In case you missed it (or want to see it again:)
I’m not all that cynical usually, but I found myself getting there yesterday. Sitting there, watching the speakers on TV one after another praise Barack Obama the same way, I started getting cranky. It didn’t help that Wolf Blitzer was droning on and on in between and sometimes during the speeches, a situation I remedied by switching it to C-SPAN, which doesn’t have commentators at all. Good thing, too, because as I understand it, Claire McCaskill’s speech wasn’t televised on CNN any other network.
Watching all those speeches back to back reminded me that public officials aren’t necessarily very good public speakers. In fact, some of the non-electeds who had been given a speaking slot were just as good as those who had spent years in office.
Case in point: Michelle Obama. As she spoke, especially introduced by her mom in a short film presented before the speech, my cynicism melted away. It was the kind of speech that hits you in the gut, telling you her story, the kind of story we all want for ourselves and for our own kids. A woman that came through hard work from a struggling family to a successful law career and raise a family of her own, a picture passionately presented by Michelle. How could you not tear up a little when hearing about her father, since deceased, struggling to make it every day to work at a city water plant while fighting multiple sclerosis?
She did exactly what she needed to do – showed herself as a likeable normal person who is also special. Showed her family as a normal American family with normal American family values. She looked great. Her delivery was pitch perfect. The kids were adorable. The campaign could not have expected more of her.
Obama screwing up the name of the city he was in – maybe gained him votes in St. Louis 🙂
I don’t have cable so I watched it on the Democratic convention site where they live streamed it in HD – amazingly clear, I’ve never seen anything streamed over my computer so clear. Anyway, I missed all the talking heads.
But I thought the rest of the night was very flat. I would say the hilights were the prepared films they showed. I liked all of them. I cried through Ted Kennedy’s. Caroline did a nice job but she is just not a public speaker. They should have had Maria Shriver introduce him – that woman can speak. Ted was good. The rest of the speakers ranged from really bad to only all right.
I saw all of Claire’s speech and as usual she came across as perky, enthusiastic and always on point. I liked that she talked about beating McCain. But even at her best Claire is not a dynamic speaker. So I would put her up in the all right category.
I hope tonight is better. If you plan a convention that is intended to do nothing but be a teevee infomercial – you should make it a GOOD teevee infomercial. I hope Hillary gives a great speech tonight. I hope she talks about women AND shows how John McCain is not good for America and not good for the women of America. She has the potential to hit it out of the ballpark too if the Hillary from the last month of the campaign shows up rather than the Hillary from the beginning of the campaign.
although I suppose that the production values will ratchet up as the convention progresses. I think that lineup of speakers itself is the real issue from a symbolic point of view–having a disaffected Republican, for instance, even though he was a leaden speaker, was a very useful–and the actual content of what he said was pretty good and could generate some useful quotes.
Kennedy was wonderful and although I regard political convention programs in general as a particular, very artificial, genre of performance art, I was actually moved. There is something special about watching somebody say goodbye to what has been his life that is both bittersweet and touching. The money slot is, of course the 9-10 period that is televised on the networks and I agree that Michelle handled that beautifully with an assist from those two almost unbelievably charming children.
I would suggest watching on PBS–they are giving the convention full coverage although you do have to put up with David Brooks’ comments periodically. I actually enjoy hearing him trot out the Republican talking points in his subtle and underhanded way–I love to talk back to the TV set.