Democratic Convention
This is the week of the Democratic Convention, a time for Democrats to come together and present Barack Obama and his family to the American people. It is a time for Barack Obama to take his appeal to a higher level, by getting more specific about where he wants to lead America, in contrast to where George Bush has taken us and where John McCain will follow.
The Obama campaign recognizes his greatest vulnerability with undecided voters is his "otherness", the perception that he is different. Tonight Michelle Obama's brother will introduce her and she will have the task of showing the American people how much her family, Barack's family and their own family have in common with the rest of us. Mrs. Obama rose from the working class roots of an intact family to earn college scholarships, which combined with student loans, resulted in her becoming a successful attorney. She and Barack have two young daughters. Her story is the embodiment of the American dream and should be an inspiration to all of us, yet some people see her accomplishments as a threat - because she is a woman, because she has self-confidence and because she is black.
If all Democrats vote for Obama, he should be able to get elected. Possible defectors are disgruntled Hillaryites and some white Catholics. Hill and Bill will be blabbing on two successive nights. As if the drawn out primary process was not enough, now we have to go through some sort of placing of Hillary's name in nomination and maybe even a roll call vote. This is supposed to be a simple process. The loser announces intent to vote for the winner and urges all supporters to do the same. But the Clintons seem to be able to make a soap opera out of everything. The farther they are from the Obama White House, the better for America.
Joe Biden was a good choice for VP. He should be able to connect with white working class Catholics and he will be an effective, pleasant attacker of McCain. He already scored a nice shot when he talked about Americans sitting down at the kitchen table to figure out how they were going to be able to pay their bills, and how John McCain first has to figure out which one of his seven kitchens to sit in.
Barack's acceptance speech will be outdoors, in the stadium in Denver. It will likely be an excellent speech, but it needs to convince listeners that this great speaker can also be a great leader and can take us where we want to go. In the Twentieth Century, Democrat and Republican nominees for President and Vice President delivered 100 acceptance speeches. According to the opinion of scholars reported at the very interesting Top 100 American Speeches of the 20th century, only three of those speeches made the list, Adlai Stevenson in 1952, Barry Goldwater in 1964 and Geraldine Ferraro in 1984. You may have noticed all three of those candidates lost the election.
Nine other Twentieth Century convention speeches made the top 100 list, eight of them Democrat. Three keynoters scored, Barbara Jordan in 1976 [she also delivered the 1996 keynote], Mario Cuomo in 1984 and Ann Richards in 1988. Top non-keynote speeches were delivered by Jesse Jackson twice (1984 and 1988), Elizabeth Glaser in 1992, Teddy Kennedy in 1980 [Teddy has 4 of the top 100, brother John 6 and brother Robert another one], and Hubert Humphrey back in 1948. The sole speech from a Republican convention was not by a politician, but by AIDS activist Mary Fisher, who in 1992 broke the Republican silence on that subject.
Barack Obama will be accepting the nomination on the anniversary of the number one speech of the Twentieth Century, the "I Have A Dream Speech" by Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. John from Phoenix and I ended a visit to Washington, DC the day before the King speech, moving on to New York City. As we drove through the Holland Tunnel into the city, we were flagged over by a greeter working for the city. His job was to spot out of state license plates and offer logistical help to tourists. He noticed our plate said Washington and told us he would be going down there "tomorrow for the big march". I vaguely knew there was to be some sort of civil rights demonstration, but had not given any thought to participating or observing. As they say, "If I had known then what I know now". But actually, I might not have put up with the crowd to hear Dr. King, since I had heard him speak the year before at an appearance at the University of Washington. I attended that speech as an assignment for a speech class I was taking, and my interest was in studying his impressive style of speech rather than the content. I hope Barack is able to impress America with his speech, both on style and on content. I won't be in Denver, but I will be watching it live.
posted by Tom Blake | 11:13 AM
14 Comments:
I'll never forget that greeter. He called out "Hey Washington" as we drove by. My first reaction is to get away if someone is yelling at me. But my passengers had saner views, and told me to pull over. We were on a cross country odyssey with no real plans and no prior reservations. We were travelling on the naivete of youth. The greeter helped us find a cheap but clean and safe place to stay in New York. He never got it straight that we were from Washington State, not DC. But ironically we had just left DC on our journey one day before the March on Washinton.
We ran out of money before getting home. I had enough money to phone my father and ask for a loan. We were stuck in Wallace Idaho with a disabled car. I told him I had just enough to repair the car, but I'd need $40 for gas and food to get home to Seattle. He wired me $400.
Since then I have pre-planned all my trips and vacations to the minute.
I too have often thought how we let history pass us in the night, so to speak. How great it would be now to have been part of one of the biggest historical events of the 20th century.
John from Phoenix
That month we spent traveling the US 45 years ago produced memories to last a lifetime. I still look to it as my preferred way to travel, with a general plan and schedule, but always flexible and open to adjustments.
Six years after that trip, my wife and I spent seven weeks wandering in Europe. History half passed us by then too, as we had gone up to stay at a small mountain village in Switzerland where nobody spoke English. When we came down for breakfast, we were greeted with cheers. A group of poor students from Belgium was staying at the same place and they put on an impromptu sketch for us, which we could not comprehend. The priest who was in charge of the group, a Dachau survivor, spoke broken English and I managed a little broken French, so we learned that, as the only Americans around, we were being cheered and the sketch was celebrating the American accomplishment of the day before - the first man walking on the moon. We had not been following any news on our travels, so that is how we were informed of the small step and great leap.
Michele Obama's speech last night was fantastic. She showed how much she and her family and Barack and his family and their family with their two daughters have in common with most Americans. At the end of her speech, her daughters (ages 10 and 7) came on stage with her and then Barack appeared via big screen TV. When the girls saw their Dad, they got real excited and started asking him where he was and telling him they loved him. It was a spontaneous moment that showed what a loving family they are.
This is a first family of which America can justly be proud. I expect most people who are prejudiced against Michelle Obama did not watch her speech, but hopefully many Hillaryites at the Convention were suitably impressed and will get behind the Obama candidacy.
As per usual, I did not watch any of the convention yesterday. I'm content reading about it in the newspaper, a very cool medium, to say the least. I did want to watch Governor Napolitano's speech, but I got home too late from work. If you watched it tell me what you thought. I intend to see a little of Hillary tonight. Her speech tonight could rate a footnote in history a half century off. But my wife controls the remote, so maybe I'll miss her too.
BTW, I was living in Houston, working on the Apollo Program, when Armstrong walked on the moon. I was head of a small group of programmers writing post flight analysis programs for a NASA contractor. That was a big time in my life - I attended several celebrations while my wife was in the hospital recovering from the birth of our son.
John from Phoenix
All focus was on the Hillary speech. She did a good job of doing what she had to do - encourage everyone to get behind Obama. There were endless speeches before and after Hillary, the theme of the night being on the economic problems. Only C-Span showed them all. CNN and MSNBC were both on through most of it, but they spent more time showing their own people blabbing than they did showing the speakers. I saw a very brief portion of Napolitano, quite late in the evening. By then, everyone was pretty worn out, so she had little chance for an impact. The keynote speaker, Mark Warner from Virginia, got buried in the Hillary thrill, but he was a fairly boring speaker anyway. Bill gets the stage tonight, as does Biden.
Here is the Napolitano speech text and audio. I just listened to it. It was OK. She has a forceful voice, but nothing outstanding.
That's a great story you guys have about the march on Washington. A big What If that is almost as interesting as if you had actually made it to the speech.
In last night's speeches, Bill made it clear as he could that he supports Obama. Joe Biden and his family made an impressive showing. All the speakers took fair shots at McCain.
Tonight Barack will speak at Mile High, striking a balance between the positive of what he offers America and the negative that is John McCain's political reality.
NPR ran an interesting piece this morning about the white fears in DC 45 years ago today regarding the march on Washington. It shows how out of touch the white power structure was with the hopes and aspirations of not just black Americans, but all who truly believed in civil rights.
Interesting article about the march on Washington.
Uncharacteristically I watched both Clinton speeches. Even more astounding, so did my wife. We both enjoyed them, because the Clintons seemed to enjoy themselves so much. I soon forgot who is the Democratic candidate. Watching the convention thus far you would think it is one of the Clintons. Sure they kept saying Obama, Obama, Obama, but it was just a buzz word or phrase like "freedom" or "health care for all" or "ours is a Christian nation". The Clintons are the party leaders and Obama is an outsider. That's the message I got.
Then Biden made his mandatory attack dog speech and he did very well. While he was basking in the crowd's adulation, outsider Obama came in and crapped on his moment.
I read an editorial this morning that said most people at the convention are coming to realize the wrong candidate is heading the Democratic ticket. She (the editorial writer) pointed out many moments in Hillary's speech where Hillary damned Obama with faint praise or with left handed compliments. I can only think of one right now. The writer described Hillary praising Obama for selecting Biden as the VP candidate. She quoted Hillary as saying "he will bring some intensity to the campaign". The writers comment was "ouch". And I do remember Hillary saying that line. And I remember the look on her face was saying something to me, but not being really sensitive to the politics I couldn't figure out what her facial expression was conveying. Now I do.
The race will continue to be interesting for some weeks to come. McCain will have his turn and then we'll see. Whatever the outcome, I know it won't be four more years of Bush.
John from Phoenix
Obama did what he had to do, letting Hill and Bill speak. Protocol says the party's last Prez talks - poor McCain has to let Bush and even Cheney speak at his show. Hill got 18 million votes and you have to keep her voters in the fold. But note that by the time she moved to cut of the roll call vote, Barack was outscoring her 7 to 1. The Clintons will campaign for Obama, but there is no doubt their primary goal is to get Hillary into the White House sometime down the line.
The Convention was a continuous flow of speakers, all interesting choices, some even interesting speakers. The vast majority were never seen, except on C-Span, which showed every single one. But the big night was last night, the show in Mile High Stadium, and they pulled it off, in front of an All-American mix of about 80,000 people. Gore and Richardson gave quick, great speeches, praising Obama and punching at McCain.
There was a parade of retired Generals and Admirals for Obama as Commander-in-Chief. There was Susan Eisenhower, Ike's granddaughter and there was a series of ordinary working class Americans. One of these workers, a dweeby Republican from Indiana named Barney Smith, rocked the house with his line, "We need a president who puts Barney Smith before Smith Barney." After the roar died down a spontaneous chant erupted, "Bar - ney, Bar - ney".
Obama had a very challenging task, to live up to the hype and electrify the huge crowd with inspiring rhetoric, while also including specifics of where he will lead us and pointing out how John McCain will lead us in the wrong direction. He pulled it off marvelously. For Democrats still outraged by the Rovian tactics of the last two Presidential elections, it was exciting to see Obama take it to John McCain. Now that the primaries and Democratic convention are over, and the Clintons have had their swan songs for this year, Obama can concentrate all his attention on beating John McCain.
McCain names his running mate today. My lady Susan suggests Dick Cheney. Next week we suffer through the Republican show. I'll watch as much of it as I can stomach and report here.
Are you kidding me?! This can't wait for next week. McCain chose Sarah Palin for VP. Who?
The choice of VP reflects on the Presidential nominee's judgment and decision making skills. This choice confirms McCain suffers from judgmental eccentricity. He chose a 44 year old first term governor of our arctic state. Why? Gender, youth, outsider, whistle blower, Christian, pro-oil.
Is choosing a female supposed to get Hillaryite votes, when the female is an anti-abortion former beauty queen? She is even younger than Obama and way less experienced, having been in town government for Wasilla (population 5,470). She is definitely an outsider - has she ever even traveled East of Idaho? She did blow the whistle on a fellow Republican with whom she served on a commission for one year and then resigned - hey, she risked being forced to resign even earlier. She proved her pro-life chops by not aborting her Down's child two years ago. She'll solve the energy crisis by drilling in ANWR, once she convinces McCain - or once he croaks.
Don't worry about her becoming commander-in-chief in the event of the pre-mature exit of President McCain. She has experience as point guard on her high school basketball team. She also has experience in the fourth branch of government, journalism, having been a sports reporter for a while on local TV. Did I mention she has experience serving in the number two spot - she was runner-up in the Miss Alaska contest. If, for any reason , Miss Alaska had been unable to fulfill her term, Sarah would have had to be "ready from day one" to step in and take over.
I heard the news of McCain's choice in a one line message from my wife while I was at work. I also said, "who?". Then I remembered she was involved with some kind of investigation, and I assumed incorrectly she was mixed up with Senator Steven, one of the lowest of lives in Congress.
I went directly from work to a dinner party with old friends, the phrase "old friends" having both meanings. As we entered the living room Palin was on the TV standing next to McCain. That was the first time I saw her. Apparently it was the first time the man we were visiting saw her too. He said, "what a good looking woman". And then he said it again.
The woman we were visiting must have seen reports during the day, because she knew more about her. No, Palin has nothing to do with Stevens. She said that McCain pulled off an Obama by picking her. Whereas Obama went for age and experience in picking Biden, McCain went for youth and vitality. Her husband said for about the seventh time, "what a good looking woman".
And she is. Even a runner up beauty contestant knows how to use clothes, make-up, hair stye and accessories to best advantage. Palin uses those techniques to downplay her looks. Who was the last national politician that wore eyeglasses while on nation wide TV? The last president that I can think of who wore glasses was Harry Truman, and that was before national TV. Palin is situated to become the Truman of the twenty first century.
The people we visited are long term Republicans who are highly negative of George Bush. The man thinks Iraq is the root cause of our current economic problems. He wants to bring the troops home ASAP. McCain's stance on the war is their major reservation regarding him. They both were bolstered by McCain's choice. It gives them hope that the Republican Party may survive the devastation Bush has done to it.
This election campaign continues to surprise and entertain. I think it has surpassed even the Kennedy - Nixon campaign for historical change, drama, and entertainment. The next couple of months should really be interesting.
John from Phoenix
Most politically interested women have figured out the Democratic Party is the place for women. On picking a woman to run for VP, the Republicans are 24 years behind the Democrats. The Palin pick was a "Clarence Thomas" style tactic, choose a lightweight ideologue token to make it harder for your opponents to challenge. With this totally political move, McCain has shown that he values his political accomplishments more than he values the well-being of America. Obama picked a VP who could be President tomorrow if he had to be. McCain chose a gimmick.
After beating up Hillary forever, the right wing now claims to be embracing her, in hopes of creating a gender war they can exploit for political gain. Palin herself was calling Hillary a whiner just a couple months ago, and now talks like they are traveling pantsuit sisters.
The Palin pick panders to evangelicals, who no doubt are praying that McCain gets elected and then dies quickly, so Palin can take over the Oval Office while the evangelical warmth of the Bush bottom is still on the Presidential chair. Speaking of the Presidential hot seat, just imagine this woman's hand being on the nucular [sic- she pronounces it the same as Bush] trigger. I must correct myself on the age of her child with Down's who is only a few months old. I wonder how the child is being cared for while she holds full time public office and now campaigns nationwide, and how that fits in with the right wing idea of family values. I suppose they will say it proves we never needed a family leave law for parents of newborns.
She is supposed to have appeal in small states, though I don't know how many of them are in the same boat as Alaska, with substantial income for its citizens based on oil revenue. No wonder she wants to drill in ANWR, to make more money for which Alaska politicians can claim credit. They are experts at making money from the public. Their Republican Senator is an earmark top gun, producer of the infamous "bridge to nowhere". McCain criticizes that on the stump, but he voted for it. Palin says she rejected the money for the bridge, but she is on record earlier as saying it was good for Alaska.
The big scandal in Alaska does involve the Senator. But there is a little scandal over whether Palin acted improperly in firing the State Public Safety Director because he did not fire her former brother-in-law. I did some reading and looked at local reporting videos on You Tube and I think Palin could be in trouble for the cover up, lying about being involved in pressuring the Director before she fired him. Then, her replacement choice had to resign because of a sexual harassment reprimand letter from his former employer that she negligently ignored.
Republicans are actually touting her executive experience, mayor of a town of under 9,000 [reports of its size vary, since it is part of the Anchorage suburbia], and 20 months as Governor of one of the 3 smallest States in the Union. They also are trying to say it is better to have inexperience in the number two spot than in the number one. This last argument ignores Obama being a much bigger player on a much bigger stage, having been publicly vetted by an 18 month nation wide campaign, having superlative academic credentials, having been mentored by Democrats of national stature and having done everything one could do to show his good judgement, temperament and management skills.
I agree with new MSNBC political host Rachel Maddow, that women who embraced Hillary but now say they cannot vote for Obama are "post-rational". If they write in Hillary, they are pissing in the wind. If they actually vote for McCain, then they should go all the way and embrace the Republican Party, maybe accomplishing something good by making it more progressive and more palatable to women. Good luck.
The real victimized woman in this campaign is Michelle Obama, who has been vilified by so many people with no legitimate basis for doing so. One former Hillary supporter has recognized this injustice and is advocating that women come to the defense of Michelle. Hillary gave a good speech at the Convention. Michelle gave a better one. I listened to both of them. I wonder how many Hillaryites did the same, instead of disrespecting Michelle.
If you mean by "politically interested women" women who voted, your statement that they pick the Democratic Party is correct since Bill Clinton ran in 1992. Before that they were swept up by Ronald Reagan. They voted overwhelmingly for Reagan and HW Bush. Of course, McCain is trying to do the same.
You accuse McCain of making a "totally political move" by selecting Palin. Of course, that's what all presidential candidates do. If they didn't they would be traitors to their party and to their supporters. After they make the most politically advantageous choice, they and their supporters, especially those in the press, show what a fine president their choice would make if, God forbid, something happened to them.
In your last entry in this blog, you did just that. You went on and on about how Biden would be a perfect replacement for Obama. As you said it is totally political and that's the way it should be. And you are continuing the tradition.
Picking Palin was a gutsy move by McCain. It could destroy his chances or make him the next president. Sit back and enjoy the show.
No matter what, Bush is history. The country will be better off. We will have rational leadership again. That's all good. The rest is entertainment.
John from Phoenix
I was hiking Shaw Butte this morning and I heard a snippet of conversation from two middle aged men as I passed. One angrily said, "Barack Obama brings nothing to the presidency". "Nothing but his black ass", said the other.
Very interesting campaign.
John from Phoenix
I was TV channel surfing and came across a local cable access program showing a community parade in Fremont. One of the participants was a man whose naked rear end was in a picture frame with the title written underneath, "George W.".
You know the joke about opinions being like a__holes - everyone has one. It is also true that some people's opinions smell worse than others.
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