If you look carefully, you can see that the elephant in question is chewing gum
The Republican National Convention, marked by its country-wide ascension of Alaska Governor (and now VP candidate) Sarah Palin into a surprised and often happy public eye (although some of that ascension was and is controversial, as noted earlier in AndrewsGumWorld) has now ended, but it appears to be — if nothing else — a convention marked by the joyful (and public) embrace of chewing gum, as this brief review of national and international media reveals…
From The New Yorker:
On the third night of the Convention, Rudy Giuliani was scheduled to speak, followed by Sarah Palin, and the delegation from New York went to hear them, and to cast its votes in the official roll call. Jay Savino, the chairman of the Bronx County Republican Party, walked into the Xcel Center unshaven, having flown to Minnesota on Monday with a few other delegates and with Giuliani… Beside Savino was Juan Carlos Polanco…who had been a batboy for the Yankees, is an attorney on the staff of the New York State Assembly minority leader, James Tedisco.
Polanco was chewing gum and talking to a Bronx alternate delegate named Anthony J. Ribustello…
From The Mercury News, in Silicon Valley:
State Sen. Abel Maldonado, who delivered an unusually fiery address at the Republican National Convention, in which he blasted Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s economic proposals, now wishes he could have removed something from that memorable speech.
Like, his chewing gum.
Perhaps the thousands of delegates and observers in St. Paul, Minn., couldn’t easily notice, but to those of us who caught the speech on television, there was obviously some major chewing going on up there. We couldn’t actually see a piece of gum swashing around in his mouth, but one fan of IA e-mailed us, asking if the GOP senator was eating peanut butter at the podium.
Maldonado, whose district runs from Santa Maria to Saratoga, sheepishly confirmed the sticky situation two days after his big speech. He explained it like this: In the minutes before his speaking role, Maldonado was pacing nervously backstage while listening to Mexican crooner Marco Antonio Solis on his iPod. Maldonado’s mouth was getting dry, and he didn’t have water, so he put a stick of gum in his mouth.
“I couldn’t take it out once I was up there,” Maldonado said. “I made a mistake,” he added, invoking a phrase rarely used by politicians.
But then, it’s not like this was the first time Maldonado chewed his way through a big event — Maldonado’s chewing habit also was on prominent display next to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger at a televised news conference near the Summit fire in May.
And, finally, today’s Independent from Ireland weighs in on the complicated life story of Sarah Palin, including a future son-in-law who, yes, chewed gum on stage during the convention:
Already she has solidified the base behind her, particularly women. On the other hand, the party’s blithe acceptance of her daughter’s unwed pregnancy, with the baby’s father chewing gum and waving from the convention stage, has outraged traditional social conservatives.