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“Guess where I am?”
It was the summer of 1992, and I could barely make out my father’s question.
“Where?”
“I’m on the third baseline of the Astrodome. On the field! Right where Ken Caminiti plays!”
Dad was speaking my language. At 7 years old, I may not have known who Dan Quayle was, but I definitely knew the Astros’ third baseman.
“Watch for me.”
And so I tuned into my first convention, at least, that I can remember. To my disappointment, Dad wasn’t reporting from a baseball diamond. The 1992 Republican National Convention was packed with people in silly hats, draped in banners and flags. They cheered speakers in suits and danced during breaks. When the speeches were done, Tom Brokaw appeared to tell us what they meant. The common connective tissue was red, white, blue. Even at 7, I knew this celebration of the American democratic experiment mattered.
Even at 7, I knew this celebration of the American democratic experiment mattered.
But conventions probably mattered for me more than most. My parents met at the 1980 Democratic National Convention in New York City. Dad was an aide to Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Mom was a writer for the Village Voice. There’s nothing like tracing your eventual birth back to the Carter-Mondale campaign.
Four years later, the DNC served as the defining moment of my father’s political career. Before becoming the revered moderator of “Meet the Press,” he spent a distinguished decade in New York politics. First in Buffalo, then with Moynihan and eventually with Gov. Mario Cuomo. The 1984 DNC in San Francisco bore witness to Cuomo’s heralded “Tale of Two Cities” speech. As the governor’s counselor and communications director, Dad helped write more than 60 drafts. Line by line, Cuomo shattered Ronald Reagan’s presentation of America as a shining city on the hill and reminded folks about the dark forgotten side of Reagan’s idealistic American projection.
I think Dad knew he’d never top that — and switched careers.
My first convention was the 2000 RNC in Philadelphia, holding my father’s duffel bag of research. I don’t recall much aside from Dad putting me on the spot to do an imitation of The Rock, in front of the WWE star, in the NBC booth. In 2004, I watched a state senator from Illinois deliver the speech that would launch him on a path to the White House; I watched New Yorkers pay tribute to President George W. Bush’s perfect first pitch at the 2001 World Series at Yankee Stadium, thrown while Ground Zero was still a smoldering heap of dust and debris. The video narrated by the late Sen. Fred Thompson brought the entire convention to tears.
Dad died on June 13, 2008. I gave a eulogy that resonated with a lot of people — including TV executives at NBC — who gave me the unique opportunity to launch my reporting career from the 2008 conventions. They were familiar ground. My Dad believed they showcase the best of American democracy. “Conventions are where you tell the people who you are, what you’re about,” he once told me. Each side pumping up their candidate and having a conversation with the nation, free from censorship or sabotage.
I don’t think in his darkest thoughts, he’d ever imagine an America where democracy could very well be at stake. He passed away a few days after The Economist published a cover of John McCain and Barack Obama titled “America at its best.” He died when our presidential election was between a popular maverick and a young senator headlining a historic campaign. The election of America’s first Black president was supposed to be the start of a more unified post-racial society, but instead turned into a long-drawn-out campaign of division and disdain.
I witnessed the beginning. I watched Obama accept the nomination from inside a football stadium. Just a few decades after Black Americans achieved equal access to the ballot box. A wave of change was churning deep. I was on the convention floor in Minneapolis when Sarah Palin stole her running mate’s thunder and launched the underpinnings of what is now the MAGA movement. I felt bad for McCain, ever the loyal soldier to his party, as he got sucked into a vortex he could no longer control. It was evident he was uncomfortable with what had spawned.
At the Tampa RNC in 2012, just two years after the ascension of the tea party, GOP nominee Mitt Romney, a humble and decent man, said he wished Obama “had succeeded because I want America to succeed. But his promises gave way to disappointment and division. This isn’t something we have to accept.”
Can you imagine hearing that today at a Republican convention?
I watched 2016 on TV, thankful to be out of politics. Yet, I felt an urge to participate. Conventions have that power. But I didn’t return for another eight years. This week, I’m back in Chicago. Back where it all started personally and professionally.
Yet, there’s a gutting feeling this could be the last.
As my former colleague Brian Williams framed it so eloquently during his last MSNBC show:
The truth is I am not a liberal or a conservative, I am an institutionalist. I believe in this place, and in my love of country I yield to no one. But the darkness on the edge of town has spread to the main roads and highways and neighborhoods. It is now at the local bar and the bowling alley, at the school board and the grocery store. And it must be acknowledged and answered for. Grown men and women, who swore an oath to our Constitution — elected by their constituents, possessing the kind of college degrees I could only dream of — have decided to join the mob and become something they are not, while hoping we somehow forget who they were. They’ve decided to burn it all down with us inside. That should scare you to no end.
The former firefighter’s warning did not fall on deaf ears. It’s OK to be scared. These are not normal times. Not long ago, the events of Jan. 6 would have forced a national party into some soul-searching. Instead, the GOP has reverted to the mean — and nominated the man responsible for the domestic terrorist attack at the Capitol. Loyalists who do not believe the results of the 2020 election occupy important electoral positions in pivotal states. By design, it’s now harder to vote in many places in America than it was four years ago.
Experts on authoritarianism watched this year’s RNC with alarm. Attendees yelled “Fight! Fight Fight!” as their leader appeared, still sporting the bandage from a near-assassination attempt. The scenes reminded some of 1930s Germany. And, indeed, the Republican nominee seems hell-bent on vengeance, stating his desire to prosecute political opponents and deploy the United States military in a domestic capacity.
Make no mistake, America benefits from having a major conservative party. I lived in San Francisco and have seen firsthand the limits of liberalism. Endless group think and vicious party politics coming before the concerns of the people is a recipe for a disaster. There’s a reason our founders strived for balance.
But I’ve also traveled and spent time in Turkey, once the democratic jewel of a troubled region. In the last eight years, academics, judges and dissidents have been jailed on bogus charges. Opposition parties harassed and threatened by an increasingly autocratic regime. People distrusting of their neighbors. It was never supposed to happen in Turkey.
It’s not paranoid to worry about America slowly slipping into a less democratic country. The people’s will can be contorted for authoritative rule.
It’s not paranoid to worry about America slowly slipping into a less democratic country. The people’s will can be contorted for authoritative rule.
Despite the lurking danger, Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz have espoused “happy warrior” personas. They are not distraught; they project a sunny optimism and inherent belief that the American people want to see a freer and more democratic future.
Polling suggests Harris has erased much of Trump’s lead, buoyed by enthusiasm from youth and minority voters. Co-opting the GOP’s “freedom” rhetoric, Harris and Walz are pushing for an America where citizens are free from autocratic tendencies, gun violence, judicial overreach and discrimination. Democrats are framing a clear choice for voters — does freedom mean being able to buy an assault rifle or birth control pills?
All conventions are deemed to be “historic,” but in 2024, this is not hyperbole. If Trump wins, conventions in 2028 may look very different. A first step of autocratic regimes is outlawing rival parties — and their ability to meet. We hope that such a travesty would never happen in this country. But we cannot know for sure that it won’t.
No matter your political ideology, enjoy the DNC this week. Do not take it for granted. We are not a land of kings and queens, but of immigrants and empowered voters. My late father’s era in politics feels long gone. Civility is an afterthought and democracy feels more fleeting. But Chicago will be flooded with effervescent American pride for the next few days, at least. Let’s cherish it.
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