I need a laptop again so I can “liveblog” these things. Oh well. I was able to Twitter some notes again. First things first: I think this speech was one of McCain’s better ones. He’s done worse, and prepared speaking has never been his strong point. He did well tonight.
For the most part, I found it comparable to Joe Biden’s speech. It did what it was meant to do, attack the other side’s candidate. Although, Palin also had to introduce herself, which I think she did well.
McCain is about to speak, so I can’t get into specifics right now, but I have two nitpicks I’ll expand on after an entry on McCain’s speech. The first is that she faltered a little when she got to foreign policy. You could hear it in her voice; she was clearly uncomfortable there, though she did make a partial recovery, and made it quickly. The other was her statement on opposing the “bridge to nowhere.” That one was…incomplete.
The “he’s an elitist” story of the day is all about Barack Obama’s plans to give his acceptance speech tomorrow in front of a replica of a wall of an ancient Greek temple, column, lintel, and all.
Besides the fact that the entirety of Western culture largely owes its existence to the Greeks, those people who were paying attention in 2004 noted that the setup seemed oddly familiar to one they had seen before.
Oh yes: the stage set up at the Republican National Convention where George Bush gave his acceptance speech.
When blasting someone for doing something, it would do well to make sure your side hadn’t done it before.
