A Newcomer’s Conventional Impressions

Political conventions can be seductive. They can wear down skeptics, make them begin to believe that the fandangos of a purely ceremonial process actually matter in what might be called the real world. On the morning after Al Gore’s speech, I found myself drawn into discussion with a few colleagues and campaign workers.

Had Gore, we deliberated, “pulled it off?”

What about his delivery?

Did he go too far, speaking so personally about his sister’s death by cancer?

It took a walk outside to break the spell and see the unintended humor in otherwise rational people ponderously assessing the strategic import of Gore’s oratory. This was not, after all, the Gettysburg Address. This was not Churchill rallying London. This was a convention speech by a vice presidential candidate--a puff of political ether that would be forgotten by the weekend. It simply didn’t matter, an observation that only within the vacuum of a political convention would be considered “cynical.”

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I came as a novice to San Diego and Chicago. Whenever I mentioned this to convention veterans, they almost invariably would ask “what do you think?” I never was sure how to respond. All the soaring oratory, the splashes of Americana, the powerful people and familiar television faces--I rode elevators with Larry King and Katie Couric!--frankly had turned my head, left me momentarily dazzled. Also, I was rusty; political conventions are not designed to encourage “thinking.”

Thinking is reserved for the few, for the unseen operatives who were bunkered below the United Center, “vetting”--as it was described--each speech, making sure they stuck to the script. Or who would send down from their suites mimeographed “talking points” for delegates. “What this convention shows is Republican unity,” I was told by more than one Republican in San Diego. “The big story,” I was told by more than one Democrat in Chicago, “is that we are united.”

That both conventions were scripted television shows--three days of prime-time buildup, leading to The Speech--has been noted and noted again. Many political experts put this in a positive light, suggesting it underscored the transfer of power from back rooms to primaries, to “the people.” This happy analysis would have delivered more comfort if the primary system didn’t so often seem like mere pageantry itself, with the front-runners anointed and all but nominated--by whom?--before the pack hits the Iowa cornfields.

On the Democrats’ final day, the Dick Morris bombshell provided the lone exception to the no-news-is-the-only-news rule. For once, the script was misplaced. Beepers chirped. Reporters scrambled. Ashen-faced whips brainstormed new talking points for delegates.

“Here’s the thing,” one young strategist told a compatriot in a Hilton elevator, trying out a line. “Morris was a Republican.”

“That’s the spin,” the other declared, brightening.

“Morris was a Republican.”

“Yep. A Republican.”

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On Monday night here, the night of Christopher Reeve, the three networks combined attracted 25% of the national prime-time audience. The Republicans had managed about the same with Colin Powell. On the Monday night between conventions, the networks had broadcast a Minnesota-Miami preseason football game, a rerun of “Chicago Hope,” and a Pam Dawber movie. The combined prime-time share was, tellingly enough, 47%.

It’s to be expected. As the relevancy of politics diminishes--not to its practitioners, of course, not to the true believers, but to everyone else--its sacred ceremonies naturally lose allure as well. More Americans would have watched if they believed the conventions mattered, or at least promised good theater.

Which is not to buy wholly the conventions-as-artifice line. Conventions always will be important to political people, in the same way trade shows are important to chemical sales reps and podiatrists: An opportunity to catch up with friends, compare notes, check out new products. And they remain vitally important to the warring candidates, in precisely the same way television advertising campaigns are important to, say, AT&T; and MCI. They also can boost host cities, galvanizing civic pride and hope, putting a San Diego “on the map,” underwriting Chicago slum clearance.

A strange-looking fellow, dressed in tattered priestly garments, stopped me last Tuesday a few blocks west of the United Center. He volunteered how amazed he was at the neighborhood transformation. He pointed out where deserted tenements had been cleared for a park, where fresh flowers and trees had been planted at curbside. He had no faith whatsoever that any of it would last after the convention left town.

“It’s almost,” he said, voice full of wonder, “like a mirage.”

And so it all was.