rightReports from the first two days of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee indicate that the atmosphere in the chamber is not just vibrant, but dizzying. Some of us know this feeling; others know this feeling. Republicans and their leaders are currently enjoying the sense of joy that comes from experiencing a near-death experience (or, for those who haven’t, seeing a loss and then a wallet found).
Two days after a failed assassination attempt on Donald Trump, Wisconsin delegates breathed a hysterical sigh of relief as their plane plummeted from 4,000 feet, then discovered they weren’t going to die after all.
For Trump himself, the mood must have been even more ecstatic. In an example of the generosity that comes with happiness, he attended the convention on Monday with his pick of Vice President J.D. Vance and an assortment of other speakers. Trump hates sharing platforms. His speeches were often filled with insults and ridicule. He frowns and accuses, or becomes sulky and moody. Yet he was so ecstatic on Monday that the man whose public gibberish reaches Fidel Castro levels just sat there, grinning, apparently unmoved.
Of course, Trump has a lot to be happy about besides surviving Saturday’s bullets. On Monday, Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismissed an indictment accusing him of removing classified materials from the White House and storing them at his Mar-a-Lago home. He leads the polls in all seven battleground states. I also suspect that Trump is enjoying the unprecedented novelty of taking the moral high ground. After Saturday’s shooting, Democrats expressed sympathy and concern for the former president, and everyone agreed that someone trying to kill him was very wrong. For a brief window, Trump was not only the center of the world’s attention but, uniquely in the life of a man so personally and professionally unhappy, also the voice of ample sympathy.
What a happy chipmunk he is! “I want to try to unite our country, but I don’t know if that’s possible,” Trump said Sunday, trying — we must assume soon — not to be a jerk. “This is an opportunity to bring the country together. I got that opportunity. In these remarks you can hear not only a possible turn to Jesus, but also a sense of doubt that this is because of doing something brave and not The feeling of being admired, praised and respected for saying or doing something rancid.
Which brings us to Ohio’s junior senator, Vance, a recent convert to Trumpism and hard-line Catholicism. Seeing Vance, I couldn’t help but recall a time not too long ago, when former Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan was considered the embodiment of evil in rhetoric—Ryan wanted to privatize Medicare and lower the top tax rate to 25%.
How innocent we are. Vance is a bearded adult Chucky who may be more strictly a Trumpist supporter than its founder. In addition to Vance’s strong stance on tariffs, his apology for the events of January 6, and his opposition to abortion rights even in cases of rape, it’s worth remembering that his best-selling 2016 memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy,” One of the key points is that poor people shouldn’t be able to eat steak just for rice and beans. To English ears, everything Vance said had a hint of the workhouse behind it.
So did the convention itself, a reminder that whatever the Republicans’ shortcomings, they did perform better than the Democrats. To wit: Rudy Giuliani sidled precariously into a folding chair; model and TV personality Amber Rose opened as keynote speaker (Rose once hated Trump, if not for being apologetic) , you could simply tell the Republicans that this detail might be used against her at the convention) I can’t believe someone so sexy showed up to support them).
Delegates were also joined by failed British politicians, some wearing symbolic ear bandages and T-shirts bearing a picture of Trump’s undefeated appearance on Saturday, including Liz Truss and Boris Johnson ‧Boris Johnson, they are all committed to getting someone, anyone, to attend their events. Like everything Trump touches, the tone of it all has a sense of inauthenticity that can only be described as camp, further proving what we already know; no incident is serious enough to turn these clowns into Become a serious political figure, fit to run the most powerful country on earth.
