John McCain was the nominee, but Sarah Palin, his surprise pick for running mate, stole the show when Republicans gathered for their national convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul in 2008. What follows are edited excerpts of interviews with some of the participants.

Kim Skipper

Alaska delegate

I was in bed, 6 o’clock in the morning on the Friday John McCain announced his vice presidential pick; I remember I could hear my laptop pinging with new e-mails. I had the TV on Fox, and I could hear Bill Kristol mention Sarah Palin, so I started checking my e-mails and I’m going, “Oh, you’re kidding!”

I think it took me four hours to get dressed that day because the media was calling; my phone just rang constantly. It was a lot of frenzy. I think I managed to get six hours of sleep in the whole week we were there. It was constant. I don’t think we left here prepared for all the media.

It was a unique experience for it to be my first convention and for Alaska to be put on the map with Sarah Palin being the VP candidate. We knew she was being vetted, but we didn’t anticipate that happening. At least, I didn’t. Everybody wanted Alaska stuff. We had our pins, but none of us came prepared with a bunch of Alaska items because we didn’t think we were going to be on the national stage like that.

You know how they usually move the vice presidential state so you’re next to the president’s? We were told we were going to be moved, but we were never moved. The whole aisle next to us was always filled with reporters. They’d come to you before the evening started and be like, “Hey, Kim, can we talk to you right after Sarah gives her speech?” You’re in and out of the seats, being interviewed by media from all over the world. I don’t think I expected that. For the most part, it was fun frenzy. And on the plane ride home, I slept.

Tom Cole

U.S. House member from Oklahoma

I always think of conventions in terms of electric moments. In 2008, that moment was Sarah Palin’s speech. When she walked onto the national stage, the drama was palpable. Nobody knew what she was going to be able to do. We didn’t know what kind of stage presence she would have, we didn’t know if she would be able to project, we didn’t know if she’d be able to put a sense of humor in the speech. I can assure you, none of John McCain’s people had any earthly idea what she was going to do, either.

It was like watching your kid at their first soccer game. At first, you’re worried. “Oh my God, what are they like? Those other kids are so big and strong and.... ”
And then, all of a sudden, you realize your kid can play this game. There was such anticipation and concern when she got up there, because nobody other than the Alaska delegation had ever seen her perform. There was apprehension and excitement, and then about five minutes in, there was enormous relief. She was hitting it out of the park.

I remember I was watching it with a colleague, who turned to me after a few minutes and said, “Gosh, she’s great. She doesn’t have that deer-in-the-headlights look.” And I said, “No kidding—she shoots deer in the headlights.”

That night, I felt terrific. Suddenly we were in the hunt, ready to give them a good game. We put a great team on the field. I felt better about McCain after her speech. I laughed all the way through it, and I just felt exhilarated. I thought, “Boy, a star is born tonight.”

Palin’s speech took what was a fairly lethargic convention and set it on fire. We were all ho-hum going in. Of course, we were there, we supported McCain, and we wanted to do our best. But the convention began with a sense that we couldn’t win—and it ended with a sense that we might. I give her speech credit for totally changing the mood in that room.

You knew, when Ronald Reagan got up at a convention, that he was going to give a great speech. And you knew, when George H.W. Bush got up, he was going to at least have a great speech to give. In this case, no one knew what the speech was going to be. And it turned out, it wasn’t just an introduction of Sarah Palin and a bunch of nice clichés. It was a careful case for why Barack Obama should not have been president and John McCain should have been. She laid it out with all the skill of a courtroom lawyer.

It’s not very often that you leave a convention and the buzz is all about the vice presidential speech. It’s usually the nominee at the end, but in that convention, the speech that everybody talked about—and continues to talk about—was the one Sarah Palin gave.

McCain was not in the same league in that convention as she was. And nobody else was, either. That was her moment in politics; that introduced her on the national stage. And she stepped up and delivered like very few politicians ever do.

Charlie Smith

College Republicans’ national chairman

We were sitting down to stage right, maybe 10 rows from the stage itself, when Sarah Palin finished speaking, and the crowd just went nuts. It was like the Broncos had just scored a touchdown in the playoffs. Then John McCain walked out from behind the huge screen, and the already-loud roar went deafening. It was like standing next to an airplane at takeoff. I’ll always remember that. I’d been on that stage just a couple days before, and it was incredible to witness. That, and the time our national field director, Will Crosswell, challenged Sway from MTV to a dance-off at some party. Sway declined.

Jo Ann Davidson

Republican National Committee cochairwoman

As chair of the site-selection committee, I spent a good bit of some cold winter months in Minnesota working with staff and mayors of the two cities—Minneapolis and St. Paul. I got to know those cities pretty well. We got thrown a little bit of a curve when the bridge collapsed in Minneapolis [in August 2007]. It was the year before the convention, and the Republican National Committee was meeting in Minneapolis at the time. There were all sorts of concerns. Do you redo the transportation plan? How many guests would be staying in Minneapolis proper? We found alternate routes with the city’s department of transportation. That was one of our earliest challenges. A lot of people were saying, “You need to move the convention because of this.” We thought that was a premature thought. It’s very hard to move an event like that that takes so much advance planning. We had to go back and make sure we were on safe ground and that we had cooperation with the city. Then we moved on with our plans.

Mike Duncan

Republican National Committee cochairman

My first memory of conventions goes back to 1960 watching the Republican and Democrat convention on television and just being totally enthralled. I can remember thinking, “Boy, I would like to be a part of that someday!” And then being able to stand on the podium in Minneapolis and call the convention to order was just a dream come true.

No matter how many times you’ve done this, just before you make a major speech—I know I felt this way going out—there’s a little apprehension. You have a green room underneath the stage where you get ready; you get your makeup put on; then you come out, and you know what the script is going to be, and then you go out and deliver your speech. It’s just an exciting moment.

I believe we accomplished what we set out to in that convention, because we got a bump out of the convention. If you look at the polling numbers, it will show that we, for the first time, took a lead in the campaign. Unfortunately, the economic conditions and September 15 [the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy] kind of set us behind.