Senator Miller’s Angry Keynote Divided Listeners
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The keynote address by Senator Miller of Georgia will go down in history, predicted observers of the Republican National Convention, but a debate raged over the legacy it would leave.
The scowl of a white Southern septuagenarian was perhaps not the most desirable face for the Republicans to project while they court independent voters in swing states, some observers suggested. His tone seemed to contradict the party’s earlier showcasing of moderate Republicans like Governor Schwarzenegger and Mayor Giuliani.
But delegates loved it, and pollsters predicted it could help the president.
Wave after wave of righteous roars from the audience met Mr. Miller’s finger-pointing attack against Mr. Kerry’s Senate voting record, at one point suggesting the Democratic candidate would defend the country with “spitballs.” But on television, his fire may have come across more clearly than his words.
Mr. Miller’s speech undermined attempts to put a moderate face on the convention and was “the harshest campaign speech since Buchanan’s 1992 culture war speech in Houston,” said the policy director of the Democratic Leadership Council, Ed Kilgore. In 1992, Mr. Buchanan spoke of a religious “war” for the soul of America.
“The language, the tone, the insults, it was so way over the top,” Mr. Kilgore said.
Mr. Miller, who is himself a Democrat, followed the speech with an extraordinary televised interview in which he told MSNBC interviewer Chris Matthews to “get out of my face,” and challenged him to a duel.
Critics saw a contrast with the young Senate candidate from Illinois, Barack Obama, the son of a Kenyan immigrant, who delivered the keynote speech at the Democratic convention in Boston.
“I kept thinking of the contrast with the Democrats’ keynote speaker, Barack Obama, a post-racial, smiling, expansive young American, speaking about national unity and uplift. Then you see Zell Miller, his face rigid with anger, his eyes blazing with years of frustration as his Dixiecrat vision became slowly eclipsed among the Democrats,” wrote one commentator, Andrew Sullivan,
A former advisor to four presidents, David Gergen, said the speech “went over the line” in its attacks on Democrats. He compared the speech to the Rev. Al Sharpton’s at the Democratic convention. “But they didn’t make him the keynote of their convention,” he said yesterday on MSNBC.
“I don’t understand why they went with the angry Southern white guy. Bush already has that vote,” said a Democratic consultant, Steven Rabinowitz. “It’s an amazing contrast. It’s not just the past and future. It’s a positive message and a negative one. It’s hope versus fear.”
A spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, Jano Cabrera, labeled Mr. Miller “an angry old elephant.”
But the speech could actually help the president consolidate his support, said pollster John Zogby.
“To me, Zell’s speech was as effective as Barack’s speech because is roused the base. Was it too hot? Sure, for independents and undecideds. But I don’t think they were watching,” Mr. Zogby said.
He said his daily tracking polls showed that the convention had given Mr. Bush a four to five point lead coming into his speech yesterday evening. The polls showed 90% of Republicans backing the president, he said.
“My overall impression is that the president has gotten out of this convention all that he could. He needed to get all his Republican ducks in a row, and he did that,” said Mr. Zogby.
Other analysts agreed that the speech would not hurt Mr. Bush, because few swing voters were watching.
“His speech did seem a little strident to me,” said the director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, Maurice Carroll. But he said his remarks were part of an “effective” overall laser focus on the war on terrorism at a time when polls show it is the no. 1 issue for voters.
A political scientist at the University of Virginia, Larry Sabato, said he “wondered about” the tone of Mr. Miller’s speech, which he said “came across as very angry.” But, he concluded, “Zell Miller certainly helped Bush with conservative Democrats and independents, especially in the South. Did Barack Obama help Kerry or did he just help himself?”
Conventioneers loved it.
“I think Zell Miller’s speech will go down in history. Here is a Democrat who stood up and said the party has left him,” said an alternate delegate from The Villages, Fla., Mary Todd. “I don’t think he was angry. He was professing a very strong feeling. It was his passion. I know because I get like that myself,” she said.
A Nevada delegate and retired banker, Al Valdez, said the speech was among his favorite moments of the week. “He was speaking from his heart and telling it like it is,” he said.
“I didn’t see it as angry, just forceful,” said an Atlanta Republican, Ginger Howard.
Mr. Giuliani also approved. “It was a tough speech but an appropriate one,” he said on MSNBC.