Headlines and Sympathies

In this morning's Bee the column right headline was Race for '08 - Republican Convention - Gala is off to a stormy start FOCUS ON GUSTAV RELIEF SHAKEN BY PALIN DISCLOSURE

Two things seem pretty clear about the state of the election. First, as noted in an earlier post, the performance of the new Governor of Louisiana and indeed the relief agencies in response to Hurricane Gustav seems to have been up to par or better. Most commentators have offered praise to Governor Jindal. True, this hurricane was not of the same force that Katrina was but Jindal's response was far superior to the incompetence of his predecessor. If anything the Gustav may have burnished the reputation of the GOP and helped to separate all republicans from the current president.

Second, when you look at what the Palin nomination has meant to the GOP, it seems to have energized the base very effectively. True organizations like NOW have commented that the Governor is not "their kind of woman" - news flash, their kind only has one party affiliation. But the commentary about Governor Palin's private family issue has been consistently positive not distracting. This further confirmed that Palin lives the philosophy she espouses. Governor Palin said the following (quoted in the Bee) " We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support." The Bee also snuck in that Palin's husband had a DUI (24 years ago). Nice balanced touch.

I do not remember the Bee raise questions of the Obama set on the last night of the democratic convention about the ostentatious nature of the platform from which Senator Obama gave his acceptance speech. Obviously the more important story was what the candidate had to say - but the message from the GOP convention is not on unity or energy or even message but on side details. On the one hand the two strikes offered in the headline at the GOP campaign seem on balance to have strengthened not weakened their hand (although this is still a very close race) and on the other the Bee seems to have ignored an issue that generated a minor storm around the democratic candidate. (They should have.) But fair should apply to both sides.

One who got it right was Senator Obama. He said unequivocally when the scandal mongers began to ply their trade, "families are off limits."