Political Conventions are Just as Fun on TV

I attended my first Democratic Convention in 1980 in New York City, and I went to every single other one for the next 24 years. Thanks to Newsday, I even attended two Republican conventions. And then, as I was about to depart for my 10th convention this weekend, something inside me said, "Don't go!"

It was my appendix.

So, here I am, sitting at home on the sofa wearing my daughter-in-law's maternity sweatpants and wondering what I'm missing.

First, the sausage.

Yes, the greasy, heart-stopping kind that they sell in large convention venues, but also the political stuff: hotel suites filled with piles of numbered speech drafts (which, like classified documents, cannot be removed from the room lest someone leak to the press or get drunk and leave a copy in a bar — often the same thing). The endless fights over who-does-what-when, over themes, issues, MESSAGE! The protracted negotiations over just how to do the roll-call vote so that Hillary Clinton's folks feel good but Barack Obama gets a unanimous vote.

A good friend with a similar background is also convalescing her way through this convention. She writes, "It's funny not to see the sausage firsthand (just the finished product)."

I also miss the view from the podium, which is simultaneously exhilarating and humiliating to nearly every single convention speaker — with the exception of the few really important people who speak in prime time.

The vast majority of speakers, including some pretty important people, are introduced, the lights go on, and they walk out onto this gorgeous stage. They look out over 20,000 seats and then, unless they are exceedingly nearsighted, realize that most of them are empty. And unless they are hard of hearing, they grasp the fact that no one is listening to them (except for three or four old ladies from Indiana, who might actually be sleeping). It's loud in there — most of the delegates are moving around, having noisy conversations and being interviewed for their local television stations.

But now that I'm watching the convention from my sofa, the way most people do (including Obama on Monday night), I see there are some advantages. If you're actually there, you miss the fascinating little tidbits that CNN runs on the bottom of its screen all the time: The 1872 Democratic Convention in Baltimore was only 6 hours! And you miss the opportunity to switch channels: On Fox News, the war between Clinton supporters and Obama supporters gets bigger by the minute.

And I'm glad to report that, to my surprise, the emotional impact of the convention is as good from the sofa as it would have been in the hall. I wanted to be in the middle of the Massachusetts delegation when Ted Kennedy came on stage, but instead I found myself smelling the sea air from Teddy's (and my) beloved Cape Cod. I can't imagine being any more moved if I had been there. And the graceful presentation of Michelle Obama was beautiful to watch, as were their two little girls — both young enough to forget that there were 20,000 (rapt and silent) people behind them, and just excited to talk to Daddy.

In the end, there's only one thing I'm missing by not being in Denver, and that's the ability to walk around outside and say to the Hillary/McCain supporters, "What are you thinking!?"

I've been bombarded by their e-mails for months now and frankly, I'm mystified. When you're a loyal member of an American political party, as they claim to be, you sign up to be inside a big tent, where compromise is the name of the game. When parties have real divisions, they're usually over big, ideological issues. It's hard to see where all this venom is coming from.

If I were there, I'd tell them to cool it — they could burst an appendix and end up on the sofa.

Elaine C. Kamarck is on the faculty of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She worked for the Clinton-Gore administration.