The Republican National Convention came to a fanfare-heavy close on Thursday night and there is a lot to unpack. If you missed my daily recaps in the Morning Briefing here is Friday’s.
I expand on that a little here, talking a more about some of the speeches from the finale that I thought were important but didn’t get into in the Briefing. It was an impressive all-around production, and I’ve been saying that a lot all week. In this episode I explain why I thought it was good from an entertainer’s perspective.
Honestly, I think that conventions from now on should incorporate a lot of what we saw this week. Some of my colleagues even said that they would prefer future conventions be exactly like this. It’s an interesting idea that merits some consideration.
There isn’t a lot of discussion here about the media’s awfulness in covering the RNC. You know they’re scum, I know they’re scum, and, on some deep, subconscious level, even they know they’re scum. I did cover that more in the Briefings throughout the week.
As soon as the convention was over and I returned to Twitter to see if I’d missed anything while liveblogging I was saddened to learn of the passing of legendary University of Arizona basketball coach Lute Olson.
I was a very young man when Lute Olson came to Tucson to take over a program that had won four games the year before. Calling it a “program” is a bit of a stretch, it was more of an afterthought.
Coach Olson turned that afterthought into a perennial national powerhouse, taking teams to the hallowed Final Four four times and winning it all in 1997. He transformed my hometown into a college basketball town forever. As Sports Illustrated‘s Pat Forde said, Coach Olson “did the hardest thing in college sports. He built something out of nothing, and then he sustained it.”
This city is in mourning today, and will be for quite some time.
#RIP Coach Olson.
Here’s a little extracurricular reading for anyone who’s interested.
In memory of Lute Olson, let's revisit the amazing Arizona Wildcats 1997 NCAA National Championship run.
Coach Olson's Wildcats are the only team in college hoops history to beat THREE No. 1 seeds en route to the title 🏆 https://t.co/785K676eDV pic.twitter.com/twTykManuN
— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) August 28, 2020
Have a great weekend everyone.
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PJ Media Senior Columnist and Associate Editor Stephen Kruiser is the author of “Don’t Let the Hippies Shower” and “Straight Outta Feelings: Political Zen in the Age of Outrage,” both of which address serious subjects in a humorous way. Monday through Friday he edits PJ Media’s “Morning Briefing.” His columns appear twice a week.
