“Our political memories have become so short that we can barely remember Trump’s monthslong impeachment saga, let alone a weeklong infomercial for our party’s nominee,” said Zac Petkanas, an aide on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2016. “The dirty little secret of politics is that 80 percent of what everyone thinks is important in campaigns doesn’t matter one little bit.”
He said that any obsession with conventions reflected a “1990s perspective” divorced from Trump-era news velocity.
Kevin Madden, who was a senior adviser to Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee for president in 2012, recalled that the party’s convention that year produced just one enduring scene: a curious, semi-scripted bit from the actor Clint Eastwood, who conversed onstage with an empty chair.
“They spend a year developing, it’ll take an hour to execute, and right afterward the effect will already be going through its life cycle,” Mr. Madden said of the modern convention, “and disappearing into another chaotic media environment.”
Join the conversation as a VIP Member