Republican Storm Warnings Ahead?

Check out our up-to-the-minute press coverage of the Republican Convention and the Democratic reaction.

Whether or not Hurricane Gustav was "good" for the Republican Party is an academic -- not to mention deeply cynical -- line of questioning. Yes, the storm may have kept Bush and Cheney from Monday night appearances that would have reinscribed the meme of Sen. McCain as Bush's Third Term, but it hardly relegated the revelations about VP nominee Gov. Sarah Palin, which snowballed throughout the day, culminating in CampbellBrown'sinterview of McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds. CNN's Brown simply refused to let the flak dodge questions about Palin's readiness to take over should McCain become incapacitated. While the McCain camp termed her line of questioning "out of bounds" (pun intended?) and cancelled a Larry King appearance, those in the profession had a different impression: Campbell Brown Caught Practicing Journalism.

It's not as though the opposition isn't on this track: Said Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio, "I won't criticize Palin, because I don't know Palin. I will criticize McCain for choosing her." The New York Times' David Brooks - hardly Karl Marx -- had this to say about the Palin pick: "Rob Portman or Bob Gates wouldn't have been politically exciting, but they are capable of performing those tasks. Palin, for all her gifts, is not. She underlines McCain's strength without compensating for his weaknesses. The real second fiddle job is still unfilled." Will the Republicans' talking points -- Carly Fiorina charging the criticism as sexist attacks against Palin - win the day?

Perspctv.com does show that for once McCain is grabbing a greater share of news and blog mentions, and even Tweets. But it would take further fine tuning of Daylife's Sentiment tool to parse to what extent the discussions are favorable.

The RNC's Macaca Moment?
With little action at the RNC itself until last night, a funny thing happened: C-Span turned over its coverage to all of the protests (including the "RNC Welcoming Committee" and Lobbyists for McCain) which ordinarily get, oh, five seconds of visibility. And it turned out that there was a story there: At the 2004 RNC in New York City, the Bloomberg administration was later found to be guilty of illegally surveilling and manhandling activists. That was pre-YouTube. This time, St. Paul's Finest, working closely with the FBI and Northern Command, raided not only the houses of activists over the weekend, but detained journalists. The most well-known of these was Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman who was arrested last night and freed within a few hours. While i-Witness video worked in the trenches to shoot and archive '04 RNC video, there are already scads of clips up on YouTube. Here's the video of Goodman's rough arrest. Even Dem party elder Donna Brazile was pepper-sprayed.

Last night's schedule -- created on the fly -- featured Lawand Order star Fred Thompson rallying the troops with a history of Sen. McCain's service to his country. Also on the bill were Laura Bush introducing a message from President Bush from the White House, House Republican leader John Boehner (Ohio), Sen. Norm Coleman (fresh from his local -- and tightening -- senate race against Al Franken), with Sen. Joe Lieberman unofficially keynoting the evening. This has pushed Rudy Giulianioff the menu until later this week. Signs proffering the "Country First" theme clearly define the Republican message for this campaign.

A few comments about the RNC's use of technology thus far. It appears that RNC organizers are not usingTwitter as intended. With minor variation, tweets from gopconvention08 read like this: "Watch our LIVE and recorded video here." C'mon guys, get personal!

The Campaign for America's Future is leveraging -- Republicans would say exploiting - Hurricanes Gustav and Katrina -- to lay blame squarely at the feet of the Bush Administration. It's a powerful ad:

Meanwhile, TechPresident's Nancy Scola professes awe of Obama's micro-donation campaign to the American Red Cross: "text GIVE to 24357" -- which she reckons takes all of 15 seconds.