For those tuning into the Republican National Convention this week expecting to see chaos as last-ditch efforts to usurp the presidential nomination from Donald Trump clash with his hot-headed supporters, you will probably be disappointed. You will have to be satisfied with every small protest group in the country “clashing with police” outside the convention–as everyone knows the way to get national attention is to just “clash with the police”–even if its just six of you and two cops–just make sure you get on camera because they will be out there looking hard for “clashes with police”.
What you will find if you tune into convention coverage is a lot of confusion. A lot of people will be inside Quicken Loans Arena wondering “How did we get to this point?” And “how did a guy that’s not even a Republican get nominated as our party’s candidate for President?”
That confusion will extend to those who bother to watch more of the convention than just the Donald Trump speech on Thursday night. For several nights, Americans will hear from Republicans that have clear plans for increasing economic opportunity for all people in the private sector, the defense of constitutional rights, attainable immigration controls and strategies to combat Islamic Terrorism. And then on that final night, Donald Trump will get a national stage and mention none of those plans, offer no details on his own proposals and seek to alienate as many people as possible from actually voting for him or anyone actually affiliated with the party in November–and possibly for the rest of their lives (although, Americans have a ten second attention span and even shorter memories–so maybe they will have forgotten everything Trump said by the 2018 mid-term elections).
Since confusion will reign in Cleveland anyway, the GOP may as well pretend like the 2016 Presidential election isn’t even happening–and start a focus on 2018 and 2020. Talk about what can be accomplished in the next two years–even under a “worst case scenario Presidency” (which would be either of the candidates winning) and start touting 2020 White House hopefuls. (Remember, Bill Clinton was the star of the 1988 Democratic National Convention with his long-winded speech that drew jokes from the late night comedians and launched him into the public eye–as opposed to the moribund Michael Dukakis–who was the actual nominee that year.)
I’ve said from the beginning that the Donald Trump campaign has been nothing more than a TV reality show–with the same audience loving every minute of it. And this week’s convention will likely be the high point of the “show” (they even have a guest appearance by Scott Baio!!) But if you are tuning in expecting the catfights and fake hair pulling of the “Real Housewives” variety–you will instead have to settle for the confusion of Ozzy in the “The Osbournes”.
