Blog by Peter Corkery

For Wednesday night, I was able to get two unique perspectives on the convention. I was able to see them from the floor, as well as getting a bird’s eye view from the Talk Radio News Service skybox. However, no matter how close you get in the RNC, the speaker is still very far away. I believe it stems from a problem with the stage. The stage is so big that one needs the giant LEDs behind it to be able to watch the speaker clearly. If the Republican Party wants to connect with the common man why should they put such a big barrier between the speakers and those loyal members who came to the convention?

The speeches I saw all had the same message but were filtered through different perspectives. Steven Cohen of Screen Machine Industries and Tad True of Bridger and Belle Fourche Pipelines talked about how national policies need to change to help their businesses succeed and to fix the private sector. Gov. Luis Fortuno’s speech discussed his own local economy of Puerto Rico and how the national economy should be fixed. Tim Pawlenty’s speech was more or less a series of jokes on Barack Obama, followed by praising Mitt Romney. The last speech I was able to see was Mike Huckabee’s, whose theme was “we can do better,” where he said that “Mitt Romney would make food stamps obsolete.”

The crowd at the convention loved every speech, cheering at any mention of electing Romney and getting rid of Obama. Most of the TV coverage of the event I have seen has been close up, which makes it odd that during speeches they flash video of attendees clapping. Whether it’s meant for TV or for the attendees, it does add to the spectacle that is the RNC.