The theme for Tuesday’s Republican National Convention was “Make America Work Again,” and each speaker included an element devoted to the economy in their speeches regardless of what else was on the plate, and to bringing the country together.
It was “domestic policy night” at the RNC, with no mention of foreign policy, let alone Israeli politics, save a nod towards the sacrilege of Hillary Clinton’s role in helping to secure the Iran nuclear deal, and a swift passing mention of the nightmare at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Donald J. Trump Jr. were the two heaviest hitters of the evening, both in their oratorial elegance and in their ability to deliver the goods in terms of content and impact at the microphone.
Christie in particular had the audience literally on its feet repeatedly throughout his speech.
“The facts, and just the facts, lead you to the same verdict,” he repeated to the crowd. “Guilty… ” he inquired at the podium, “or not guilty?”
And the crowd roared back, “GUILTY!”
The verdict delivered by the delegates at the convention, over and over, about the various actions of Hillary Clinton during her tenure as U.S. Secretary of State.
“We know what four years of Hillary Clinton will bring,” he said. “Four more years of Obama with less charm and more lies.”
As for Trump’s oldest son, “father of five, son of my father,” he told the audience that he and his siblings got their education as apprentices “from the time they could walk, learning from those with doctorates in common sense” who worked for Donald Trump.
“As for ‘impossible’ … well, ‘impossible’ was always just the starting point for my father,” Trump Jr. grinned from the podium. “And when they told my father it would be ‘impossible’ for him to succeed in running as a candidate for president 11 months ago,” chuckled the son, “well here we are…”
Former presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson also spoke, underlining the importance of a candidate who is proud to acknowledge “the Creator” as opposed to one who “acknowledges Lucifer.”
Carson went on to say, “One of the things that I have learned about Hillary Clinton is that one of her heroes, her mentors, was Saul Alinsky. Her senior thesis was about Saul Alinsky… This was someone she greatly admired and that affected all of her philosophy subsequently.
“Are we willing to elect someone as president who has as their role model somebody who acknowledges Lucifer?” he asked the crowd — which roared back, “NO!”
Alinsky dedicated his book, ‘Rules for Radicals,’ to “Lucifer, the very first radical” in a sly swipe along with a dedication to his wife Irene.
Carson had abandoned his own run for the White House in March, instead pledging support for Trump’s campaign.
Each of the speakers devoted a portion of their remarks to the issue of unity: unity of the party, and unity of the country. Republican National Convention chairman Paul Ryan emphasized the issue of equality in his own speech, which was focused primarily on keeping the party message itself front-and-center.
“Everyone is equal, everyone has a place,” Ryan. “No one is written off…that is the Republican ideal. And if we don’t defend it, who will?”