DAY 3: Wednesday August 29
Alabama’s Jewish Heart
While I never would have expected to surface in the middle of the Alabama delegation while covering a Republican Jewish Coalition confab for members of Congress it soon became clear that support for Israel runs as bottomless in the Deep South as it does anywhere else in the United States.
This manifested itself when a lone protestor broke the diplomatic protocol that pervaded the get-together by interrupting a speaker and shouting how Israel had to stop oppressing the Palestinians. A security guard quickly ushered the protestor out the same back door where delegates from the heart of Dixie were waiting to board buses to take them to the next-to-last session of the 2012 Republican National Convention. A friendly gentleman who introduced himself as Boyd assured me they could show their Southern hospitality by finding me a seat on their bus.
Being the only person in line who didn’t look like he was from Alabama delegates were curious as to my reaction to the pro-Palestinian protest. My explanation based on personal observation that Arab citizens of Israel as well as Arab residents of the West Bank have a good life compared to their comrades who live in many other Middle East countries seemed to strike a responsive chord.
“There’s a group in California that contributed about $2 million to the SPLC [Southern Poverty Law Center] that solicits funds to fight racial discrimination in Alabama. That’s ridiculous ” said delegate Clara Price from Montgomery who suggested the West Coast donor might be out of touch with today’s Alabama. “You can’t know anything about a place unless you live there ” she added.
Barbecued Ribs and Romney
Reno Nevada is far from Alabama both in mentality and the pace of life but it is home to Ben Farahi a Jewish Republican who has arrived at his own brand of outreach to woo voters to the Romney camp.
An owner of apartment buildings Farahi says that he hosts barbecues for his tenants to draw them their friends and family and of course to chew the political fat along with the barbecued beef. Farahi who is also in the gaming business and is a close friend of billionaire casino mogul publisher and GOP donor Sheldon Adelson is as direct as Adelson himself when it comes to expressing his partisan opinion. “We have a disease infecting America and we have the next two months to try and get rid of it.”
Once I finally got seated on the bus I found myself next to a native New Yorker Patrick Brennan who served as commissioner of agriculture in the administration of former governor George Pataki. Brennan grew up on a family farm and still works there once a week to make sure his brother can get a day off.
While he had to ponder a bit to recall the term chalav Yisrael he said that as part of his job he learned many of the laws of kashrus and worked closely with rabbis who trained him in the terminology and to ensure he would be able to help enforce state laws that dealt with kashrus issues.
But the night belonged to Paul Ryan who took center stage to accept his party’s vice presidential nomination. Ryan’s delivery was level and relaxed having obviously worked on toning down some of his mannerisms that often seemed to give his speech a clipped and edgy tone.
He spoke mainly about the economy. In keeping with the GOP’s theme of “putting Obama on trial ” he condemned the president for cutting the average American out of the nation’s economic recovery plans. Instead of focusing on job creation Ryan charged the president launched “a divisive all or nothing attempt to put the government in charge of health care.”
“Obamacare is 2 000 pages of taxes fees mandates and fines that have no place in a free country.”
“So here’s the question. Without a change in leadership why would the next four years be any different from the last four years?” asked Ryan.
Ryan offered little by way of particulars as to how he and Mitt Romney would do better other than to say their administration was committed to adding 12 million new jobs in the next four years.
They hope they can start by adding the first two new ones on Election Day.
DAY 2: Tuesday August 28
ON THE FLOOR IN TAMPA
Mitt Romney has finally sewn up the Republican nomination for president — getting the nod he has been seeking since his first campaign that fell short in 2007.
It’s taken him five years to earn it. His hardest work is ahead over the next 70 days leading up to November’s Election Day.
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