Blue Lives, Grey Hair and Purple Prose: 12 Takeaways from a Crazy Week in Cleveland

The Republicans had met before in Cleveland. It was 1924. The city and country were booming, and the Grand Old Party was confidently in charge. The GOP’s convention, though, was as dull as its nominee, Calvin Coolidge, who had moved into the White House the previous year after Warren Harding’s sudden death.

History was not to repeat itself this week when the Republicans returned to Cleveland. Gone were the party’s Cadillac precision and patrician manner. Production snafus, crowds chanting for the arrest of their opponent, treachery in prime time – and that was before Donald Trump, the greatest showman to hit American politics, took the stage.

I attended the convention as an observer. Here are 12 moments I thought  helped define the event, and why they will matter come November:

1. Donald Trump frames the ballot question: Do you feel safe?

If anyone thought Trump would temper his rhetoric for the general election, his acceptance speech Thursday night provided a clear answer. He intends to double down on fear.  His message was simple: “I will be the law and order candidate.”

In a 75-minute speech that was stern in tone and grim in outlook, he described chaos in America’s cities, rooted in gun violence and police killings that have unnerved the country. He also vowed to suspend immigration from countries linked to terrorism, including Syria, which he suggested was using the refugee system to infiltrate the U.S. with terrorists. In a preview of his campaign’s primary message, he described Hillary Clinton’s legacy in four simple words: "death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.”

Trump’s speech was a hit with delegates, many of them old enough to remember Richard Nixon’s law and order speech at the party’s 1968 convention in Miami. Its purple prose lacked the poetry of Nixon's speechwriter Pat Buchanan. (“As we look at America, we see cities enveloped in smoke and flame. We hear sirens in the night.”) But it could have a similar impact, by drawing a hard line between candidates, and forging a harsh question – do you feel safe? -- on every ballot.

 2. Blue voices matter, too

The killing of three police officers in Baton Rouge, La., dominated the first day of the convention and stayed a part of most conversations throughout. Trump set the tone on Day One by calling Fox & Friends to attack the Democrats for being soft on Black Lives Matter. The next night, the convention featured Milwaukee sheriff David Clarke, who is black and drew a rousing ovation when he declared “Blue lives matter.” It was a line repeated all week.

The message may become a wedge among suburban white voters, particularly women, who have not been Trump's strong suit. Republican strategists believe their Democrat rivals have not distanced themselves sufficiently from the BLM movement. As they roll out more police chiefs like Clarke, they hope to shift attention to a perceived association between the Democrats and BLM.

 3. Not quite ready for prime time

All political conventions are theatre; Cleveland’s got closer to reality TV. As soon as the speaker lineup was released, it was mocked for its B-list talent that featured the likes of Scott Baio, a 1970s sitcom star, and Antonio Sabato Jr., a former underwear model and soap-opera star. Many better-known figures were reported to have turned down invitations, to avoid any association with Trump.

The talent draw was quickly overshadowed, though, by a plagiarism scandal surrounding Melania Trump’s speech, which had passages lifted from a speech by – of all people – Michelle Obama. A junior staffer eventually accepted blame for the error.

The convention organizers tried to turn things around on the second night, with two Trump children – Tiffany and Donald Jr. – and an eclectic mix of entrepreneurs and self-made success stories that represent the campaign’s can-do ethos. There was Dana White of the UFC, former soap star and avocado farmer Kimberlin Brown, LPGA golfer Natalie Gulbis, and Kerry Woolard, the general manager at Trump Winery.

Even then, the stage managers seemed unable to stick to schedule, a capital offence for anyone on live TV. On Monday, a procedural dispute by members of the Colorado delegation threw off everyone’s timing and kept one of the party’s new political stars, Iowa senator Joni Ernst, off stage until after 11 p.m. Ernst is everything Trump needs to project – female, 46, an Iraq War veteran, strongly conservative. She ended up speaking to a largely empty arena.

On Tuesday, another minor delegate protest forced an inconsequential vote recount, leaving prime time viewers to watch Paul Ryan, speaker of the House of Representatives, explain an arcane procedural rule to his bemused audience. Then on Wednesday, another Trump child, Eric, was forced to speak through an electronics glitch that left the screen behind the 32-year-old flashing erratically before it blacked out.

The campaign team may be suffering from the same curse that befalls many fast-growing start-ups. Its small, tight-knit management group, which is dominated by Trump and his children, pulled off one of the greatest primary upsets ever. But a general election is a different game. Team Trump won the nomination with 14 million votes. To win the White House, they will need close to 70 million – and a lot of organizational strength to reach them.

 4. Donny Football: An improvisational quarterback goes pro

Everyone expected Trump to be Trump – impulsive, erratic, unpredictable, creative. He didn’t disappoint. To introduce his wife Melania, he made an Apprentice-like entrance on the main stage, complete with clouds of fog, Hollywood lighting and the unsanctioned use of the rock group Queen’s “We are the Champions.”

Even on the main stage of U.S. politics, Trump seems determined to play without a playbook. At the convention, leading Republicans said he talked privately about winning predominantly liberal states such as California and Oregon, perhaps even his home of New York – states where he is consistently 10 points or more behind Hillary Clinton. As his son Donald Jr. put it, “impossible” is a trigger word for Trump.

Facing the impossible in such states, Trump acolytes tried to borrow the nickname Superman from Cleveland’s basketball hero, Lebron James. Another local sports figure sprang to mind, too: the Cleveland Browns’ fallen quarterback, Johnny Manziel, who was an improvisational, unpredictable star in college, where he won the Heisman Trophy and was nicknamed Johnny Football, and was a disaster in the NFL, where he was cut after his second season. Manziel’s fate, compounded by substance abuse, illustrated the frequent demise of college football stars who fail to adjust to the more complex, faster and physically unforgiving nature of the pros. Same can be said for the transition from primaries to the general election. Trump’s improvisational rhetoric, so effective in garnering attention in the early rounds, could leave him vulnerable during the open campaign when many more voters are paying attention and special interest groups are as focussed as a blitzing linebacker.

 5. The best defence is a good offence

If the convention had a unifying theme, it was the character of Hillary Clinton. Speaker after speaker attacked her moral code and that of her husband Bill. In a dramatic display of base politics, Chris Christie used his slot to carry out a mock prosecution of the Democrats’ presumptive nominee. His arguments were neither new nor revelatory, largely focussed on her conduct as Secretary of State during the Benghazi debacle in Libya. But he served a purpose by fomenting the crowd, which chanted “guilty’ and “lock her up” after each of his allegations. Delegates talked about it as a convention highlight.

Such polarizing politics are good for fundraising, and the Trump campaign is in need of help. The Democratic campaign and its associated superPACS have already outspent Trump by more than four to one. The Clinton attacks will also be important come November 8, in mobilizing anti-Trump conservatives to vote. His organizers concede their best hope still is to make the election a referendum on her, rather than one on him.

 6. A party divided

Cleveland was supposed to be about bringing a badly fractured party together. The GOP has been tearing itself apart for years – going back to Ross Perot’s campaign as an independent in 1992 and carrying through the Tea Party uprising. This time around, it’s threatened by a popular Libertarian candidate, who will drain support on the far right, and the agony of centrist Republicans, who cannot bring themselves to vote for Trump. Paul Ryan, one of the most respected figures in the party, pleaded with delegates to unify. At the same time, he seemed to have trouble expressing support for his party's candidate and platform.

The convention was also marred by the absence of many GOP blue-bloods, from the Bush family to the party’s 2012 candidate Mitt Romney. Senator Marco Rubio, running for re-election in Florida, spoke to the convention only by video, for two minutes. The party’s two biggest figures in Ohio, Governor John Kasich and Senator Rob Portman, stayed well away, too. In a speech just two blocks away from the convention, Kasich took aim at the Trump platform and urged Republicans to remain open to both immigration and trade, which he said are essential to Ohio’s economy.

None of that seemed to matter on the convention floor, where the Republican old guard of cocktail conservatives was greatly outnumbered by Trump insurgents. One Congressman said his party had gone from resembling a country club to feeling now more like a truck stop. He meant that in a good way. Except when it came to the party platform.

Rather that reconciling Trump’s heterodox views with the party’s traditional agenda, delegates voted to adopt a platform that would make abortion illegal under any circumstances, require the Bible to be taught in public schools, bar female soldiers from combat, allow for discrimination based on religious beliefs, and rejects the idea of stronger gun controls. Trump pledged in his convention speech to defend LGBTQ rights, even though his platform calls for banning same-sex marriage and empowering states to determine which bathrooms transgender people can use.  

7. The GOP makes a play (again) for urban America

Of the last six elections, the GOP has won the popular vote only once, in 2004, largely because of its disconnect with urban America. Cleveland was a chance to change that. The Republicans won’t win the Democrat stronghold, but they could have sent a signal to Rust Belt cities – Green Bay, Pittsburgh, Toledo – that Trump speaks their language. There was plenty of political opportunity to do so.

On the west side of Cleveland is a swath of urban blight that the GOP normally loves to associate with failed social programs. The city’s population is down by one quarter since 2000. Its median income is less than half the national number. And its per capita income is more than $10,000 less than the national average of $28,555.

Next to the despair, there’s also hope that the GOP could have seized upon. On the east side of the city is a thriving health care hub based around the Cleveland Clinic, Ohio’s biggest employer with 115,000 staff from all over the world and a leader in the use of artificial intelligence to transform medicine. It’s a shrine to free enterprise and free trade, traditional GOP pillars.

Trump’s primary wins were based largely on rural and semi-urban counties, where voters tend to be more conservative, as well as easier to reach. To win the swing states of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan in a general election, his campaign will have to connect with at least some urban poor and a lot of urban professionals.

 8. Trading contradictions

Trade is the elephant in the Republican tent. The party of free trade now has a platform that calls for a wall along the southern border with Mexico, labels China a “pirate economy” and threatens to tear up a host of trade agreements.

Enter Mike Pence, the decidedly bland Indiana governor who is on the Trump ticket to both secure Christian conservative support and assure trade-minded Republicans that all is not lost. Pence spoke to the convention Wednesday night about his state's economic success, which is very much rooted in trade, especially with Canada. He's led trade missions to China, Japan and Germany, and convinced several Canadian firms to move operations to Indiana to take advantage of NAFTA, lower taxes and looser labour laws, the traditional GOP trifecta.

While Pence will be trying to hold support of the GOP’s business class, he’ll have to balance that with Trump’s appeal to blue-collar disenfranchisement. Even in Pence's Indiana, where manufacturing job loss has been significant, the party is at risk of losing a Senate seat that it won in 2010.

Republican Congressmen seem determined to keep following the party's traditional course on trade. Kevin Grady, Chair of the House Ways and Means committee, said he intends to push for ratification of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, regardless of who is in the White House. As the election wears on, such conflicts may rise to the fore, requiring Trump to be more blunt about his willingness to go against the Congressional wing of his party, and perhaps even his running mate.

9. Can down-ballot Republicans sequester themselves from Trump?

The Republican gaming of Trump support will be as interesting as the campaign itself. Few down-ballot candidates seem to know how to position themselves, but many seem willing to find ground that's a safe distance from the presidential nom. Congressional representatives, who must seek re-election every two years, may be more immune from the Trump factor; they tend to be associated with local politics and issues. The Senate races – 24 Republican seats are in play  –  will be more tense, as just the loss of four seats for the GOP could swing control of the upper chamber back to the Democrats. Among those under pressure are Rob Portman in Ohio, Marco Rubio in Florida, Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania, and New Hampshire’s Kelly Ayotte. In Indiana, the Democrats are fielding a former Senate heavyweight, Evan Bayh, who announced just before the GOP convention he was re-entering politics.

The Senate outcome will be critical to the appointment of Supreme Court justices, starting with the one to replace the late Antonin Scalia, which is why the Christian right is likely to throw a lot of resources at Senate battlegrounds.  In his speech to the convention, in which he refused to endorse Trump, Ted Cruz urged his many followers to look “up and down the ballot” for candidates who support the U.S. constitution as it was written. His subtle message: originalists can abstain from the presidential choice while using the rest of the ballot to support conservative candidates for Congress.

10. Electoral college math that doesn’t add up (yet) for Trump

The U.S. presidential system is not a straight popular vote covering the entire country; rather, votes are, for the most part, apportioned on a state-by-state, winner-take-all system. That means the contest tends to come down to a handful of populous swing states, such as Florida and Ohio.

It’s a system not always suited to an air-war candidate like Trump. For him to win the White House, he needs to sweep all of the states won by Mitt Romney in 2012, plus Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. The Republicans have not won Wisconsin since 1984. It would help enormously to win Florida, which is Trump's home away from New York, but he would still need a few Great Lake states. (His hope for Western swing states such as Colorado and Nevada seem lost to his inability to attract Hispanic support.) 

To get beyond Romney’s results, Trump supporters think he need not play for new demographic groups bit can expand his white, working-class base in the Rust Belt. That was Romney’s hope, too. The result: while he won 64% of non-college-educated whites, he still lost 10 of 11 swing states.

11. The GOP's demographic deficit

During the GOP’s glory days under Ronald Reagan, the electorate was 80% white. This year, it will be down to 62%. The crowd inside Cleveland's Quicken Loans arena, with its sea of white faces and grey hair, didn't shout change.

Enter Darrell Scott, an African-American preacher from nearby Cleveland Heights. Scott raised the roof Wednesday night with a fiery speech that talked about “one America” but was aimed at black voters who might find inspiration in Trump’s can-do spirit. He decried the rise of gun violence, the decline of incomes and the growth of racial tensions during the Obama years. Trump, of course, has a mountain to climb there. In a July 13 poll, he polled zero percent support among African-American voters in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Trump has a different mountain to climb with the larger and more politically mobile Latino population, which the GOP has been trying to woo for a generation. Trump is currently polling in the mid-teens among Hispanics – less than half what George W. Bush drew when he won re-election in 2004. As one Republican pollster pointed out, since Bush left the White House, about nine million Hispanic Americans have reached voting age. That’s roughly equal to the entire voting population of Ohio.

12. The voice of a new generation

When Ivanka Trump took to the stage Thursday night, the 34-year-old seemed to speak over the cheering audience and appeal directly to her 1.4 million Facebook fans. “Like many of my fellow Millennials,” she said, “I do not consider myself categorically Republican or Democrat.”

It’s fair to say no convention speech has ever expressed such partisan ambiguity, but that’s what makes the race for Millennial votes so curious.  Bernie Sanders changed everyone’s political calculus by crushing Hillary Clinton with voters under 35. Now, Republicans are wondering if they can cut into the Democrats’ youth base. Ivanka will be their voice, especially among the Millennial women who Clinton has such difficulty reaching. Trump, a mother of three and executive in her father’s company, devoted most of her speech to gender equality, with a focus on young working mothers. She described her father’s support for women –  they outnumber men in executive ranks –  and his apparent commitment to labour law reform to support working mothers.

Her most important message may have been to Millennials who have little faith in any form of politics. Referring to her father as “the people’s candidate,” she portrayed him as the sort of independent that Sanders personifies. “Real change,” she said, “is only going to come from outside the system.”

Pollster Frank Luntz shared his insights on Millennial voters, suggesting they are more anti-government than even Trump’s blue-collar supporters. His polling indicates 58% of millennials believe socialism is a better economic model than capitalism. That poses a challenge for Trump – except for the fact that roughly the same number of Millennials believe government is to blame for America’s problem. They want a disruptor.

With 69 million voters, the Millennial generation (18-35) will outnumber Baby Boomers (52-70) for the first time, making them the largest age group in the electorate. Ironically, all those voters born in the 1980s and '90s face a choice between two candidates born in the 1940s. Expect to see a lot more of Ivanka, Donald Jr., Eric and Tiffany – and a lot more from Trump himself trying to appeal to disenchanted Sanders supporters.

*********

In 1924, when Republicans held their staid convention in Cleveland, the Democrats gathered in New York and were soon embroiled in a melee over Tammany Hall corruption and party ties to the Ku Klux Klan. The so-called Klanbake at Madison Square Gardens has been called the "wildest convention in U.S. history." This week, a very different Democratic Party meets in Philadelphia, where far fewer fireworks are expected. I will attend as an observer, and share more thoughts through the week.