Here’s the first bit of good news to come out of the Republican convention in Tampa: Humorist Dave Barry will apparently be writing daily dispatches about it for the National Journal. The Florida native’s first column gets right to down to business, asking why any sane person would try to hold an event in the Sunshine State in the first place:

I don’t know why anybody thought it was a good idea to hold a presidential nominating convention in Florida. This state has a terrible track record with presidential politics. Does anybody remember 2000? That was the year when the presidential election was decided by Florida residents who were deeply confused about which holes to punch in a ballot. This is not surprising: Florida residents are also deeply confused about what lane they’re driving in, or what, specifically, they’re supposed to do when the traffic light changes color. So this is the last place where anybody should attempt to nominate somebody for president. Nevertheless as I write these words, Tampa is the site of a massive convention gathering featuring thousands of delegates, party leaders, media people, protesters, hookers, random lunatics, and Donald Trump.

He has some interesting insights on the host city too:

I am not suggesting for one second that Tampa is some kind of cultural backwater. Tampa is a major city boasting a wide array of things, as evidenced by this list of Five Fascinating Facts About Tampa: 1. Tampa boasts the world’s longest continuous sidewalk. 2. The Hooters restaurant chain originated here in 1983. 3. OK, if you want to get technical, Hooters actually originated in Clearwater. 4. I only included Hooters because we have pretty much exhausted the fascinating facts about Tampa. 5. Seriously, though, it’s a really long sidewalk.

You can read the whole thing here.