By Bob Benenson, CQ Staff

The Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., opened this afternoon under extraordinary circumstances, as the greatly shortened first-day program was eclipsed by national news coverage of the high winds, torrential rains and storm surges produced by Hurricane Gustav as it reached landfall in southern Louisiana and moved slowly to the west.

First lady Laura Bush and Cindy McCain, the wife of Republican presidential candidate John McCain , closed the brief session late this afternoon in St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center with brief and non-partisan appeals for the public to contribute aid for the affected states.

Bush did mention the pending Republican ticket at the start of her speech, saying she is happy to be in St. Paul as the party prepares to nominate Arizona Sen. McCain for president and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for vice president. But she noted that President Bush deferred his plans to attend the convention — he had been scheduled to deliver a speech tonight — to observe the efforts to coordinate emergency response operations at a command center in Austin, Texas.

The president has taken a hands-on approach toward this natural disaster three years after he and his administration received heavy criticism for a haltering response to the devastation inflicted on New Orleans and other Gulf Coast areas by Hurricane Katrina.

Mrs. Bush only mentioned the Party once more during her appearance. She noted that all of the governors from the five-state Gulf Coast region — Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Haley Barbour of Mississippi, Rick Perry of Texas, Charlie Crist of Florida and Bob Riley of Alabama — are Republicans as she introduced video statements about the hurricane by four of them. Jindal, whose state has absorbed the brunt of the storm so far, was unavailable to participate; none of the Gulf Coast governors has yet left home for their planned trips to the Republican convention.

After the videos, Cindy McCain joined Laura Bush on stage and made another brief and politically toned-down statement during which she reiterated previous statements by her husband that “this is a time when we take off our Republican hats and put on our American hats” to work together on behalf of those affected by Hurricane Gustav. Both women urged attendees and viewers to go to a new Web site named Cause Greater as well as state-based emergency relief sites to provide aid to those affected.

Republican National Committee Chairman Mike Duncan earlier had opened the convention by asking delegates and party officials to send financial aid for victims of the hurricane. The giant video screen behind the podium urged viewers to text pledged donations for “Hurricane Relief” to 2HELP (24357), using the keyword GIVE (4483), prompting a number of attendees to reached for cell phones and other communications devices.

The only essential business that must be performed at the convention is the approval of the platform and rules, the nomination of John McCain for president and Palin for vice president. When and whether the convention returns to its normal role as a partisan pep rally is uncertain, pending an assessment of how much damage Hurricane Gustav will produce, something that will take anywhere hours and maybe even days depending on the progression of the storm.

Though reduced from its height as a Category 4 storm as it progressed past Cuba into the Gulf of Mexico, Gustav came ashore this morning on the central Louisiana coast southwest of Louisiana as a powerful storm and remained a minimal hurricane centered over inland southern Louisiana and packing sustained winds of up to 80 miles an hour as of 4 p.m. central time.

Television news reports showed flood waters overtopping levees in New Orleans, which was inundated by flood waters after Katrina, though the Army Corps of Engineers told media outlets that it appeared — unlike in the 2005 crisis — the levees protecting the city are holding. The state capital of Baton Rouge, which escaped Hurricane Katrina relatively unscathed, was battered today by heavy rain squalls and strong winds. CNN reports that a levee in Plaquemines Parish, at the state’s southeast corner, might give way. And much of an area reached from Alabama and Mississippi to the east through most of Louisiana continued at mid-afternoon to be besieged by gusty winds and downpours.

Current guidance from the National Weather Service’s National Hurricane Center is that there could be prolonged effects as Gustav reduces to tropical storm strength but slows to possibly produce torrential rains. While the storm will gradually weaken but is expected to be persistant, as it is currently anticipated to proceed only as far as the Louisiana-Texas border by early tomorrow morning and then virtually stall out, moving northward only as far as the Arkansas-Oklahoma border by Saturday — five days from now.

The fact that Gustav came ashore this morning at Cocodrie, La., as a strong Category 2 storm instead of a potentially more catastrophic Category 3 or 4 storm had some Republican leaders viewing an increased possibility of reclaiming at least part of their carefully constructed program touting their candidates and agenda and responding to last week’s Democratic convention in Denver.

Responding to a question about whether McCain will come to the convention to accept his pending nomination, Davis said, “We are more optimistic than we were a day ago. We have obviously no anticipation that the senator will receive his nomination anywhere but St. Paul.”