Our opinion writer for the Washington Post. Welcome to first look, Washington Post live stop shop for news and analysis, all about this week, the Republican National convention. Lets get started with White House Reporter ann geron. In chief Political Correspondent dan. It is a tuesday morning. Welcome, both of you. Thank you. Glad to be here. Jonathan dan, to get your take on what we saw on night 1, was there any one particular thing that stood out to you . Dan i would say there were a couple of things that stood out. This was not quite the optimistic Convention Many organizers had been advertising. There were speakers who tried to do that, but for the most part this was a night if attacks on of attacks on Vice President biden and kamala harris. What struck me was that last week the democrats went after President Trump on basically character and temperament. Last night i thought the republican attacks were basically focused on ideology and policy of the democrats. The republicans were portrayed last week as subservient to President Trump, that the president is bound by no party, no norms, nothing we should be confident in. Last night, they portrayed biden as basically a tool of the left, an agent of a radical leftwing. The descriptions of the two sides are dramatically different although their points are the same. Which is, the the election of one of the other would be catastrophic for the country. Jonathan as i was listening to you talk i was thinking for the folks that are watching and for the folks who read you or the armchair pundit who is trying to understand how to watch this convention, after seeing what we saw last week, how is this convention playing to the people who already support the president or might be on the fence but leaning towards the president . Does what we heard last night help the president . Dan i think it is premature to answer that. I think your point or question is a very good one, a smart one. Obviously i think for the trump base everything that happened , they would be quite pleased with and probably energized by. Both in the attacks on biden and the defense of the president and his followers for who they want to believe they are. But i think the real question is who is watching beyond that . It will be interesting to see with the ratings for this are and whether there are truly people who are openminded about the choice in november, who decided to tune into this. They may wait to tune in simply to watch President Trump. I think most people know what they are going to get with President Trump. They may be looking for something different. I dont know with the appetite is at this point among people who are not already firmly committed to him. Jonathan anne, you cover the white house for the Washington Post. You are closest in proximity to what goes on in the white house. Can you talk about what the president s strategy is . Im thinking of those interviews he did in the east room with everyday nonpoliticians and citizens. What was he trying to do . Anne he was trying to do a couple of things. I would add one note about last night, which was another part of the strategy is the pandemic. What pandemic . The fact we have not talked about it is an indication of how they are trying to move past it and make this not a referendum on trumps handling of the virus. One thing he will do in service of that and generally changing the subject from the recovery, the Economic Outlook of the country, is to have these little surprise reveals. In addition to a number of regular people telling their stories, standing up at a podium and speaking to empty rooms, we saw the president sitting in the white house with people he calls hostages who were returned to the United States during his presidency. He has made a real focus of his foreignpolicy, to deal directly with leaders of other countries, including the somewhat autocratic leader of turkey to get americans released from jail or other kinds of imprisonment or bondage in Foreign Countries and returned to the United States without paying ransom. Hes had a quite good record in doing so. The most highprofile was pastor andrew bunsen who was returned from turkey. He was there with the president speaking about his experience and thanking the president for that kind of personal diplomacy. It is a way to show the president doing something that other president s have not done to the same degree. It is something trump himself can point to as a way he would make foreignpolicy in the second term. Jonathan the interviews with the hostages was a bit of a surprise revealed. Is that something we should anticipate for the next three nights of this convention . Each night a different revealed . Anne yes. We will see the president doing something every night, according to the campaign. He will not necessarily be giving a speech in the traditional sense until the last night when he gives the big one. We will see things that are similar to that video of him speaking with the freed americans. We dont know yet what tonights surprise will be but im told there will be one. Jonathan dan, last night, among all the speeches there were two thats in my mind stood out for their being oldschool in that they sounded president ial. I am thinking of former Ambassador Nikki Haley and senator tim scott of south carolina. They sounded president ial, but will that play with the audience the president is trying to reach . Dan it might, jonathan. I agree with you. I thought those speeches were markedly different in tone, not necessarily in substance. Both had some harsh things to say about biden. Nonetheless in the totality of the way the speeches were put together and the delivery, i think they were different from the others. I think the challenge for President Trump is that there is so much known about him and the judgments about him have been made for such a long time that i dont know a surrogate or validator can do much to change that. We will see. I suspect we will hear some more speeches like that through the course of the week. They did stand out from being different in the way they sounded. Jonathan anne, let me end on a different subject. There is a new book coming out by Stephanie Winston walkoff and a couple of weeks. Do you know anything about it . She ran the trump inaugural committee. Anne right. She is an old friend of Melania Trump, who will be the main speaker tonight, tuesday nights portion. This book appears to be sort of a tell all. I havent actually seen the book yet myself. In it she apparently taped melania calling ivanka a princess and trash talking her. We know there is if not bad blood, at least a chill in the air between these two women. And apparently saying less than fully flattering things about President Trump. We will not hear any of that tonight. She will give a traditional first lady speech from the rose garden. She is likely to focus on her main agenda items, the antibullying campaign. Jonathan i keep thinking of james comeys famous line. Oh lordy, oh lordy, let there be tapes. Another story where someone in the trump family is being taped. We have got to go. Thank you for coming on first look this morning. Dan thank you, jonathan. Jonathan next up, my colleagues on the opinion side. Eugene robinson and mark deisen. Good morning. Jonathan welcome. What were your impressions of last night . Eugene it was pretty scary. The whole theme of last night seemed to be fear. It seemed to be telling those watching you should be deathly afraid of joe biden and kamala harris. Kamalay continue to call harris, or whatever. That they are somehow the point of a communist spear that will render the fabric of our society. You should be afraid of black people. Especially those marching for social justice. You should throw your guns on them. According to the mccloskeys. You should joe biden is basically not that different from fidel castro according to the big republican donor from florida. It was be afraid. Be very afraid. That is what the whole deal was. Jonathan mark, i know you have the complete opposite view of eugene robinson. Answering my question to you, zero in on when eugene said last night was about fear, you let out a little chuckle. Do you not see it that way . Mark no. We seem to be watching to differ two different conventions. Very different. Two very different worlds we are seeing. First of all, to criticize republicans for spreading fear of every speaker at the one prophetic National Convention said the democracy is under threat from another four years of donald trump. The Democratic Convention was substancefree and it unrelenting assault on donald trump. The reason is because the democrats spent their week trying to shore up their lukewarm base and hold onto voters that they had won in 2018, suburban republicans. They made no effort to expand their base our reach out to say or reach out to say the workingclass republicans who voted twice for barack obama but switched to trump in there was 2016. No message for working blacks. Donald trump has a fired up base. They are going to walk over broken glass to vote for him. He has the luxury of using his convention. Every president testify rep is based, but using his convention to reach out beyond his base and trying to expand. It we saw a concerted effort to do that last night. Particularly reaching out to africanamerican voters. You had this incredible congressional candidate from baltimore who set the internet on fire with this ad walking americans through her neighborhood with the burned down buildings and drug dealers and Liquor Stores and talking about how this is the result of democratic rule of our cities. You had vernon jones, a representative from georgia talking about Donald Trumps record on criminal Justice Reform. Unprecedented support for historically black colleges and school choice. You had tim scott who came in and gave an amazing speech about his experience, how his family his grandfather had been taken out of school at the age of three to pick cotton and he got to see his grandson elected to be the first African American elected to the senate. His family went from one lifetime from cotton to congress and talked about trumps record helping him pass opportunity zones in the innercity. You had Herschel Walker talking about his 37year friendship donald trump. There was a concerted effort to reach out beyond his base to the africanamerican voter. I thought it was an incredibly well done first night. Jonathan on that point about the first night of the Republican Convention reaching out to africanamerican voters, from your perspective how effective was it to have the mcleskeys speak at the Republican Convention . Eugene i think it was counterproductive. What they were trying to do is reach out to africanamerican voters, i think choosing to have mcluskys talking about pulling up their weapons to defend the property against protesters who just marching past in support of social justice and to End Police Violence was incredibly counterproductive. Lets face it. The reality is we know how donald trump did with African American voters last time around. We know how he is pulling with africanamerican voters right now. I dont think it is going to have the effect the party would like it to have because it is again all taken back by things like the mccloskeys. I suspect we will hear more of that thing as a Convention Goes on. They are trying to tediously i think they would like to peel away some small percentage of black votes. If they can do that, maybe they can repeat the sort of Electoral College victory they had in 2016 when the academic and vote was down in milwaukee and detroit and philadelphia and pittsburgh. Had it been at obamaera levels, we would be talking about Hillary Clintons reelection prospects. Jonathan marc, yesterday the nation was reeling from another shooting of an unarmed black man by police. This time in kenosha, wisconsin. His three children in the backseat. That was earlier in the day. Last night, Patricia Mccloskey says in this speech we dont have basic safety and security in our communities. We will never be free to build a future for ourselves, our children, and our country. To your point about the convention trying to reach out to africanamericans, how does that coming from them land with African Americans who are watching what happened to jacob blake and might think those words are hollow . Marc first of all, the denver everybody rushed to put out a statement out about the incident. I did not see any the Democratic Leaders talking but the guy who got his head kicked in a few days earlier in portland. Jonathan we are talking about the Republican Convention. Marc im answering your question. Let me finish. The people who marched on their house were not protesters. They broke through the gate and entered a private community. They were on their property. In this country you have a right to defend your property. They were not pointing their guns at protesters. They were pointing guns at people threatening their homes. The reality is the Africanamerican Community wants peace and security. They dont want the violence happening. The majority of the victims of the rioting in the cities are black. The majority of the victims in chicago where gun violence and murders are up through the roof are black. The polls show the African American committee, the majority community, the majority of that community does not support defunding the police, do not support having produced police reduced Police Presence has switching to community policing. They want peace and security. The democrats what trump was doing last night and the republicans were doing was going after a vulnerability. That the democrats have. Joe bidens African American support is weak. He has lower African Americans support overall than Hillary Clinton did in 2016. They did not turn out for her the way they had for obama. Among africanamericans who are younger, 18 to 29, he only got 68 support, 17 points below Hillary Clinton. The Africanamerican Community support for joe biden is soft. In the 2016 convention campaign, donald trump went to charlotte, North Carolina and said the African American community i will fight for you whether you vote for me or not. What the republicans were doing was showing in the Convention Last night he has done that. He has delivered. He produced the lowest Unemployment Rate in history before the pandemic it. Permanent support for historically black colleges, which ae years barack obama did not have time to do. Criminal Justice Reform which barack obama did not have time to do. He has a strong record to present to the Africanamerican Community. They may look at that and say i dont need to support joe biden. Maybe i wont vote for trump but i will not support biden. Or if he is able to win a small fraction of the africanamerican vote, it would be enough to put him over the top. Jonathan i wish in moments like these we had the Washington Post fact checker here. Go on. Eugene i was going to correct one thing. In this country it is not legal to point loaded weapons at people who do not pose a threat. According to prosecutors in missouri who have charged the mccloskeys criminally for that incident. Just to clarify that. Jonathan i will move on to another question. Gene, please explain to me Kimberly Guilfoyles speech. What was your reaction to it . How do you think it played out in the rest of the country . Eugene i have no idea. It has become kind of an internet meme instantly. She was standing in an empty auditorium and she was yelling as if she were in front of a crowd. My first thought, i was the correspondent in south america for four years, lived in argentina. I lived with the ghost of eva perrone. That is what i kept thinking. This speech needs a balcony. That is what the speech needs. At the end when she was like this, it was over the top. I think many people will see it as having been over the top. I think some in the trump base, some really fervent supporters of the president might think it was terrific. I thought it was over the top. Jonathan marc, was it over the top . Will people in the trump universe think it was over the top . Marc yes, it was over the top. It was a speech written for an audience. There was no audience. Im sure if she had been given that in a convention where there were 7000 to 10,000 people and they were cheering all of her applause lines there would have been a different response. But yes, it was over the top. Jonathan i want to ask you both the same question i asked of dan balton. Of all the speeches we heard l