It might have been a less notable contrast if Mr. Trump’s show had not been such a break from the tightly scripted performance that has come to typify these conventions. In Cleveland, an important endorser, Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, started speaking after the broadcast networks had already moved on to local news (Republican Party officials argued Thursday that they should have shown her instead); Mr. Trump called in to “The O’Reilly Factor” while Patricia Smith was speaking emotionally onstage about her son’s death in the Benghazi attack; and one night’s program ended prematurely, leaving precious prime-time minutes unused.
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Asked about the differences, Mr. Trump said he could not speak to them with much specificity, because “I didn’t produce our show — I just showed up for the final speech on Thursday.” (He acknowledged that he made other appearances while the convention was going on, including on O’Reilly, but said they weren’t a distraction from the convention because they were unannounced and “nobody even knew” he would be appearing.)
Yet even as it became clear that Mrs. Clinton’s convention planners had done a far better job of making use of the television time, the question that had hung over the campaign all year remained: Does it matter?
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