Before we proceed to other matters, just a brief note on how the Republicans don’t get tripped up over fastidious details.
Right at the top of Adam Nagourney’s piece in yesterday’s Times (in the second graf) is this …
Mr. Bush’s advisers said they were girding for the most extensive street demonstrations at any political convention since the Democrats nominated Hubert H. Humphrey in Chicago in 1968. But in contrast to that convention, which was severely undermined by televised displays of street rioting, Republicans said they would seek to turn any disruptions to their advantage, by portraying protests by even independent activists as Democratic-sanctioned displays of disrespect for a sitting president.
Now, let’s pause with this for a moment.
No one believes that any of the protests scheduled for the Republican <$Ad$>convention are sanctioned by the Democratic party. Indeed, far from it — if for no other reason than that implied in the article. Namely, that any violence or ugly scenes or anything really will tend to help the president, rather than hurt him.
It is probably true that most of the more vitriolic protestors don’t even support Senator Kerry, let alone operate with his or his party’s sanction. And I think I can guarentee you that the Democratic party and the Kerry campaign would vastly prefer that Kerry supporters among the demonstrators keep their heads down and their voices low or simply not show up at all — again, for the simply reason I noted above.
There’s no use in belaboring the point since everyone knows this is true. Yet here we have Nagourney’s sources telling him they plan to make the case for a demonstrably false proposition.
Think about that …
