The Republican Party’s apprehension over such an event is understandable. The RNC is supposed to be a three-day infomercial for the party that unites Republicans around their nominee for president. Yet, despite the media narrative that Mitt Romney secured the nomination after his Texas primary win, NPR reports that he still doesn’t have enough delegates bound to vote for him on the first ballot at the convention.
Worse yet, there are an undetermined number of delegates that are bound to him that are actually Paul supporters – and who would abandon him and vote for Paul if Romney failed to get 1,144 votes on the first ballot.
None of this is in the RNC script. Neither is a massive rally for the anti-establishment candidate going on at the same time. The party can’t even appeal to Paul to call it off. While Paul’s campaign organized the Rally in 2008 in an act of defiance against a party that had snubbed Paul and his supporters, neither he nor the campaign have anything to do with this one....
This is the kind of enthusiasm that the party’s nominee is supposed to generate, but it’s non-existent for Romney. Despite his primary successes, he’s hasn’t even been able to get his delegates seated in many states where he won the primary by a wide margin. It’s no secret that there is a strong anti-Romney undercurrent among traditional conservatives.
Certainly, no one will be organizing a “Romney Festival” anytime soon.
This puts the party in a difficult position. If they strong arm the Paul supporters by blocking their event, they risk losing their votes. If they acquiesce to allowing the event, their spin doctors will have to work overtime to keep the RNC from looking like an afterthought following a festival for the other guy ten times as large.
Whatever they decide, the 2012 RNC will not follow the usual script. The Ron Paul people just cannot seem to remember their lines.
But it’s going to be fun.
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