Below The Beltway

The Los Angeles Times’ Andrew Malcom writes today about a purported attempt by Ron Paul supporters to stage a “revolt” at the GOP Convention in September:

Virtually all the nation’s political attention in recent weeks has focused on the compelling state-by-state presidential nomination struggle between two Democrats and the potential for party-splitting strife over there.

But, in the meantime, quietly, largely under the radar of most people, the forces of Rep. Ron Paul have been organizing across the country to stage an embarrassing public revolt against Sen. John McCain when Republicans gather for their national convention in St. Paul at the beginning of September.

(…)

The last three months Paul’s forces, who donated $34.5 million to his White House effort and upwards of one million total votes, have, as The Ticket has noted, been fighting a series of guerrilla battles with party establishment officials at county and state conventions from Washington and Missouri to Maine and Mississippi. Their goal: to take control of local committees, boost their delegate totals and influence platform debates.

(…)

They hope to demonstrate their disagreements with McCain vocally at the convention through platform fights and an attempt to get Paul a prominent speaking slot. Paul, who’s running unopposed in his home Texas district for an 11th House term, still has some $5 million in war funds and has instructed his followers that their struggle is not about a single election, but a longterm revolution for control of the Republican Party.

So eager are they to follow their leader’s words, that Paul’s supporters have driven his new book, “The Revolution: A Manifesto,” to the top of several bestseller lists.

Given the fact that political conventions have, at least until the prospect presented to us this year by the Democrats, pretty much been boring, scripted, pep rally events the chance that even a small faction would try to disrupt things would prove just too interesting for the media not to cover:

Since most of the convention will be considered dullsville by most of the news media with a foregone conclusion, little drama, the Paul story could get extra focus if Paul forces come up with some great quotes, angry followers, etc that could add the beloved conflict to what was supposed to be zzzzzz-er scripted coronation.

Ed Morrissey, for one, isn’t impressed:

One look at the delegate count should make the scope of the nascent revolution clear. Paul has won all of 26 delegates. Even if he wangled a few dozen more through manipulations in caucus states like Nevada, at best he’ll come up with 100 delegates in a 2,200-delegate convention. That’s not a revolution, it’s a lunatic fringe.

Which, given some of the more quixotic positions that Paul’s supporters have been known to take, may be the media in Minneapolis ends up spinning whatever does happen:

If Paul supporters manage to have a role at the convention I hope they concentrate on issues such as opposition to the war and abuse of civil liberties where they are on the right track, as opposed to some of their more conservative views, often including racism and paradoxically anti-freedom positions, or discussion of the various conspiracy theories which are prevalent among them.

Yea, well, frankly I wouldn’t be too optimistic about that happening.

Even if Ron Paul does end up with 100 or so delegates at the convention, they aren’t going to be able to do anything other than protest and march signs around the convention floor, which is what every losing candidate’s supporters are likely to do at some point during the process. They won’t be able to have much of an impact on the convention, and given Paul’s recent comments about the Republican nominee, they’re certainly not going to be able to force the GOP to give their candidate a prime time speaking spot (keeping in mind that as far as the broadcast networks are concerned, prime time will likely be limited to one hour per night on each night except the one when McCain makes his acceptance speech). Add to that the fact that most of the Paul supporter aren’t going to vote for McCain anyway, regardless of what happens at the convention and the GOP knows that.

In the harsh calculus of party politics, the GOP doesn’t owe Ron Paul anything at the convention and no amount of screaming is likely to get anywhere.