RNC Convention- Speech highlights

Now that the RNC Convention has come to a close, I want to reflect back at some of the speeches and the highlights that came from them.

These, in my opinion, will be etched in our minds for quite some time.

First up, the man of the hour, Mitt Romney

-But today, four years from the excitement of the last election, for the first time, the majority of Americans now doubt that our children will have a better future.
It is not what we were promised.

-I wish President Obama had succeeded because I want America to succeed. But his promises gave way to disappointment and division. This isn't something we have to accept. Now is the moment when we CAN do something... Now is the moment when we can stand up and say, “I’m an American. I make my destiny. And we deserve better! My children deserve better! My family deserves better. My country deserves better!”

-Many of you felt that way on Election Day four years ago. Hope and Change had a powerful appeal. But tonight I'd ask a simple question: If you felt that excitement when you voted for Barack Obama, shouldn’t you feel that way now that he’s President Obama? You know there’s something wrong with the kind of job he’s done as president when the best feeling you had was the day you voted for him.

-It’s the genius of the American free enterprise system – to harness the extraordinary creativity and talent and industry of the American people with a system that is dedicated to creating tomorrow’s prosperity rather than trying to redistribute today's.

-Many Americans have given up on this president but they haven’t ever thought about giving up. Not on themselves. Not on each other. And not on America.

-President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet. MY promise...is to help you and your family.

-I will work with all my energy and soul to restore that America, to lift our eyes to a better future. That future is our destiny. That future is out there. It is waiting for us. Our children deserve it, our nation depends upon it, the peace and freedom of the world require it.

The entire speech can be read here.

The second in command, Paul Ryan:

-I'm the newcomer to this campaign. So let me share a first
impression. I have never seen opponents so silent about their
record, and so desperate to keep their power. They have run out
of ideas. Their moment came and went. Fear and division is all
they've got left.

-The first troubling sign came with the stimulus. President
Obama's first and best shot at fixing the economy. At a time
when he got everything he wanted under one party rule. It cost
$831 billion. The largest one-time expenditure ever by our
federal government. It went to companies like Solyndra, with their gold-plated connections, subsidized jobs and make believe markets.The stimulus was a case of political patronage, corporate welfare anachronism at their worst. You -- you the American people of this country were cut out of the deal. What did taxpayers get out of the Obama stimulus? More debt. That money wasn't just spent and wasted, it was borrowed, spent and wasted.

-Here we were faced with a massive job crisis so deep that if everyone out of
work stood in single file, that unemployment line would stretch
the length of the entire American continent.
You would think that any president, whatever his party,
would make job creation and nothing else his first order of
economic business, but this president didn't do that. Instead,
we got a long, divisive, all or nothing attempt to put the
federal government in charge of health care.

-And the biggest, coldest power play of all in Obama Care
came at the expense of the elderly. You see, even with all the
hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover, even with the
new law and new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the
planners in Washington still didn't have enough money; they
needed more. They needed hundreds of billions more. So they
just took it all away from Medicare, $716 billion funneled out
of Medicare by President Obama.

-So our opponents can consider themselves on notice. In
this election, on this issue , the usual posturing on the Left
isn't going to work. Mitt Romney and I know the difference
between protecting a program and raiding it. Ladies and
gentlemen, our nation needs this debate, we want this debate, we
will win in this debate.

-It began with a housing crisis they alone
didn't cause. It ends with a housing crisis they didn't
correct.

-You know, President Obama was asked not long ago to reflect
on any mistakes he might have made. He said, ``Well, I haven't
communicated enough.'' He said his job is to, quote, ``tell a story to the American
people''. As if that is the whole problem here? He needs to talk
more and we need to be better listeners? Ladies and gentlemen, these past four years, we have
suffered no shortage of words in the White House.
What is missing is leadership in the White House.
And the story that Barack Obama does tell, forever shifting
blame to the last administration, is getting old.

-And I'm going to level with you: We don't have that much
time. But if we are serious, and smart, and we lead, we can do
this.
After four years of government trying to divide up the wealth, we will get America creating wealth again. With tax fairness and regulatory reform, we'll put
government back on the side of the men and women who create
jobs, and the men and women who need jobs.

-College graduates should not have to live out their 20s in
their childhood bedrooms, staring up at fading Obama posters and
wondering when they can move out and get going with life.

 -We are a full generation apart, Governor Romney and I. And in some ways, we are different. There are the songs in his Ipod, which I have heard on the campaign bus.... and I have heard it on many hotel elevators.
He actually urged me to play some of these songs at campaign rallies. I said, ``look, I hope it is not a deal breaker Mitt, but my playlist starts with AC/DC and it ends with Zeppelin.

-They are self-evident and unchanging, and sometimes, even presidents need
reminding, that our rights come from nature and God, and not
from government.
The founding generation secured those rights for us, and in
every generation since, the best among us have defended our
freedoms. They are protecting us right now. We honor them and
all our veterans, and we thank them.

-So here is our pledge.
We will not duck the tough issues, we will lead.
We will not spend the next four years blaming others, we
will take responsibility.
We will not try to replace our founding principles, we will
reapply our founding principles.

The rest of his speech can be read here.

And I feel it honorable to highlight Ann Romney's speech, as well.

-I want us to think tonight about the love we all share for those Americans, our brothers and sisters, who are going through difficult times, whose days are never easy, nights are always long, and whose work never seems done.
They are here among us tonight in this hall; they are here in neighborhoods across Tampa and all across America. The parents who lie awake at night side by side, wondering how they'll be able to pay the mortgage or make the rent; the single dad who's working extra hours tonight, so that his kids can buy some new clothes to go back to school, can take a school trip or play a sport, so his kids can feel. like the other kids.

-Sometimes I think that late at night, if we were all silent for just a few moments and listened carefully, we could hear a great collective sigh from the moms and dads across America who made it through another day, and know that they'll make it through another one tomorrow. But in that end of the day moment, they just aren't sure how.

-Dad came to America. In our country, he saw hope and an opportunity to escape from poverty. He moved to a small town in the great state of Michigan. There, he started a business — one he built himself, by the way.

-There were many reasons to delay marriage, and you know? We just didn't care. We got married and moved into a basement apartment. We walked to class together, shared the housekeeping, and ate a lot of pasta and tuna fish. Our desk was a door propped up on sawhorses. Our dining room table was a fold-down ironing board in the kitchen. Those were very special days.

-And let's be honest. If the last four years had been more successful, do we really think there would be this attack on Mitt Romney's success? Of course not.

-Mitt doesn't like to talk about how he has helped others because he sees it as a privilege, not a political talking point

-But because this is America, that small company which grew has helped so many others lead better lives. The jobs that grew from the risks they took have become college educations, first homes. That success has helped fund scholarships, pensions, and retirement funds. This is the genius of America: dreams fulfilled help others launch new dreams.

-I said tonight I wanted to talk to you about love. Look into your hearts.
This is our country. This is our future. These are our children and grandchildren.
You can trust Mitt.
He loves America. He will take us to a better place, just as he took me home safely from that dance. Give him that chance. Give America that chance.

And I couldn't finish without providing links to some of the other woman, who presented some of the greatest speeches at the convention. 

Susana Martinez

And

Nikki Haley

It was a complete success, if ever I saw one