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Trump and Melania kissed like two blind tortoises trying to gum the same lettuce leaf... JAN MOIR watches The Donald's messianic reception at the Republican Convention - tribute ear bandages and all
At the end of one of the most incredible weeks in American political history and at the culmination of the National Republican Convention in Milwaukee, Donald Trump finally took to the stage to accept the GOP presidential nomination – and make his first speech since the assassination attempt last Saturday.
Around 9pm local time, the former president appeared in front of a blaze of lightbulbs spelling out 'TRUMP', a showbiz backdrop redolent of Elvis in his Las Vegas heyday.
In silhouette, he looked like a minotaur: bulky in the shoulders but light in the hooves as he trotted over to the lectern. His right ear was still bandaged, occasionally he sweated under the spotlights and in mood he switched from folksy and emotional to pugnacious and aggrieved, then back again.
'There is love in the room, there is big love in the room,' Trump purred, before promising to stop all wars, introduce tax cuts, make cities safe again, boost oil and gas production and sort out that illegal migration mess down Mexico way.
'Drill baby, drill! And close our borders,' he bellowed, as the fevered crowd roared their approval. But not everyone was pleased.
Former US President Donald Trump and former First Lady Melania Trump at Republican National Convention (RNC) at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Thursday
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on stage with his family
People wear fake bandages on their ears as they watch on the third day of the convention
'Was there anything in there for the moderates?' fretted a host on NBC News.
There was little room for moderation in the 18,000 capacity Convention Hall, where Trump was given a hero's welcome from the nailed-on fans, senators and delegates known variously as Trumpers, Trumplicans, Trump Boosters, Trumpists and Trumpites.
The 78-year-old leader began his epic 93-minute speech by describing in detail what it's like to be the target of an assassination attempt, adding that he would never tell the story again because it was 'too painful' to recount.
This was gripping; raw history being played out on millions of television screens across America. For no one needed reminding that too few presidents, serving or otherwise, have lived to tell the tale.
'The bullet came within a quarter inch of taking my life,' he began. 'Trump, Trump, Trump,' chanted the crowd, some of them already in tears.
People celebrate after Donald Trump accepts the nomination
Balloons are released at the convention following the Donald Trump's nomination as the Republican candidate
A delegate wearing a cowboy hat holds a banner reading 'Trump Vance Make America Great Again!'
Closing Celebration: AJ Yvette, left, a delegate from TX celebrates after Donald Trump accepts the nomination for president
'I felt very safe because I had God on my side. I'm not supposed to be here tonight,' he continued.
'Yes you are, yes you are, yes you are!' intoned the party faithful.
'I stand before you in this arena only by the grace of Almighty God,' he said.
'USA! USA! USA!' they cried.
Had the shooting changed something in Trump? Tucker Carlson, America's most influential Right-wing media commentator, seemed to think so.
In a speech onstage earlier, the man who proved too toxic even for Fox News, argued that everything was different now.
'The nation is different, the world is different. Donald Trump is different. When he stood up after being shot and put his hand up, I thought at that moment that was a transformation. I think it was divine intervention.'
That might be pushing it a bit but who can know what goes through a man's heart and soul when someone tries and fails to kill them by a fraction of an inch? Certainly, it seems clear that Trump feels touched by the hand of God and appears to be invigorated with a new sense of purpose.
Donald Trump hits a balloon next to former US First Lady Melania Trump
Closing Celebration: Trump accepts the nomination for President
On an interview with CBS Mornings, on Thursday, his daughter-in-law Lara Trump – wife of his second son Eric – put forward her view. 'I don't think you can go through a near-death experience and not come out on the other side impacted,' she said, meaning mentally, I presume.
Lara was there last night, seated with the rest of the Trump family in a little enclave in the arena. There were the First Sons – Eric and Donald Junior – there was Ivanka and Jared, there were the assorted Trumpkin grandchildren, cute as buttons.
Everyone was poodle-groomed within an inch of their lives, all were togged out in red, white and blue, like a patriotic but blond Addams Family. No one looked as marvellous as Melania of course, polished and exquisite in her perfectly fitted red Dior suit, but remote as a satellite as always. Everyone had to sit through hours and hours of warm-up speeches, including contributions from Kid Rock (a dull rap song) and former wrestler Hulk Hogan who paid tribute to Trump as 'my hero, the gladiator', someone who was going to 'straighten the country out for all the real Americans'.
Even Eric got in on the action. 'Your conviction is truly next level,' he said to his father. 'I am honoured to be your son, our country loves you. One of the most courageous acts in the history of American politics was when you shouted: 'Fight-fight-fight'.' 'Fight, fight, fight,' chanted the crowd, cheerfully oblivious to hyperbole.
US Senator from Ohio and 2024 Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance gives a thumbs up onstage
Out on the floor, many of the delegates wore cowboy hats, some had MAGA caps, while the legendary Wisconsin delegation – called the 'Cheeseheads' – wear wedges of foam cheese on their heads in honour of their state's impressive dairy production.
As a sign of respect, they take them off when singing the national anthem or in moments of high emotion.
O ne came when Trump was explaining that there was so much blood when he got shot because of the location. 'Doctors told me it's the ears, they bleed more than any other part of the body. So we learn something,' he said. Indeed we do.
What I have learned is how you feel about Donald Trump's ear bandage reveals how you feel about Donald Trump. In the days preceding his keynote speech there was grumbling from Democrats and Leftists that the former president was milking it; wearing that big ol' patch like a badge of courage, flaunting his wound like a gauze pennant fluttering on the presidential battlefield.
MSNBC host Ari Melber was one of the disbelievers, snorting that the ear bandage was 'a spectacle' when Trump made his first appearance inside the hall after being shot.
And out on the badlands of X, formerly known as Twitter, there was a typical exchange of half-baked misinformation.
Someone called Peggy Vandervoort wrote that 'Trump's huge pad bandage on his ear is a PR stunt'. Her source on this was that well known gunshot trauma expert, Martina Navratilova.
According to Peggy, the tennis champ had 'just posted saying her close friend is a nurse from Major Trauma in a big city and concurred that 'there is no need to dress an ear wound like this, even if half the ear was blown off'.'
Martina had done no such thing. She had reposted a post from someone called LazarTagWolf (Good cook. Stones fan. Native Californian. Biden/Harris Dem. Taurus. Tall in Socks) and it was HER friend who was the charge nurse. 'It wouldn't look like this,' Lazar insisted, and Martina agreed.
Delegates express their support as a banner reading 'Trump Vance Make America Great Again!'
Donald Trump speaks at the 2024 Republican National Convention
'Of course this is obviously a stunt,' tweeted Navratilova. 'The day after the shooting he had no bandage on his ear, not even a Band Aid.' She was referring to a widely circulated photograph of Trump playing golf used as evidence for this stunt bandage theory, even though it had been taken the week before the shooting.
During an appearance on Fox & Friends on Wednesday, son Donald Trump Jr expressed his understandable disgust.
'He wasn't shot in the face enough for them? It wasn't enough?' he said, explaining the sceptical reactions as part of something he calls The Trump Derangement Syndrome. 'You can see the photograph at the time. There's blood everywhere,' he added.
Trump Derangers include Whoopi Goldberg, who complained about the former president's 17-year-old granddaughter Kai taking to the stage to 'show a side of my grandpa that people don't often see'. 'They are trying to humanise him, don't fall for it,' said Whoopi on ABC talk show The View. But others went too far.
The actor Jack Black, who also fronts a comedy rock band called Tenacious D, was forced to cancel his group's Australian tour when a bandmate expressed a wish that the shooter 'didn't miss next time' – a repellent comment about an assassination attempt that killed one bystander and critically injured two others.
By Wednesday, convention attendees began wearing their own ear bandages in support. It seemed to start with Arizona delegate Joe Neglia. 'I thought, 'What can I do to honour the truth? What can I possibly do?' he told Fox News Digital. 'And then I saw the bandage and I thought, I can do that. I put it on to honour Trump and express sympathy and unity.'
It caught on like a contagion. Bandaged ears soon appeared all over the hall, like Life Of Brian disciples suffering amid an ear plague but still worshipping the new messiah.
Emily Maitlis was in Milwaukee reporting for her News Agents podcast and had called the delegates 'weirdos and misfits' even before the sympathy bandages appeared.
I thought it rather a gratuitous sneer at thousands of people expressing their sincerely held political beliefs but that is Emily for you.
Donald Trump gives a thumbs up next to former Melania Trump and vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance and his wife US lawyer Usha Vance during the last day
'The conversations in this hall are utterly dystopian,' she reported to co-host John Sopel. 'I think it has become more cultish, I genuinely think the people who are spouting this garbage are starting to believe it.'
Bit rich, considering that for 16 years she worked for the biggest and most invidious cult of all: the BBC.
Meanwhile, large parts of America are still in shock and distress over what happened last Saturday night. It comes at a time when the moral code of the country seems to be unspooling, amid a backdrop of ideological and partisan divisions along with cultural and political hostilities.
There is unease, there is disinformation, there are worries about the incapacity of Joe Biden, about war, migrants, house prices, climate change, drug wars, gun violence and hate speech.
Is Donald Trump the man to bring the country together and move forward as one into the golden future he promises, or will he only deepen divisions, just like before? CNN have already listed 'more than twenty false claims' they allege he made in his acceptance speech.
At the end of this very long night, Pastor Franklin Graham came on and made everyone stand and 'pray to the heavenly father for saving the life of Donald J Trump'.
The Trumplicans sprang up as one. The Cheeseheads took their cheeses off. Donald bowed his head for a moment and Melania appeared on stage to congratulate her husband. 'Good job,' she said, as if he'd just put some cutlery back in the correct drawer.
Then the couple did one of their awkward, fumbled public kisses, acting like two blind tortoises who are allergic to each other trying to gum the same leaf of lettuce. Then thousands of balloons fell from the ceiling in the traditional euphoric finale and NBC asked a delegate what she thought of Trump now.
'I think the spirit of the loving God is in him,' she said, her eyes shining. Amen to that.