but hasn’t the primary Republican beef against Oby been his lack of experience?
Regardless of how things turn out eventually, don’t be surprised if, initially, at least, Palin’s greatest weakness actually affords her some buffering. Dems who are salivating over the prospect of a Biden-Palin debate might be a little frustrated when their guy questions her grasp of Pakistani politics and winds up coming across as a smug Inside-the-Beltway smartypants trying to embarrass a self-described small-town “hockey mom” who can hardly be expected to know or care about such things in the first place.
Anyone who thinks successful politicians have to be thoughtful and informed, is likely to be a Democrat anyway, and we all know how they’ve fared so far this century. There’s actually a lot to admire about Palin. She walks the way she talks on a variety of issues, and certainly her decision to bear a Down’s Syndrome child makes her opposition to abortion seem a matter of deep principle rather than mere political convenience . Palin’s primary religious affiliation has been with The Assembly of God, a Pentecostal outfit that affirms “Speaking in Tongues” as “The Initial Physical Evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.” I actually think it would be terrific to have a VP who talks in tongues. At the very worst, whatever Palin says in that mode will do the country a lot less harm than the utterances of the odious chicken hawk who currently holds the office to which she aspires.
I have read several reports suggesting that Palin’s selection has persuaded the "Religious Right" to finally hop aboard the Johnny Mac Express. I’d say that depends on who the religious right really is. A gushing Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religion Liberties Commission says Palin is "straight out of veep central casting." Land even claims he urged the McCainers to give her a look-see. This is interesting since the Assemblies of God ordain women as ministers while the SBC does not. In fact, when the group’s annual assembly declared in 2000 that "while both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture," it was Land himself who explained "We, as Baptists, are people of the Book. . . . Most Christian traditions, in most places, in most of the centuries of the Christian faith, have understood that the office of pastor is to be filled by a man."
Just in case you might be thinking that the SBC’s stance on women in the pulpit applies only to the affairs of the church and not the affairs of the world, take a gander at the more far-ranging 1984 resolution on which the 2000 statement is based: “While Paul commends women and men alike in other roles of ministry and service (Titus 2:1-10), he excludes women from pastoral leadership (1 Tim. 2:12) to preserve a submission God requires because the man was first in creation and the woman was first in the Edenic fall (1 Tim. 2:13ff).” If you require further evidence of how extensively some Southern Baptists use greedy ol’ Eve’s first bite of the apple to justify the proverbial glass ceiling, how about the response of Dr. Paige Patterson, President of Southwestern Baptist Seminary in Ft. Worth (and former Southern Baptist Convention president) to a lawsuit challenging his institution’s policy against women teaching theology to men? “ This,” Patterson insisted, “is not a question of occupation. It is a question of an assignment from God, in this case that a woman not be involved in a teaching or ruling capacity over men."
Richard Land’s professed eagerness to place someone whom he would not allow to take the pulpit in his own church only an uncertain heartbeat away from the most powerful position in the world is all too typical of the hypocritical and reckless political opportunism of the Religious Right’s main mouthpieces. But what about the rank and file of the SBC flock? Out of roughly seventeen million Southern Baptists, how many might really be inclined to think St. Paul trumps a not-so-saintly John the non-Baptist?
Palin’s stand against abortion may prove a mitigating factor here., but if I am to believe that Hillary’s gender undercut her effort to win her party’s nod, I don’t feel I am going too far out on a limb to suggest that whether it’s rooted in religious doctrine or simply in plain pure-tee ol’ meanness and ignorance, there’s probably at least as much sexism afoot among the Repubs as among the Demos. So far, it seems to me that the women who are genuinely enthusiastic about Palin are mostly GOP conservatives who had heretofore been lukewarm at best about Johnny Mac. Meanwhile, although the McCain camp obviously thought choosing Palin might win over some hard core Hillary women, this bunch generally seems madder now at McCain than Obama because they are insulted by the apparent presumption that their votes could be secured simply by picking a running mate—any running mate, even an anti-abortion one—of the female persuasion. It may be fitting if this week’s Republican convention is cut short by a hurricane, because this may well have more than its share of stormy weather in the next two months.
