Wednesday at the RNC featured Paul Ryan, many more!

Hello again from Tampa! You can see from the picture above that Honest Abe decided to come to the convention to show his support for Mitt Romney!

Wednesday was a little less hectic day than Tuesday as we only had the evening session to go to which started at 7:00 p.m.  That meant being in the lobby of the hotel to board the buses at 5:00.  One somewhat challenging aspect of having the convention in Tampa is that most of the hotels are at the beaches in Clearwater and St. Pete, where we are.  With light traffic, the ride from St. Pete to Tampa would be 45 minutes or so. However, with all the traffic around the convention center, it is MUCH slower.  Leaving at 5:00 for example, we got there at 6:45, just barely in time for the 7:00 start. 

The bus situation coming home is similar.  We catch one bus from the convention center to Raymond James field.  There they have many more buses broken out by destination. We left the convention at 11:00 p.m. but didn’t get back to the hotel
until 12:45 a.m.   It is a long time to get there and back!

The best thing was that when we walked into the hotel lobby last night, there was food and drinks available!  Thank you Edison International!  I didn’t think I was hungry but the smell of the hot food and yummy rolls was irresistible and the food tasted so good at 1:00 in the morning!

The session last night was really good.  John McCain made the case for America to again be the leader of the free world. Condi Rice adopted a similar theme. 
I heard Senator Rand Paul speak for the first time.  He is, of course, the son of Ron Paul, and he gave a very good talk.  An unexpected delight was hearing from Governor Susana Martinez of New Mexico.  She told of being raised by poor Mexican parents, but who gave her the inspiration to succeed.  She went to law school and then to work as an assistant district attorney, prosecuting cases in defense of children who had been abused or killed.  She then decided to run for district attorney.  A lifelong Democrat, some friends approached her before she ran.  They talked about issues such as fiscal conservatism, the economy, social policies and so forth.  By the time they were done, she looked at her
husband, and said “well, I guess we are Republicans”!

The highlight of the night of course was Paul Ryan.  The crowd went crazy when he came out, with a long standing ovation.  He introduced his family, his beautiful wife and three charming kids.  They were all sitting in a booth not too far
from me.  His mom, who lives in Florida, was there too.  His mother was widowed at age 50, and started her own business to support her family.  As Paul told us that she was his role model, she stood beaming and waved to the crowd, as everyone cheered.   

Paul did a good job elaborating on a lot of the failings of the current administration and how he and Mitt will do better.  A common theme throughout his talk was leadership.  The current President has not been a leader; has not addressed the tough issues, has not been willing to stake out positions and lead the country forward.  A common phrase heard about him was “leading
from behind”.  Paul Ryan promised us that he and Mitt will lead the country forward. That they would take on the tough issues, and win.  It was a rousing talk, greeted with lots of standing ovations and cheers.  It is clear that the delegates are pleased with this choice, and the energy for himwas plain to be seen.

Tonight, Mitt Romney and many others!  Don’t miss it!