#63 - Convention Recap: War and Terror Edition

Last night in New York, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Senator John McCain started off the Convention on a war footing.

Giuliani Highlights

For those of us who had forgotten, Rudy reminded us that on Sept. 11, 2001, America was attacked by terrorists. He mentioned "Sept. 11" eleven times and "terrorism," "terror," or "terrorist" 38 times. He recalled his first thoughts on that fateful day when he realized the magnitude of what had happened: “Thank God George Bush is our President.” [If we had a nickel for everyone who thought that when they turned on their televisions that morning....]

Rudy reminded us that Saddam Hussein was a threat (there seems to have been some confusion on the point) and that Bush, like Winston Churchill and Ronald Reagan, will remain "rock solid" no matter how he is demonized, ridiculed, and misinterpreted by the media.

"President George W. Bush," said Rudy, "already has earned a place in our history as a great American President."

McCain Highlights

John McCain didn't need to remind us about terrorism. He told us that we are at war (23 times) and that this is a war against evil pure and simple. We are on the side of freedom, and "Only the most deluded of us could doubt the necessity of this war."

So once again, those against Bush's war are enemies of freedom and, in a new twist, outright deluded. (Take that, lefty protester pigs.)

McCain went on to place the Presidential Election itself in the context of the battlefield, although, he made clear, "we are not enemies, but comrades in a war against a real enemy...."

We "take courage from the knowledge that our military superiority is matched only by the superiority of our ideals, and our unconquerable love for them."

And once McCain gets us on this war footing, he takes us straight into the heat of battle:

We fight for love of freedom and justice, a love that is invincible. Keep that faith. Keep your courage. Stick together. Stay strong.

Do not yield. Do not flinch. Stand up. Stand up with our President and fight.

We’re Americans.

We’re Americans, and we’ll never surrender.

Although we do thank the Republicans for reminding us that war and terror lurk around every corner, we have to wonder: is this all they got? Because you can only get away with the "war on terror" excuse for a year, maybe two, before you need to start addressing things like why you've racked up deep budget deficits in record time, or why you've slashed environmental protections while allowing corporate polluters to increase emissions, or why you respond to scientific facts that don't agree with your policies by saying we don't need the science because it doesn't tell us the truth.

Let's hope we'll hear about those things in the days ahead. Otherwise, we're going to take very serious issue with Bush's "place in our history as a great American President." And so will those folks marching across the city, banging on the doors of the Garden.