Republican National Convention

NEW YORK - All in all, the best route to the biggest show in town is to walk down Broadway. You begin at 51st Street where Mamma Mia! has posted the sort of reviews that President Bush can only dream of: "JUST SIT BACK AND LET THE JOY SWEEP OVER YOU!!!" Then you continue on downtown past the street where The Lion King is reigning in perpetuity and through the buffed-up and de-sleazed Times Square. You may have to walk around the Falun Gong folks who are equal-convention-opportunity demonstrators.

Last week, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal called on his fellow Republicans to stop being "the stupid party" Yet in his recent column, commentator Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. made it clear that if he got the memo, he chose to ignore it ("The vast left-wing conspiracy," Feb. 3). There's not enough space in your entire Sunday edition to point out all the things Mr. Ehrlich routinely gets wrong. But this time there was one thing that stood out as an especially excellent example of the "stupid" Governor Jindal was referring to. The "you didn't build that" remark, which Mr. Ehrlich erroneously referred to as President Obama's "rhetoric" from the 2012 campaign, was actually part of a longer quote that the GOP took completely out of context, then used as their theme at the Republican National Convention in what may be the lamest move in presidential campaign history.

NEW YORK - I've been going to political conventions - Democrat and Republican - for 32 years, and I've never seen a bigger disconnect between what is actually going on at the convention and the way it is being reported. The networks decided to skip the opening night of the Republican convention. So unless you were one of the fewer than 10 million Americans who tuned into Fox News Channel, CNN, MSNBC or C-SPAN to hear Sen. John McCain or former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, you'd have no idea how powerful a case these two men made for George W. Bush's re-election.

Perhaps it was the expectations raised by his far more eloquent appearances at earlier conventions, or maybe it was the modest ambitions he embraced, or that he labored in the shadow of Bill Clinton's rousing defense of his administration, but even the most hard-core Democrat would have to concede that President Barack Obama's acceptance speech to his party's national convention was neither especially memorable nor ambitious. If the message of the Republican National Convention can be distilled to, as Mr. Clinton memorably described it, "we left him a total mess, he hasn't cleaned it up fast enough, so fire him and put us back in," then perhaps the Democratic National Convention might be boiled down to "we're doing the best we can with this mess so be patient, and, oh, by the way, that other guy would be a lot worse.

Emil B. Pielke, a former state legislator who was to serve as a delegate at this year's Republican National Convention, died of pancreatic cancer Friday at Greater Baltimore Medical Center. He was 66. Mr. Pielke had lived in Towson for two decades and had been active in the Maryland Republican Party since the 1970 legislative session. He took over the seat of Del. James M. Kelly when Mr. Kelly left for a job in the Bush administration in August 2001. Mr. Pielke was appointed to the position in January 2002.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - "Mac is back" chanted John McCain's supporters when the Republican candidate staged his seemingly impossible comeback in this year's primaries. Last night, the old Johnny Mac was back on display, claiming his party's nomination in a setting meant to evoke his anything-goes town hall events. Standing on a narrow stage amid a sea of supporters, he reprised trademark lines and themes from his stump speech and, in a way that convention planners did not always intend, recreated the spirit and excitement of his campaign rallies.

LANCASTER, Pa. - While campaigning through Pennsylvania yesterday, Sen. Barack Obama contended that his opponents are more focused on attacking him than providing solutions for the nation's economy. A day after a series of speakers at the Republican National Convention - including vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin - blasted Obama as an out-of-touch liberal with no executive experience, Obama told a group of about 30 workers at a hydroelectric power company in York, Pa., that he was surprised there has been so little discussion of the state of the economy at the convention.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and national Republicans made offense their best defense last night, turning a week's worth of questions about the vice presidential nominee's experience and "reform" image against their Democratic rivals. Largely unknown outside of Alaska a week ago, Palin was the unquestioned star in the Xcel Energy Center on the third night of the hurricane-shortened Republican National Convention. Delegates showered her with a prolonged standing ovation - a stark contrast to the media hazing she faced over the past several days, as a stream of personal and political revelations raised questions about how thoroughly McCain had vetted her. The first female member of a GOP presidential ticket, who styles herself "a hockey mom," showed she could deliver a body check.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Republicans got back to the business of politics last night, shuffling their president out of prime time and beginning the condensed mission of contrasting John McCain with his Democratic opponent. Seeking to wrest control of their convention from Hurricane Gustav, the GOP focused on "country first," a theme that ran from the opening prayer to the closing speech and was written on screens across the Xcel Energy Center. The program focused on reintroducing voters to the presumptive Republican nominee, his family, his military and public service, and his time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - A prolonged, thunderous roar greeted Sarah Palin last night as the newest Republican star joined a long line of the party's media scourges, including former Maryland Gov. Spiro T. Agnew, who stood in her place 40 years ago. Boos rained down when she added her voice to John McCain's new campaign counterattack against the news media in the aftermath of unflattering publicity about Palin and how she was chosen. But in confidently introducing herself to the nation, the Republican vice presidential candidate chose another vice president, a Democrat, Harry S. Truman, as a model for comparison.

Democrats and Republicans can surely agree on one thing - if the presidential election were a popularity contest (which it isn't, as Al Gore famously observed when he ran against the affable George W. Bush), the current incumbent would be a shoo-in for reelection. No offense to Ann and Mitt Romney, but if there's one thing that Barack and Michelle Obama have, it's star power, a point made clear early in the Democratic National Convention. But President Obama isn't running for class president or Homecoming King.

- For three days, they hobnobbed with Republican stars, were pursued by reporters, cast ballots for their party's presidential nominee and generally had a taste of life at the center of the political universe. Today, Maryland's delegation to the Republican National Convention returns home to a state where Mitt Romney is given little chance of carrying in November and a slate of congressional candidates is being heavily outspent in every district but one. In other words, state Republicans come back to reality.

TAMPA, Fla. - Former Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. rushed through a convention hall that holds more than 15,000 journalists to get to an interview about why Republican nominee Mitt Romney should be elected president. Across town, Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley was telling a room packed with cameras and national political reporters why that same nominee would be a disaster for the nation's economy. As delegates went through the formal process of nominating their candidate at the Republican National Convention on Tuesday, much of the messaging that will actually reach voters back home was taking place offstage as an army of political surrogates threw jabs and deflected counterpunches under the glare of studio lights.

One in a series of profiles of Maryland delegates to the Republican National Convention JoAnn Fisher readily acknowledges she's a bit of an oddity in her Prince George's County community. She is, after all, a Republican. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by a ratio of 9-to-1 in the county in suburban Washington. She also has a different take on President Barack Obama than many of the delegates here at the Republican National Convention: As an African-American woman, she says, she's proud of the president and feels she can in some ways relate to him. But that's where her relationship with the Democrats ends.

As the 2012 Republican National Convention gathers in Tampa, I find my thoughts going back nearly half a century, to San Francisco in 1964. It was the first political convention I covered as a reporter, and it was the one at which Sen. Barry Goldwater of Arizona was nominated for president. Then, as now, the air was filled with far-right conservative demands for restraints in the size and reach of government, capsulated in Goldwater's rousing call to the delegates: "I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.

Reality isn't supposed to intrude on a major political party's national convention, so after weathering the bluster of a Missouri Senate candidate last week, Republicans are understandably frustrated by the presence of yet another storm, this one the literal kind. Tropical Storm Isaac poses a serious threat to the Gulf states and could easily worsen and even slam into New Orleans - on the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Republicans must feel as if a higher power (or at least the Weather Channel)

If this thing sticks, Gennifer Flowers could get to sing the National Anthem at the Republican National Convention.Who needs the B-2 bomber? We have the Washington Redskins.

Q. What act could follow the Olympic Games? A. The Republican National Convention.President Dole promises a tax cut to everyone in America and if that won't get him there, nothing will.Democrats have become the party of law and order and Republicans the party of civil liberties. This confuses everyone.After decades of building subdivisions without schools, Baltimore County is shocked to find its schools are where no kids live.Pub Date: 8/07/96

He's a rookie in Congress, but Rep. Andy Harris is positioned to become a GOP heavyweight in Maryland. As delegates from across the country converge at the Republican National Convention this week to nominate Mitt Romney for president, the first-term lawmaker from Cockeysville is the state's highest-ranking elected official to attend. And while his role will be limited - he is not a delegate - his efforts at getting fellow state Republicans elected in November have been extensive.

TAMPA, Fla. -- Maryland's delegation to the Republican National Convention doesn't include any headline speakers, but there is a nationally recognized figure within its ranks: Anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist. Norquist, the founder of Americans for Tax Reform, is staying at the same Tampa hotel as the 37 delegates, 34 alternates and party guests this week. Norquist, who lives in Washington, reached out to Maryland Republican leaders months ago to request four rooms from their hotel block.