Bill Clinton's foreign policy experience is pretty much confined to having had breakfast once at the Intl. House of Pancakes. (1)

It's weird reading the Buchanan speech with only a vague comprehension of mainstream culture. It seems pretty clear that the republicans were on the defensive though. This speech really pushes base issues though, and it does so with quite a hardline approach. Anti-Abortion, Anti-women in combat, anti-feminism, pro-religious school choice, economy over environment, pro-military (wan't this right after the first successfully completed Iraq war?)

The other thing that is really interesting is that he makes a lot of claims by assocciation. He talks about Regaen more than Bush, and spends roughly equal time on Bill, Hillary, and Gore.

heres a gem
"Friends, this is radical feminism. The agenda Clinton & Clinton would impose on America--abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat--that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change America wants."(2)

There may be a uniting effect to his speech, but there is certainly an ostricizing effect as well. Though I think it was more the presentation than the issues. There is a very strong oppositional feel, very fiery, it feels a little like the speech a coach would give his team at halftime in a 6-14 football game, there is hope, but it's hiding behind spin and rhetoric.

How to make a Convention speech
1: excite the religious hard-liners (not hard).
2:Bring it down a notch. (you know you've done this when their firearms are clicked back to the "safety" position).
3: Make reference to past republican success (in this case Bush sr. is out of the question.)

Example
"There is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America. It is a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself. "(3)


Here is a breakdown for your (and my) amusement

+Bush, the candidate, is mention 15 times.
+Reagan, the actor, is mentioned 7 times.
+Clinton (Bill) is mentioned 13 times.
+Clinton (Hillary) is mentioned 5 times .
+Al Gore is mentioned 6 times. (including one reference to him as "Prince Albert")
+Desert Storm is mentioned, oh, never.
+the Cold War however gets a solid 4 references. (this number really doesn't do justice though, for example paragraghs 8,9 and 10 are exclusively about the cold war.)

This breakdown really doesn't do justice though. You really wonder if Buchanen is pulling for Reagan or Bush, or just the Republicans in general. He really doesn't have much to say in terms of Bush's success. (He actually talks about the recession and the LA riots instead!)

This makes me wonder, since Reagan died, doesn't that make him like a political-rock-star? Which would make the Reagan Doctrine the political cousin of Nirvana's Nevermind. (in as much as I knew little of either when they were released, and that the ideas and culture they symbolize are now vastly more important than the works themselves.)

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(1, 2, 3) Pat Buchanen, 1992 RNC speech. http://www.buchanan.org/pa-92-0817-rnc.html