GOP Convention – Day 4: McCain’s night (MULTIPLE UPDATES)

Update 3 – 10:04 PM: They’re showing Mc’s video bio now. I’m actually looking fwd to this speech. For all the differences conservatives have had with him, he’s come a long way and he deserves props for that. Long career in the military, 30 years in Congress. And now, presidential nominee. Congrats, Senator.

— Good grief! What’s with the friggin’ spotlight stuff? Overdone …

– Thanks/praises Pres. Bush – good for him. Now he’ll highlight how he’s a maverick …

– Looks like they caught an anti-war protester.

– Cindy is more my inspiration than I am hers. Praises his mother.

– Transcript of the speech.

– Praises Obama, says we’re Americans first more than party members. But says we’re going to win the election.

– Another anti-war protester caught.

– And again. Idiots.

– Talks about Gov. Palin’s record.

– Mc’s pumped up. “Change is coming.”

– I will veto pork projects, and you will know the names of the pork barrel spenders.

– Supported surge when it wasn’t popular.

– I’d rather lose an election than see my country lose a war. Praises military, General Petraeus.

– What you fight for is more important than the fact that you can fight.

– Says gov’t’s gotten too big thanks to Rs and Ds, and we lost the trust of the American people thanks to a few corruptocrats.

– Education is the civil right of this era. Promotes school vouchers.

– Getting ready to talk energy policy.

– Foreign policy next.

– Shows support for Georgia. Talks about Russia’s aggression.

– He’s showcasing his foreign policy creds now. Really distinguishing himself from Barry O.

– I’ll appoint Dems, Independents in my admin. We need to get things done in Washington – we can share the credit.

– The seriousness of this speech versus Obama’s is very obvious, IMO. Obama’s was almost child-like and petulant at times. McCain’s is adult. I’ve found Mc to be a little negative at times, tho.

– Talks about POW experience. Says it taught him to grow up.

– I’m not president because I think I’ve been anointed to be president.

– There’s the optimism! Excellent.

– My quick review: It certainly wasn’t Palin-esque, but it wasn’t supposed to. His speech was meant to draw contrasts between him and Senator Obama in terms of experience, policy, and how he’ll reach out to both parties to get things done. His most powerful points in the speech were the ones he made about his POW experience, and how it made him a man, and how he segued it into how this country is worth fighting for. The contrasts between McCain and Obama are stark, and I think he made an effective case tonight.

– Now the families are on stage, and they’re playing Heart’s “Barracuda” – nice

– Mc’s gone into the crowd to shake hands. Can’t find where Gov. Palin is.

—
Found another person who thinks the big screen is too much.

Update 2 – 9:27 PM: Ok – Graham and Ridge have spoken. Mrs. McCain is up next.

Is it just me or does anyone thing that big jumbo screen is annoying?

– Wow – great bio video on Cindy McCain. I didn’t know the level of her humanitarian work.

– Good speech. If you didn’t know a lot about her, you definitely do now.

Update 1 – 8:57 PM: Sen. Lindsey Graham will be speaking next. I think I’ll have something else to do until the next speaker, Cindy McCain, takes the stage at around 9:30.

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Well, tonight’s the final night of the GOP convention in St. Paul, and the stage is being set (literally) for Senator McCain to officially accept his party’s nomination of him for POTUS (speech excerpts here). No way he wows the crowd in the way Gov. Palin did last night, but I’m sure it will be moving enough. I’m hearing from multiple sources that Mc is going to take some pretty sharp digs in at Barry Oh! By the way, he’ll be competing with the NFL season-opener, so his ratings probably won’t be as strong as Gov. Palin’s and Obama’s were (of course, they may not have been even without the NFL game). Don Surber, meanwhile, has some advice for Senator McCain.

Here’s tonight’s schedule, and you can view events as they happen on C-SPAN and UStream.

While the mediots and other liberal critics of Gov. Palin are still picking their jaws up off the floor, here’s the latest political news:

—– Hearts were aflutter last week after it was reported that 38 million people watched Barackus descend from above and speak from his Greek temple. Guess how many watched Gov. Palin last night? 37.2 million – and it wasn’t even covered on as many networks as Obama’s:

The Sarah Palin speech generated 37.2 million viewers, just 1.1 million viewers short of Barack Obama’s record-breaking speech on Day 4 of the Democratic Convention. The Palin speech was carried on only six networks while the Obama speech was carried on ten (including BET, TV One, Univision and Telemundo).

Palin attracted a large female audience (19.5 million women, or 4.9 million more than Day 3 of the Democratic Convention).

She attracted more total viewers than La Clinton, too.

Not bad at all for a gal who had to wing her way through some of her speech due to teleprompter issues (. Gosh only knows how Senator Obama would have reacted …

—– And even more great news: Mc was behind Obama by 8 points over the weekend, and has made it up to where they are now tied, as per the latest CBS poll numbers. Keep in mind that these numbers do not include Gov. Palin’s speech. Looking fwd to seeing post-convention poll numbers to see what kind of bounce McPalin will get. On the other hand, Gallup is showing no dent in Obama’s 8 point lead in the daily Obama/McCain tracking polls.

—– Here we go again: Gov. Palin has been accused of “slashing” funds again, this time for special needs children. Like the previous “slashing funds” story, this one, too, has been debunked.

—– Wow … Obama’s now admitting that the surge was a success beyond our “wildest dreams.” He did so in a sit down interview with Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly, which is scheduled to air tonight. Read more and watch a sneak preview vid here. Does this mean he’s going to admit now that he would have voted for the surge had he known then what he knows now? He said back in July he still would have voted against the surge, even knowing then what he knows now.

—– And speaking of Obama, some of his staunch supporters are upset at the cracks Gov. Palin and Rudy took last night at community organizers. Tom Maguire has humorous commentary on the “outrage,” as always. I wonder if those same folks will express outrage, too, over Obama’s dismissal of “small town mayors” as though it’s not a real job? Not holding my breath.

—– Community organizers and their supporters might not have appreciated Sen. Palin’s speech last night, but hockey moms sure did.

—– Even better than a dis from Senator Harry Reid: Radical feminista Gloria Steinem wrote a critical piece on Gov. Palin today, exclaiming, “Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton.” Thank God. (h/t: Carol Platt Liebau)

—– Here’s the Gov. Palin bio video that the RNC didn’t air last night (they will tonight):

Cool.

—– And speaking of videos, the video of Gov. Palin’s youngest daughter Piper giving baby brother Trig a “spit comb” has gone viral. Too cute!

—– The woman who wrote the Us magazine cover story on Gov. Palin that has generated a lot of controversy this week claims she is voting for McCain-Palin. Hmm.

—– Anti-GOP protesters are out in full force today in advance of Mc’s speech. Terrorism-related charges have been filed against some of the ringleaders of the phoney “RNC Welcoming Committee” in St. Paul for the anarchy and chaos they have both promoted and engaged in. Prepare for the howls of “free speech suppression” to commence shortly.