Before we forget about Tampa, let's take a journey way back to 1956,
when the National Broadcasting Company aired a "reality" television show
so dead-souled and reprehensible that it should rightly absolve the
clan Kardashian of having established certain precedents of televised
societal decline in the HD era. The show of which we speak was, of
course, "Queen for a Day," an interview-based game show in which a
parade of destitute homemakers and housewives competed against one
another for a grab bag of fancy prizes.
To win NBC's boodle, these women would have to tell their stories of misery to interviewer-host Jack Bailey -- and really
sell their saga of destitution. The winners, determined by an "applause
meter," would take home both practical swag like washing machines and
aspirational gifts like family vacations. The winner would also be
briefly crowned, throned and celebrated to the tune of "Pomp and
Circumstance." We'd never hear from those women again, but that wasn't
the point of the show. The important thing to take away was that all of
the brands that had charitably supplied their wares to the network --
along with NBC itself -- were capable of changing lives.
At political conventions, the pomp and the circumstances work much
the same way, except you swap out the charwomen of economic dislocation
for millionaire politicians, competing to win the attention of
billionaires and their donor network, for the purpose of branding a
political campaign as in touch with the common man. Those who take the
stage without stumbling, speak without faltering, and perform well
enough to bring the delegates to rapture can go home with new political
patrons and a higher profile.
And as with "Queen for a Day," the tale of humble upbringings and
hardscrabble origins plays a big role on the convention stage. There's a
reason the phrase "son of a mill worker" has more cultural currency
than "father of a millionaire trial lawyer and skirt chaser."
While both conventions will inevitably put this phenomenon on
display, Republicans have more work to do in demonstrating themselves to
be "in touch with the people" -- simply because they are currently the
party out of power in the executive branch. They rebounded in 2010
without a convention because they had an effective short cut: the words
"Tea Party."But with those words all but banned from the stage in Tampa
(too gauche for this high level of yacht-partying aristos), it fell to
the convention's speakers to offer up themselves as the sons of sea and
soil.
TIM PAWLENTY: "For much of his life, my dad was a truck driver.
My mom was a homemaker. She died when I was 16, and my dad lost his job
not long after that. And I was the only one of the five kids in our
family who had a chance to go to college."
Pawlenty's father was in the Teamsters at a time when high union participation and low economic inequality was the norm.
TED CRUZ: "Fifty-five years ago, when my dad was a penniless
teenage immigrant, thank God some well-meaning bureaucrat didn't put his
arm around him and say, 'Let me take care of you. Let me give you a
government check and make you dependent on government. And by the way,
don't bother learning English.' That would have been the most
destructive thing anyone could have done."
Is there an epidemic of such bureaucrats saying such things? I ask because the GOP platform doesn't actually address this.
RAND PAUL: "My great-grandfather, like many, came to this country
in search of the American Dream. No sooner had he stepped off the boat
than his father died."
Had this actually been an episode of "Queen for a Day," Rand would easily be on the inside track for a new refrigerator.
SUSANA MARTINEZ: "We grew up on the border and truly lived
paycheck to paycheck. My dad was a Golden Gloves boxer in the Marine
Corps, then a deputy sheriff. My mom worked as an office assistant. One
day, they decided to start a security guard business. I thought they
were absolutely crazy -- we literally had no savings -- but they always
believed in the American Dream. So my dad worked to grow the business.
My mom did the books at night. And at 18, I guarded the parking lot at
the Catholic Church bingos."
And the central planners never did seize those bingo parlors, the
end. Actually, this is a pretty great evocation of Romney's strategy for
upward mobility: Borrow money from your relatives.
CONDOLEEZZA RICE: "And on a personal note, a little girl grows up
in Jim Crow Birmingham, the most segregated big city in America. Her
parents can't take her to a movie theater or a restaurant. But they make
her believe that even though she can't have a hamburger at the
Woolworth's lunch counter, she can be president of the United States,
and she becomes the secretary of state."
Legitimately stirring because it was stirringly true. There's a
reason Rice left the stage with many wondering, "Why doesn't she run for
president?" If we were Chris Christie or Marco Rubio, we'd be more than
a little afraid.
-- Patrick Svitek and Nate Willis contributed reporting.
TIM PAWLENTY: "For much of his life, my dad was a truck driver. My mom was a homemaker. She died when I was 16, and my dad lost his job not long after that. And I was the only one of the five kids in our family who had a chance to go to college."
TED CRUZ: "Fifty-five years ago, when my dad was a penniless teenage immigrant, thank God some well-meaning bureaucrat didn't put his arm around him and say, 'Let me take care of you. Let me give you a government check and make you dependent on government. And by the way, don't bother learning English.' That would have been the most destructive thing anyone could have done."
RAND PAUL: "My great-grandfather, like many, came to this country in search of the American Dream. No sooner had he stepped off the boat than his father died."
SUSANA MARTINEZ: "We grew up on the border and truly lived paycheck to paycheck. My dad was a Golden Gloves boxer in the Marine Corps, then a deputy sheriff. My mom worked as an office assistant. One day, they decided to start a security guard business. I thought they were absolutely crazy -- we literally had no savings -- but they always believed in the American Dream. So my dad worked to grow the business. My mom did the books at night. And at 18, I guarded the parking lot at the Catholic Church bingos."
CONDOLEEZZA RICE: "And on a personal note, a little girl grows up in Jim Crow Birmingham, the most segregated big city in America. Her parents can't take her to a movie theater or a restaurant. But they make her believe that even though she can't have a hamburger at the Woolworth's lunch counter, she can be president of the United States, and she becomes the secretary of state."
************* *****