Now that they are almost no longer the venues to resolve nomination contests (with the possible exception of this year’s Democratic edition), party conventions’ key purpose is to serve up heaping helpings of red meat to fire up the base, near and far.

And for the most part, the 2024 GOP edition delivered just that, with a four-night can-you-top-this contest.

Featuring a series of transcendent orations from former candidates and wannaveep runnersup. Nikki Haley’s did-what-she-had-to appeal for party unity. Ron DeSantis’ dead-aim demolition of Joe Biden’s “Weekend at Bernie’s” presidency and exuberant exposition of the GOP vision for 2025 and beyond.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ quiet, confident contention that Trump seeks to empower not just women but “every American” and impassioned insistence that God spared the 45th president because he “isn’t finished with him yet.”

And Marco Rubio’s emotional encomium to Corey Comperatore, who “died as he lived: a hero.” As a route to defending “the Americans who wear the red hats” – “the people who grow our food and drive our trucks, the people who make our cars and build our homes” who only want “good jobs and lower prices … borders that are secure, and for those who come here to do so legally.”

Not to mention a power-packed parade of inspiring “everyday Americans” – from the 98-year-old D-Day veteran who averred he would re-enlist with Trump as his commander in chief to the black sick-and-tired-of-being-sick-and-tired victims’ rights advocate.

With celebrities such as Hulk Hogan, with his warning to “criminals … low-lifes … scumbags … drug dealers and … crooked politicians” of their fate “when Donald Trump and all the Trump-o-maniacs run wild on you.”

And most of all, with former First Granddaughter Kai Trump’s delightful humanization of The Donald as a “normal grandpa” who sneaks candy and soda to his grandkids when their parents aren’t looking and has to be reminded not to call her at school to talk about their golf games.

Yet the top of the ticket, who the on-site and national audiences expect to top all their top-this foregoers, seemed somehow to have missed the memo.

In place of red meat, the aloof and almost professorial vegetarian convert JD Vance served up lentil curry. 

And the presidential candidate? Pretty much pure mush.

Vance veered in the first part of his speech between moving personal stories, especially about the salty-tongued “Mawmaw” who raised him and gave him direction – and died with 19 loaded guns strategically placed around her home – praise for Trump, and denunciations of “decades of betrayals inflicted by Joe Biden and the rest of the corrupt Washington insiders.”

He found his stride near the end with a pledge that Trump and he “won’t cater to Wall Street, we’ll commit to the working man” on immigration, energy production, trade, and foreign policy, and that he personally would “give everything I have … to make this country a place where every dream you have for yourself, your family, and your country will be possible once again.”

But his delivery was so flat and pacing so slow that by the end of the vice presidential candidate speech – traditionally a barn-burner in the style of Al Gore’s time-for-them-to-go stemwinder and Sarah Palin’s pit-bull-with-lipstick self-characterization – the air seemed to have been let out of the room and the delegates to be all but deflated.

The worse news? Vance’s address was riveting compared to that of his new boss.

The Donald is said to be a “changed man” in the wake of an assassination attempt. But he fell back into old habits at the worst possible time, treating his convention acceptance like one of his every-which-way campaign rally riff-apaloozas. Unlike the George Patton of the Academy Award-winning eponymous film, who didn’t “like to pay for the same real estate twice,” Trump double-covers every subject and theme. 

He’ll start by dutifully reading his prepared remarks, which are generally crisp, cogent, colorful and at times, poetic, as in this moving assertion that “(t)here is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for others … and this is the love that will lead America back to the summit of human achievement and greatness.”

But then he expands on his remarks, stream-of-consciousness style, interminably. Did America, looking for his broad vision for a second term, really need nearly a minute of explication on “right to try” for the terminally ill?

Or he’ll get sidetracked – like the extended shout-out to seemingly everyone who had appeared before the convention, his family, the state of Wisconsin and the Green Bay Packers, and anyone else who popped into his mind. Or lengthy anecdotes about his triumphant interactions with world leaders.

And on this occasion, Trump repeatedly circled back to reiterate positions he had already staked out – on inflation, on immigration, on energy policy – complete with further sidetracks.

Generally, these detours and travelogues at least have the benefit of being more entertaining than his planned script, if not as inspiring. Not this time. If the current White House occupant is “Sleepy Joe,” his predecessor came across Thursday night (and into Friday a.m.) as “Drowsy Donald,” looking for all the world as if he was going to nod off in the middle of his own remarks (as a friend and fellow commentator and political junkie admitted he did).

Entering his peroration, 45 too rediscovered his footing, and an inspirational tone, with a return to the solid ground of his text. Quoth he, “You’ve been told to lower your expectations and to accept less for your families. I am here tonight with the opposite message. Your expectations are not big enough. It is time to start expecting and demanding the best leadership in the world: leadership that is full, dynamic, relentless, and fearless.”

We can only hope that as this long and already drama-filled campaign begins in earnest (perhaps with a new opponent), both occupants of the top of the GOP ticket can raise their self-expectations – and top their disappointing convention performances – with rhetoric that equally meets that description.

Bob Maistros is a messaging and communications strategist, crisis specialist, and former political speechwriter. He can be reached at bob@rpmexecutive.com.