THE RNC BEGINS...FOR ME AT LEAST

Photo courtesy of wikipedia.org

Hello! My name is Alec Chenkus and I will be sharing my thoughts and experiences connected with the 2016 Republican National Convention taking place in Cleveland. I'm very excited about the opportunity to have such a unique and impactful event taking place in my hometown; I was born in Peoria, Illinois but moved to Twinsburg, Ohio, a suburb 30 minutes outside of Cleveland, when I was a year and a half old. I have played basketball and baseball, but for most of my life (since I was at least five years old) soccer has always been my sport of choice - and I played competitively until I graduated high school. I went to public school for the entirety of my academic career before enrolling in the Honor's Program at John Carroll University where I plan on graduating in the spring of 2016 with a Bachelor's degree in journalism and a concentration on political science and political communication. My ultimate goal is to focus on investigative reporting as one of my favorite shows is John Oliver's Last Week Tonight; it is my dream of mine to be a researcher for his show. Oliver is fantastic to watch as he has such an impressive ability to condense and analyze massive political and social issues in a very clear, yet entertaining, manner allowing for his viewers to learn a substantial amount of information while still entertaining them. Most of my extra time is spent traveling and hiking with my close group of friends. Anyways, I hope you enjoy traveling along with me through this (predictedly) chaotic 2016 Republican National Convention!

Henry Gomez of Cleveland.com posted two articles related to the convention this week: one focused on Donald Trump's "hostile" hijack of the Republican party and a second on a proposed plan to have John Kasich as the alternative to Trump at the convention.

The article focused on Trump hijacking the party went into great detail about some of the most crass statements that Trump has made in regards to any kind of human consideration, how this campaign makes many nostalgic for Romney's campaign as well as the hope that Rubio's campaign brought, and the hesitance for any true Republicans to back up Trump in any way in order to preserve the party's fundamental ideals.

The second article discussed New Hampshire Sen. Gordon Humphrey's proposed plan to have John Kasich step up as the alternative to Trump at the convention. Humphrey originally had considered Romney as well but ultimately ruled him out, according to an email Humphrey sent to Kasich allies. Chris Schrimpf, a spokesman for Kasich's political team, has responded to the story asserting that Kasich's only plans for the convention are to preserve the safety of the city and to not disrupt.


References
Gomez, Henry. (2016) Donald Trump leads the Republican Party down a troubling, fateful path to Cleveland: analysis. Cleveland.com. Retrieved from http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2016/07/donald_trump_leads_the_republi_1.html.
Gomez, Henry. (2016) A key ally is urging John Kasich to step up as the GOP convention alternative to Donald Trump. Cleveland.com. Retrieved from http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2016/07/a_key_ally_is_urging_john_kasi.html.