GOP Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan delivered exceptionally strong remarks in Tampa tonight, capping off an incredible hour of nationally-televised speeches from Republican headliners. The construction and tone of Ryan's address was masterful. He was serious, earnest, likeable -- and he took apart President Obama's record with great skill and relish. The Congressman opened with a stark assessment of the dismal campaign President Obama has been forced to run, due to his failed record in office:



I’m the newcomer to the 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’ve run out of ideas. Their moment came and went. Fear and division are all they’ve got left. With all their attack ads, the president is just throwing away money – and he’s pretty experienced at that. You see, some people can’t be dragged down by the usual cheap tactics, because their ability, character, and plain decency are so obvious – and ladies and gentlemen, that is Mitt Romney.



The Wisconsin native spoke about his family and upbringing, introducing his wife and young children, as well as his mother -- whom he called his "role model." On a policy level, he ticked down the list of the current administration's misfires, mistakes and mendacity; he hit the stimulus, Solyndra, unemployment, the credit downgrade, and Obama's inexpiable abdication of leadership on deficits and debt. Ryan really warmed to his task as he spelled out the case against Obamacare:



Maybe the greatest waste of all was time. 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. Obamacare comes to more than two thousand pages of rules, mandates, taxes, fees, and fines that have no place in a free country. The president has declared that the debate over government-controlled health care is over. That will come as news to the millions of Americans who will elect Mitt Romney so we can repeal Obamacare.