Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

You would normally have to try pretty hard to self-incriminate this badly.

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

Mediocre white men think RFK Jr’s pathetic midlife crisis is inspirational. The bar is set so low for them, it’s subterranean.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Peak wingnut was a lie.

The revolution will be supervised.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

The words do not have to be perfect.

Roe is not about choice. It is about freedom.

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

He really is that stupid.

We will not go back.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

“But what about the lurkers?”

You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2016 / DNC Night 2: This Is What My America Looks Like

DNC Night 2: This Is What My America Looks Like

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I have no idea where the other FPs are, but I expect John to bigfoot this one moments after I post. But it does look the like we could use a part 2 before Bill Clinton steps up to the plate.

I’ve been clicking around youtube and found this, and believe it or not, I had never heard it in its entirety before:

And then of course I had to rewatch this, just to remember the joy of that night:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnvUUauFJ98

This here’s a DNC open thread…waiting for the Big Dog….

ETA: I swear there were no posts in process when I started editing this one. Now I’ve bigfooted Betty Cracker. Sigh. Apologies.

Reader Interactions

506Comments

  5. 5.

    muddy

    I think people across America were saying, “That man will be president some day” after Obama’s 2004 speech. I know I was, and whenever I related that was told, Me too. I was surprised that it happened so soon, but thank the gods for it!

  6. 6.

    amk

    oh boy, we really are celebrating tonight, aren’t we?

    either that, or dmsilev is awfully shouty.

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    I gave you all serious, uncomfortable analysis at 2 PM EDT. Someone else can do the open threads for the DNC, I’m pooped!

  9. 9.

    liberal

    Hilarious article on front page of WaPo: (heading) “The creator of the viral pro-Trump act ‘USA Freedom Kids’ now plans to sue the campaign”
    (subhead) Jeff Popick says that the campaign failed to live up to promises it made to him, including canceling performances and not making provisions for the group to sell its albums.

  17. 17.

    Truegster

    I’m expecting a hat trick from the Big Dog tonight. I want him to account for all his past legislation and bring in the hillbilly/trump vote. He is a damn good speaker, third after Obama and Michelle.

  18. 18.

    guachi

    You can see all sorts of Keynote speeches on the CSPAN Democratic Convention page. I watched this again while the roll call vote was taking its sweet time.

    He looks so young! Though I did, too, in 2004.

    I remember my roommate and I being so bummed at Kerry losing.

    Also, that’s a very big eagle on Albright’s lapel. (or where a lapel would be…)

  19. 19.

    Jim Parish

    I remember watching the 2004 speech and thinking to myself, “That man could be our first black president”. (I didn’t expect him to make his move quite so fast, though.) I also remember watching the camera pan around the delegates, smiling, laughing, clapping, cheering – and Jesse Jackson, looking like he’d just bitten a lemon. Delegates in uproar – and Jesse. The third or fourth time, I was shouting at the TV: “Smile, Jesse!” He finally got a little smile on his face and started clapping, but it looked as though he knew the baton had been taken from him. (I say this with affection, and recognition for Jackson’s importance. He just didn’t quite get where he wanted to go.)

  23. 23.

    Mnemosyne

    Okay, the Big Dawg’s intro film is showcasing several working class white dudes. Hopefully this will soothe guachi’s hurt fee-fees.

  26. 26.

    JPL

    Obama is the man and I’ll never regret my donations to him. We will miss him, but Hillary can lead us forward. .

  27. 27.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Baud: Seems to speak to the demographic.

    ETA: It looks like our trollish friend is back.

    ETA2: I see Adam noticed?.

  28. 28.

    BR

    @guachi:

    I had asked in an old thread something I’m curious about — I’d like to learn from you what sorts of things might motivate you or people like you. As in, what sorts of political messages move you? I know others are dismissive, but votes are votes, and if you’re saying folks like you don’t really see the appeal of the DNC messages, I want to know why.

    I’m also curious whether the NYPD guys spoke to you better than the other folks who spoke.

  30. 30.

    dmsilev

    Bill O’Reilly, History Guy:

    Fox News shining star Bill O’Reilly responded Tuesday to First Lady Michelle Obama’s commanding Democratic National Convention speech by putting forth that the slaves who built the White House were actually “well fed and had decent lodgings.”
    “Slaves that worked there were well fed and had decent lodgings provided by the government, which stopped hiring slave labor in 1802. However, the feds did not forbid subcontractors from using slave labor,” O’Reilly said. “So, Michelle Obama is essentially correct in citing slaves as builders of the White House, but there were others working as well.”

    (link)

  31. 31.

    Adam L Silverman

    @dmsilev: I have now, but it tracks with what I was seeing at a number of sites, in addition to the ones I linked to in my post earlier today. Doesn’t surprise me at all.

  32. 32.

    Schlemazel Khan

    @lamh36:
    That level of ignorance is not accidental, the man has to work hard to be that stupid. Makes me wish there really were a hell just for him

  34. 34.

    Mnemosyne

    Is it bad that I think Michelle Obama got a bigger hand last night?

    ETA: Though the sound seems to be mixed a little differently tonight on CSpan.

  38. 38.

    Adam L Silverman

    @efgoldman: I’ve been busy covering, in real time, terrorist attacks, coups, and mass shootings. I’ve got an interesting thing dealing with a Saudi cleric I’ve been trying to get to for ten days and a terrorism analysis post I want to do as well. I’ll try to squeeze something in.

  41. 41.

    Chris

    Oh, Bill. The first U.S. president I am old enough to remember. Warts and all, I am fond of this guy.

  50. 50.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    I am so so so glad Bill Clinton is on our side. He would be positively dangerous to our side if he was on the other side.

  57. 57.

    Quinerly

    @Mnemosyne
    His stories are fabulous. I’m in tears. He’s aged. Worried about this tremble in his hand. On a brighter note, I had forgotten how long his fingers are when he wags that one index finger at us.?

  64. 64.

    Wag

    And Bill’s knocking it out of the park. A folksy telling of Hillary’s life is the perfect way to reintroduce her to America.

    Third times the charm

  66. 66.

    Patricia Kayden

    Loving Bill’s speech. Sweet story of how they met and married. Going to enjoy them being back in the White House!

  74. 74.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @LAO: Next we hear of you, you’ll have knocked over a liquor store to get your Bundy fix.

  89. 89.

    Punchy

    Anyone watching the Don’s twitter feed? Waiting for the inevitable Lewinsky ref and something about Hillary causing all his infidelity.

  93. 93.

    Mnemosyne

    @Vince:

    Now that reminds me — the next time someone tries to tell me taxation is slavery, I’ll tell them that Bill O’Reilly said slavery was pretty cushy, so obviously taxes can’t be that big a deal.

  96. 96.

    PhoenixRising

    This is a great speech and needs to end soon. Easy for me to say because I already know her resume but…cut to the chase: Hillary did a lot of things before Republicans started saying horrible things about her.

  99. 99.

    dmsilev

    @Punchy: Pretty quiet so far. Most recent one:

    Donald J. Trump ‏@realDonaldTrump 23m23 minutes ago
    Many of Bernie’s supporters have left the arena. Did Bernie go home and go to sleep?

  100. 100.

    muddy

    He’s looking healthier to me, gained a few pounds. For a while he was so thin he looked fragile.

  104. 104.

    Steeplejack

    I see I’m in the minority, but this speech is not really working for me. Now just hoping he wraps it up in a reasonable amount of time.

  105. 105.

    Comrade Scrutinizer

    I was watching a 60 Minutes interview with them from ages ago when he was running for President the first time. During the middle of the interview a light stand fell over with a terrible crash and popping of bulbs. Scared them both, and they wrapped their arms around each other. Their relationship seemed really tight. That was really affecting for some reason.

  106. 106.

    JPL

    @dmsilev: When my son was younger, my ex watched Dukes of Hazzard with him, until I overheard my son sharing with a friend that he had to watch it with his dad.
    Parenthood is a strange thing.

  110. 110.

    Wag

    @PhoenixRising:

    And that’s a point that needs be be driven home over and over.

    And Bill just got the Dems to applaud Tim Delay. That takes skill and a great outlook on politics.

  115. 115.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Peter: Assange is playing with fire. Eventually the government of Ecuador will need something from the US and his protection will end, he’ll be on a plane to the US, and in Federal lockup awaiting indictment and trial. What he’s done in that quote is essentially try to blackmail the US government into prosecuting his personal vendetta that resulted from his posting the leaked cables or else. His being a willing dupe in the DNC hack also tells you that his interests aren’t in transparency, they’re in running down his petty grievances. He’s so concerned with other people being brought to justice, but refuses to submit himself for prosecution and a day in court over his alleged rape. His utility to others with real power will one day end and when that happens they will hang him out to dry.

  117. 117.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    Charles P. Pierce Retweeted
    Steve Inskeep ‏@NPRinskeep 8m8 minutes ago
    A long speech, though its purpose is clear: he’s painting an extended portrait of a human being, who’s often talked about as if she isn’t.

  119. 119.

    JPL

    @Comrade Scrutinizer: Even when he was less than faithful, her feelings were apparent. They might show, I’m gonna kill him, but they were real. Those feelings don’t show when you don’t care about someone.

  121. 121.

    ? Martin

    I’m so glad Bill is giving this introduction. If you spend a bit of time, and are willing to shovel all of the GOP shit piled on top, you can find this Hillary Clinton. It’s all out there, a lot of it from way back in the days when we forced her to bake cookies because that’s what First Ladies were supposed to do.

    But this is also the kind of convention speech that couldn’t ever have been given before. Michelle could have told similar stories of Barack, but she didn’t have the power she has now let alone of having been President. We have a two term President telling us this. It’s quite remarkable. Can anyone imagine Trump telling this story? Do you think he even gives a shit what Malania’s accomplishments are, other than those that reflect on him?

  123. 123.

    Mnemosyne

    @PhoenixRising:

    In theory, this is supposed to be our re-introduction to Hillary and (hopefully) counteract 25 years of bullshit.

    Honestly, it’s giving me a better opinion of Bill, who I’ve always viewed as being very egotistical, but he’s doing a really good job here of keeping the focus on her.

  126. 126.

    amk

    @Adam L Silverman:

    He’s so concerned with other people being brought to justice, but refuses to submit himself for prosecution and a day in court over his alleged rape.

    Typical libertarian puke.

  128. 128.

    PsiFighter37

    @Peter: I would be very pleased if something unfortunate happened and he woke up in Swedish custody one morning.

  129. 129.

    ? Martin

    @Adam L Silverman: Yeah, I’m stunned he was willing to admit to tampering with a foreign election from an embassy he has asylum in. What the fuck was he thinking?

  130. 130.

    lamh36

    @ctuckerprof 4m4 minutes ago
    #BillClinton just extolled the virtues of HIPPY, which helps less-educated parents help their kids in school. One of my favorite programs

    But wait, did he specifically say “less-educated WHITE” parents, cause how would we know if he’s speaking to white or non-white folk

    And yes, I’m being a Petty Betty

  131. 131.

    dmsilev

    @Mnemosyne: Go back and listen to Bill’s convention speech from 2012. He did something similar for Obama then. He’s really good at it, when (as you say) his ego doesn’t get in the way.

  135. 135.

    Adam L Silverman

    @amk: I always think of those folks as pseudo or faux libertarians. The real libertarians I know, who aren’t stuck on Ayn Rand or the Austrian School, aren’t like that. Of course there aren’t that many of those types of real libertarians, so…

  137. 137.

    dmsilev

    Via dkos:

    Bill Clinton is completely off TelePrompTer right now. Just talking… Prompter person is lost.

  138. 138.

    Mnemosyne

    @? Martin:

    I was saying for G this morning that Bill was going to need to do for Hillary what James Cameron did for his ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow — make it clear to his sexist peers that it’s okay to vote for a mere woman.

    And I think he’s succeeding, just as Cameron succeeded and Bigelow got her Oscar for “The Hurt Locker.”

  143. 143.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    If he doesn’t work in a “Anyway, long story short…” here somewhere he’s an amateur.

  147. 147.

    patroclus

    The point. The Republican story of Hillary is made up. There is a real story instead.

  155. 155.

    TaMara (HFG)

    A friend of mine had heart surgery years ago and in her 70s her voice still sounded like Bill’s – just a bit hoarse all the time.

    Keep talking Bill, I could listen all night. <3

  159. 159.

    Keith P.

    Oh, goddammit. I’ve been watching a fucking roll call replay for the Big Dog’s speech. WTF?!??! Dammit.

  160. 160.

    JordanRules

    @Bill E Pilgrim: He wants to say as much as he can, fit it all in because he knows her and knows she’s not what has been portrayed for so long. He loves her and really wants people to know her and he knows better than most what it takes to do the job he once did. He knows she’s always been good enough to do it, even if he got to do it first.

  164. 164.

    RSR

    Big Dog. Enjoying this. Some good LOL moments And, of course, serious moments as well.

    Trying to imagine a tag team of Bill and Biden, both retired.

  172. 172.

    Keith P.

    @Keith P.:

    ETA: By request. Here’s a link to the live stream (I didn’t realize I posted the wrong link in my previous thread).

    Note to self, that ain’t a live stream no more.

  174. 174.

    Adam L Silverman

    @? Martin: He thinks he’s untouchable. He’s cultivated the impression that he’s either got or can get everyone’s dirty laundry and in the interest of honesty, candor, and transparency, all done with the purest and most noble of intentions, he’ll just put them out there and everyone can just make up their own mind…

    The DNC emails he posted disclosed PII. He is now an accessory to hundreds of counts of Identity theft. The more he talks, the deeper he digs the hole.

    The gaudier the patter, the cheaper the crook.

  181. 181.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    I hope the current POTUS is getting all competitive wanting to give an even better endorsement speech than Bill.

  186. 186.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I didn’t time it, but it came in at under an hour, surely.

    (NPR says 45 minutes.)

    I loved it. But now I want to hear “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow.”

  190. 190.

    patroclus

    Very effective from the Big Dawg. Not a policy or substantive speech – a homey one filled with touching yarns about his wife, which humanized her. Very much needed at this convention and no one else could have done it.

  193. 193.

    PsiFighter37

    For those of you that have more yesterdays than tomorrows – that’s a very, very good line. And a poignant one.

  195. 195.

    Keith P.

    I’m going to have to watch the replay because I caught about the last 5 minutes. It sounded like classic Bill, though

  197. 197.

    gogol's wife

    He’s a good storyteller!

    I notice he skipped over 1998 (sorry if someone already said this).

  199. 199.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Chris: I’m all for transparency. I’m all for a serious policy discussion about straightening out what we classify, why we classify it, and how we do so. As well as for how to get our systems up to spec so that they actually serve their intended purpose of allowing government personnel to do their jobs effectively. And I’m all for a discussion on how to best focus our Intel agencies and their counter intel programs. And that’s as both a citizen and someone who works within the system.

    What Wikileaks is doing is not facilitating that at all.

  200. 200.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    I for one am not complaining but teasing. He was perfect. And for him, as he’s the first to admit, and did at the start, that involves the loooooong form.

  204. 204.

    Groucho48

    And, MSNBC is doing its best to downplay the speech. I’ve never been an O’Donnell fan but, he’s provided the best sense of the Convention of the MSNBC folks. Maddow, can’t get over his calling Hillary a girl. You know, back when she was a teen age girl.

  207. 207.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Keith P.:

    I gave up on it when it gave me Madeline Albright three times in succession. Decided just to listen to the audio on NPR. Will try to see a YouTube or something tomorrow.

  209. 209.

    Keith P.

    In terms of a celebrity dick-swinging contest, the Dems have schlonged the GOP pretty epically, and easily. I mean, who were the most memorable “stars” from last week? Scott Baio and Antonio Sabato Jr. Oh, yeah, Willie from Duck Dynasty. They couldn’t even get Bedhead Clint Eastwood this year.

    NOTE: The penis stuff is intentionally doubly-ironic.

  211. 211.

    Adam L Silverman

    @TaMara (HFG): She came out of recovery sounding like a 70 year old from rural Arkansas? I’ve heard of some serious post-operative complications, but that’s a doozy!

  213. 213.

    Fair Economist

    Hunh, they got Kristen Chenneworth and Idina Menzel back together for this. I was just listening to Wicked.

  214. 214.

    MazeDancer

    Bill Clinton just signed on to be First Spouse.

    He paid every karmic debt.

    He made Hillary the star. And vowed, because of love and her amazing ability, he will be First Gentleman. He gave the classic Spouse Speech. “I am so lucky and now America will be, too.”

    Didn’t think he could. Impressive beyond measure.

  215. 215.

    Trentrunner

    @Groucho48: Hillary was in law school, so not a teenager, not a “girl.”

    That WAS a creepy opening, given the speaker. Period.

    ETA: Bill, with poor word choices and scene-setting, described how he pursued Hillary, staring at her, following her, nearly “touching” her. It was just weird, and I can’t believe no one helped him rewrite that part.

    Anyway, the 2nd half was vintage Clinton and was great.

  216. 216.

    Xantar

    For those not in the know, there’s a guy on YouTube who is famous for creating a Capella versions of pop songs. That’s this guy. They’re appealing to sorts of people who watch YouTube more than TV (i.e. Millennials).

  218. 218.

    hovercraft

    So Rachel thinks he was sexist referring to the girl, not saying her name, who the fuck else would he be talking about? Steve Schmidt thinks it was a meandering wedding toast gone wrong. Fuck them I loved it.

  219. 219.

    dr. bloor

    @Adam L Silverman: Yep. My first thought was that he couldn’t possibly have run this gambit by his Ecuadorian hosts beforehand. Assange might be happy to go all in on a Trump win, but they couldn’t possibly be.

  225. 225.

    Chris

    @Wag:

    Again, this is a man who was elected twice, at a time when the Reagan coalition was at the height of its power, and actually left office with higher approval ratings than he came in with, despite a Congress that went all out in its attempts to destroy him.

    That’s one goddamn hell of a politician.

  227. 227.

    Oldgold

    Rachel Maddow has been a jackass this entire convention. Her analysis of Bill’s speech was laughable. That was a damn effective speech.

  230. 230.

    Linnaeus

    @Chris:

    I never trusted them, either. They struck me as techno-libertarians who wanted to leverage legitimate concerns about government secrecy and information gathering into a general mistrust of anything our political institutions do.

  235. 235.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    That video was a takeoff on the Pitch Perfect movies, which Elizabeth Banks produced, and directed in the case of one of them.

  238. 238.

    Linnaeus

    Good speech by Bill. The party has moved on from him, but he can still bring it when he needs to.

  240. 240.

    patroclus

    Rachel is not particularly well-tuned-in to the (almost) universality of the Boy meets Girl story. I thought it was charming and particularly appropriate for a First Gentleman’s speech.

  242. 242.

    Comrade Scrutinizer

    @hovercraft: Wow. I can remember when MSNBC was an anodyne for Faux News. Seems like they are going to be in queue for VDE’s tumbrels.

  250. 250.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Linnaeus:

    The party has moved on from him, but he can still bring it when he needs to.

    Remember what he tried to do in his first couple of years? The country has moved left an a number issues. Bill did what he could with what he had. A lot of it was playing defense.*

    *Yeah, I still like him.

  252. 252.

    Kropadope

    Man, Bill Clinton was amazing. Even my vehemently Republican dad was giving Hillary props by the end.

  254. 254.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Adam L Silverman:

    The DNC emails he posted disclosed PII. He is now an accessory to hundreds of counts of Identity theft. The more he talks, the deeper he digs the hole.

    Dudebros get really angry when you point this out. Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s corrupt and nefarious plot to not actually attack Bernie Sanders for being an atheist is far more important.

  258. 258.

    Adam L Silverman

    @gogol’s wife: Could you imagine how Putin would respond if she was still Secretary of State. No disrespect to Secretary Kerry, but Secretary Albright has steel in all the places that matter!

  259. 259.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Oldgold:

    I haven’t followed MSNBC coverage that much, but I remember being shocked early last week when she waxed lyrical over one of the Trump spawn (can’t remember now if it was Eric or Junior, but Rachel was beside herself with gushing admiration).

  260. 260.

    PhoenixRising

    @patroclus: exactly. I’m Rachel’s age & met my wife in college and she is choosing not to embrace the universal love story he opened with. To be clear, I’m at least as gay as Rachel. She was tone deaf on that one.

  261. 261.

    guachi

    @BR:

    I had asked in an old thread something I’m curious about — I’d like to learn from you what sorts of things might motivate you or people like you.

    I’m a white heterosexual male in my 40s with no disabilities and no college degree (well, I have an AA from the military) and i”m in the military . I decided to be a Democrat when I was 10 (1984) because of economics. I was a Democrat in 1992 (when i could finally vote) because of economics and Clinton’s record in Arkansas (especially education) and an answer to a question in the ND primary really early in the primary season about Native Americans that Clinton nailed.

    Here was a guy that actually took the time to learn something about Native Americans that are routinely ignored. I grew up in Montana so Native American issues actually matter to me. Montana is the least black state and was overwhelmingly Democratic when I moved there. It’s one reason I get frustrated when white voters are written off and people say “blacks are the base” or something similar. Not in Montana. It’s the least black state – 0.5%. And yet Democrats won and still win. How can that be if they have no base there? Because the “base” of the democratic party varies wildly from place to place because of demographics. More white men voted for Obama, a group he lost by 25 points, than blacks of both sexes combined.

    Now, I’m still a Democrat for all the reasons that another straight, white, heterosexual (and not Christian) military male like John Cole is – because they give a damn about others less fortunate.

    But elections are heavily about “what will you do for me”. Often, what directly will you do for me. Not for others, though that matters. With unions, Democrats could give those white men (and, obviously, everyone else in a union) something directly. When a party looks like one that is giving things directly to others but not you, I can see why white men (with no degree, especially) would vote for Republicans.

    I can see two areas that they might focus on: security – attack Trump on Russia.
    And the good economy – it’s been moving along quite well.

    I doubt “not crazy on climate science” would appeal as much to a not-college educated person. I suspect it has a great appeal among the more educated voter. Unless you can directly tie it to something that matters directly to that voter (which is, unfortunately, hard to do with climate change).

    I know in Montana Democrats won on never implementing a sales tax, better on education, and directly tying environmental protection to benefits for voters.

    I can’t actually blame someone for not voting for a party that has less direct appeal. Empathy will work for a number of people. We clearly see that with John Cole, for example. But not everyone.

    It may not matter, in the end. In the sense that the Democrats will probably win anyway. It’s just that the polling anomaly of Trump doing so much better among white dudes and so much worse among others combined with what I had seen yesterday and today made me realize why it had happened.

    It may be just the way politics have gone. Too polarized to be surmountable. But I don’t want a Democratic party that writes groups of people off like that. All the liberals who attacked Clinton for picking a white man is a signal to white men they are “not welcome in the Democratic party”. That is NOT my Democratic party. Let the Republican party be one of racial identification. Not the Democratic party.

    And, from a purely electoral standpoint, there are too many states with high percentages of white people to not try in them. Those states may not have lots of people, but they do each have two senators.

    To me, the appeal of Democrats is obvious. It’s the economy, stupid. That’s an appeal to, well, everyone. But I find the constant dismissal of white male voters by liberals to be just bizarre. I’m a Democrat in spite of those people, not because of them.

  265. 265.

    Matt McIrvin

    @lamh36:

    All kidding aside. Bill Clinton was the first POTUS I ever voted for.

    Mine too. Dukakis didn’t win. And, I should mention, it was after I’d decided I really, really didn’t like Bill Clinton during the primary campaign.

  266. 266.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Omnes Omnibus: He was also specifically told that he couldn’t do most of the things he initially wanted to because the DC consensus/establishment, whatever that means, wouldn’t approve of it or allow it regardless of the outcome of the election. Can’t remember which political biography of him or his administration its in, but there’s a recounting of him cursing a blue streak in the Oval Office when told this.

  267. 267.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    The distinction between this convention and last week’s poop storm is remarkable. Fear has been replaced with hope, resentment with smiles, rage with celebration. F, yeah!

  269. 269.

    Linnaeus

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Remember what he tried to do in his first couple of years? The country has moved left an a number issues. Bill did what he could with what he had. A lot of it was playing defense.*

    *Yeah, I still like him.

    Don’t get me wrong. I don’t dislike Bill Clinton. Yes, he was playing a lot of defense, but he also really believed in the policies he advocated. Some of those didn’t quite work out. That’s not an indictment of Bill Clinton so much as it is a recognition that we need something different now.

  270. 270.

    Mnemosyne

    @Trentrunner:

    I really can’t disagree more. Bill was very clearly telling a “boy meets girl” story, which makes him the boy and her the girl.

    And the “reaching out” bit was about him suddenly realizing that she was NOT just another “girl” and that this would be the relationship that would change his life.

    I don’t think he actually used the phrase She made me a better man but it was implied the whole way through.

  273. 273.

    mike in dc

    Sigh. When are they gonna have big name celebs like a Baio or Sabato out there on stage?

  275. 275.

    patroclus

    @Trentrunner: Because, like me, she’s gay. And she’s also a hyper sensitive professional woman who bridles whenever any woman is described as a girl. I disagree with your analysis – are you gonna call me names now?

  277. 277.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Matt McIrvin: I’ve got monitoring for life from the OPM hack. As does my brother. I’ve got a close friend who just had ID stolen and is trying to deal with the fallout (not a government employee). I have very little sympathy for people who would do this in the name of good government, transparency, and political accountability.

  281. 281.

    dmsilev

    @guachi: One note. When you write:

    All the liberals who attacked Clinton for picking a white man is a signal to white men they are “not welcome in the Democratic party”.

    bear in mind that what those people were really attacking was Hillary’s right to choose who she wanted. It really had nothing to do with Tim Kaine; if she had ended up choosing a Hispanic woman, they would have attacked that choice as well.

  282. 282.

    lamh36

    @guachi: and yet the Obama has repeatedly talked and spoke in terms as Bill C has…and yet he still got less votes from non-educated whites than Romney or McCain.

    Even though Barack and Michelle O do NOT come from rich beginnings…

    So ask yourself, why Obama still didn’t get as many votes by the people you profess to being ignored here? What was different about Obama’s presentation of the same facts…that those folks didn’t feel he felt their pain?

  283. 283.

    Trentrunner

    @patroclus: Yup. I’ll start with “wrong.” It was a creepy, tone-deaf intro. Hopefully forgotten by tomorrow.

    Also, I’m gayer than you. Of that I’m sure.

  289. 289.

    MisterForkbeard

    Has anyone else has a burning urge to post something to facebook like “Hello assholes! I’ve seen way too many of my friends post some incredibly sexist stuff over the past day or two. If you can’t even acknowledge that Hillary winning the democratic nomination is a really important milestone for the country without some evidence-free ranting about war crimes, election rigging and investigations you need to do some serious self-evaluation and grow the fuck up?”

    Honestly, the amount of ridiculous made-up shit out there is stupendous, and I get the feeling that everyone gets a pass on it because we tend not to stick up for Hillary on social media.

    All that said, that was some fantastic speechifying by Bill. Loved it.

  291. 291.

    Emma

    @guachi:

    With unions, Democrats could give those white men (and, obviously, everyone else in a union) something directly. When a party looks like one that is giving things directly to others but not you, I can see why white men (with no degree, especially) would vote for Republicans.

    My understanding is that unions have been struggling to retain membership, especially in states where right-to-work laws have been enacted. Anecdote not being data i don’t want to get into what I’ve heard from people who don’t want to join unions and pay dues because they can get the same benefits due to these laws. What can the Democrats offer them?

  293. 293.

    Matt McIrvin

    @guachi: The problem with talking about the good economy is that people don’t believe it’s good. For working-class whites in more rural areas and the middle of the country, many of them, it’s not good–they really haven’t been able to share in the benefits. And if you tell them it’s getting better, they’ll just feel insulted and angry. If you tell them it sucks, they’re losers, but you’ll be able to magically help them, that can work–but it’s not a message that works if you’re in the incumbent party. That’s part of what Trump’s been able to run on.

  294. 294.

    patroclus

    @PhoenixRising: Spouses/lovers can get away with boy/girl references – I suspect even Rachel does this with hers. It was charming and obviously not meant to demean Hillary at all – it was reminding everyone that she was once a girl that a boy named Bill was attracted to.

  296. 296.

    AnotherBruce

    @Trentrunner:Oh for Christs sake. Young men do get smitten by “girls”. I don’t give a fuck what Rachel says about that. If you weren’t reading too much into it, you could obviously tell that Bill was telling an affectionate story about his relationship with Hillary. If you or Rachel are creeped out by that. It’s on you two.

  298. 298.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mike E: He was asked and provided a candid answer. Its not for me to defend the answer or why he’s given it, but he took the question at face value and replied. So maybe a modicum of slack can be provided?

  299. 299.

    japa21

    Upthread somebody mentioned the lack of any contrition displayed by Bill. I don’t know, but it sure seemed to me when he talked the good times and the hard times it was pretty obvious he was referring to the indiscretion with Lewinski. Yes he is a good speaker and can feign a lot, but I think I saw some real remorse there. No need to talk about specifics.

  305. 305.

    Misterpuff

    Carter was my first 1976
    Record since then:
    Good Guys 5 GOPers 5

    Not Bad I though it was worse than that Of course living thru the Reagan/Bush years felt like 24 years not twelve

  307. 307.

    lamh36

    Montana is the least black state and was overwhelmingly Democratic when I moved there. It’s one reason I get frustrated when white voters are written off and people say “blacks are the base” or something similar. Not in Montana. It’s the least black state – 0.5%. And yet Democrats won and still win.

    Montana Presidential Elections

    Let’s focus on Presidential: 1976 – 2012… Dem Presidential Candidate won 1 time.

  309. 309.

    Peter

    @Adam L Silverman: It can’t happen soon enough. I wonder if he actually thinks he’s a big champion of freedom and transparency, and is just so invested in his own shit that he can’t see that it stinks, or if he’s just a complete opportunistic slimeball.

  310. 310.

    mike in dc

    Halfway through, I can tell a major bump is coming next week. Obama and Biden up tomorrow, then Kaine and #45.

  311. 311.

    Matt McIrvin

    @MisterForkbeard: I’ve actually been seeing a lot of posts along these lines. People only post them when they’re spoiling for a fight, because if you do you’ll get one. But they happen. One of the biggest Bernie fans in my feed is now making agitated post after post about how stupid and selfish it would be to not unite behind Hillary. He gets friction but it just riles him up more.

  313. 313.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    @guachi:

    Thank you for the effort you put into expressing your thoughts. Personally, I think you make some thought-provoking points.

    I’m white, straight, mid-50s male. Was a civilian in LE for 13 years before teaching CC English for another 13. So I am not exactly the demographic you speak of, but as a father to a girl, equality, opportunity, a vibrant economy , and clean environment are of tremendous importance to me. We have more in common than we don’t.

  314. 314.

    muddy

    @gogol’s wife: Thank the gods for that. It was supposed to be about Hillary’s accomplishments, not the accomplishments of his stupid boner. I just want that to be between the 2 of them forever and leave me right out. Sadly, I’m sure the Republicans will want to focus on it.

    I mean, she kept her family together! Who does she think she is, a Christian? omg

  317. 317.

    lamh36

    @guachi: I like how you continually name check John Cole…because he’s the white understands you.

    Not all these other white folks at BJ…who are trying to engage you and just disagree with you

  318. 318.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    @Peter:

    It can’t happen soon enough. I wonder if he actually thinks he’s a big champion of freedom and transparency, and is just so invested in his own shit that he can’t see that it stinks, or if he’s just a complete opportunistic slimeball.

    A little column “A” and a little column “B”?

  319. 319.

    Adam L Silverman

    You know you’re in trouble as a highly credentialed supposedly really smart person (Maddow) when Chuck Todd has to explain reality to you. Also, overrated.

  323. 323.

    Emma

    @Adam L Silverman: Still, it does pose an interesting question. How do we get these people to understand what they are doing and why it’s bad for them? People talk a lot about union corruption, but it was one of the ways high-school graduates got into the middle class: your uncle worked in the factory, he got you an entry-level job there, you joined the union, you got a good salary and bennies. That’s mostly gone, I think. Unions are now almost seen as the enemy.

    What do we do?

  324. 324.

    Groucho48

    @AnotherBruce:

    And now, we have Chuck Todd schooling Maddow on this. What next?

    Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling!
    Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes…
    The dead rising from the grave!
    Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together… mass hysteria!

  326. 326.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @dmsilev: I haven’t read the whole thread, but if I can chime in on Tim Kaine and the boring white guy thing. It was partly my fault, and maybe a bit the Democratic Party’s fault, that I just didn’t know that much about Tim Kaine. In part I confused him with Mark Warner and assumed a low-profile Dem from VA was a Blue Dog, too quick to call for military action. Definitely my fault to have forgotten that Kaine was one of the leaders of the attempts to force a vote on an AUMF against ISIS– whether he came down for or agasint military action in that case, calling for Congress to debate and vote on military action is important.

    So it’s my fault I thought Tim Kaine was just another boring white guy. I’m happy about what I’ve learned about him since he was picked. I wouldn’t have thought ‘boring white guy’ about Sherrod Brown, to pick one of my favorite choices, if all things were equal, which they aren’t. I could have been sold on Al Franken, or someone like Jerry Brown who had proved his chops on policy and effectiveness, a young Ted Kennedy, a young Tom Harkin.. there are any number of white guys, real and imaginary, I would have loved to see complete the ticket. I wouldn’t have been that happy with Claire McCaskill, or Cory Booker, or Robert Menendez, or a number of other non-white and/or non-male people, for reasons of policy and history.

  327. 327.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    Maybe Rachel should ask any of the younger hetero women that she works with if they heard their bfs called ‘men’ or ‘guys’? It’s not like Bill called her ‘doll’ or ‘chick’ ‘Girl’ is perfectly normal, even more so when you consider Bills age. And ‘touching’ as in I could have reached and touched her to greet her not touch her as in grope her. Good lord!

  329. 329.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mike E: No worries on my end. Just think its a good idea to not assume the worse. Unless we’re dealing with an obvious troll.

  333. 333.

    gf120581

    @Adam L Silverman: Not sure what’s up with Maddow. It’s odd how she could carp about that speech by Bill (is she not aware couples call each other “girl” and “boy?”), yet go all fangirl over Trump’s Mafia goombah of a son.

    CNN been oh so much better at convention coverage than MSNBC.

  334. 334.

    MisterForkbeard

    @MomSense:
    @Major Major Major Major:
    @Matt McIrvin:

    The dumb thing is that I really don’t even LIKE fighting. I’m just really fucking sick of the ridiculous amount of slander on Hillary and the rampant sexism, and people almost never even try to correct them.

    Like today, when someone posted a “Hillary’s got the nomination! Time to get Trump!” message, and several people immediately liked it… and then one woman with a “Go Bernie!” portrait started happily talking about how she was awful and she could never beat Trump. And no one said a thing.

    There’s something to be said for letting Bernie supporters grieve, but goddamn are some of these fuckers assholes. And that’s on top of the otherwise intelligent people who’re doing the ridiculous “pox on both their houses vote Stein/Johnson” thing.

  336. 336.

    BR

    @guachi:

    Thank you for replying at length.

    I guess I’m a bit confused, and this maybe is the disconnect. As a non-white male of an ethnic group not represented at all in any elected office pretty much anywhere in the U.S., I’ve never had anyone who “represents” me or looks like me in office. And that hasn’t been a problem. I agree that attacking Kaine for his race is not who the Dems should be. But I think most people didn’t do that.

    So I guess the thing that others were trying to convey to you was that the fact that they have never had anyone who looks like them, and they never expected that they were special and needed to be politically catered to. Now the Democratic party looks like America, and as a result no racial group or ethnic group or religion is favored. I understand why that change to a more equal party might be jarring to some, but that might be the disconnect (and why some are saying to get over it — the country has changed).

  337. 337.

    Emma

    @Groucho48: My late dinner making a projectile return visit?

    In all seriousness, this is starting to need “The World Turned Upside Down” as a theme song.

  338. 338.

    Linnaeus

    @Emma:

    Here’s a start:

    1. You keep talking to folks, even when they don’t seem to listen. Because eventually, some do.

    2. Make it easier to form unions. Or at least make it harder for employers to interfere with labor organizing.

  339. 339.

    Old Dan and Little Anne

    Rachel’s reaction to Bill’s speech was a fuckton more bizarre than the actual speech. Holy Christ.

  340. 340.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Emma: I honestly don’t know. The labor movement that existed when I was growing up (70s and 80s) was starting to wain and no longer really exists. Some of this has been the result of a concerted effort by very specific interests to promote the bait and switch that is right to work – both the concept and the laws that result. Labor will clearly have to become something else, something new and different. It is not that the labor movement isn’t needed, it desperately is, but it has to find its new form and focus.

  341. 341.

    Lizzy L

    @guachi: Your response deserves more than I can give it tonight, very tired, sorry, but I wanted to say thanks for taking the time to write it. I’d like to think the Democratic party isn’t writing off anyone, that we truly are a big tent.

  342. 342.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    jumping back on the MSNBC coverage if anyone noticed: Was Kristin Welker talking to a young Indian-American woman from Arkansas, and getting concern-trolly about Arkansas being in play? We’re supposed to be worried cause Arkansas might be a swing state?

  344. 344.

    J R in WV

    Well, I voted for Jimmy Carter, when he won, and when he lost, so that places my political experience in time. I voted for lots of good people who lost.

    But I voted for Bill, and thought he was a good president. I voted for Hillary in our pissant little primary, and will vote for her again in this November’s election.

    I think Bill hit this one put of the park. As other have said, starting with boy meets girl, and ending with a powerful and effective Secretary of State. Amazing story teller, telling a great story about someone he really cares about. A lot of love shown there.

  346. 346.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    @PsiFighter37: It was a beautiful speech.

    He did look very good, but I worry about his thumb twitching. That can be an early sign of Parkinsons… His line about “more yesterdays than tomorrows” could be heard as if he’s gently telling us something more as well…

    :-(

    Cheers,
    Scott.
    (Who is not an MD.)

  348. 348.

    Chris

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Yeah. I have beef with the Clinton era Democratic Party, but it’s mitigated by the knowledge that expecting him to govern as a liberal in the nineties is probably as unreasonable as expecting Eisenhower to govern as a conservative in the fifties. The demographic and public opinion trends that made the last eight years possible were against us then. Bill is probably the best we could’ve gotten.

  350. 350.

    Mike E

    @Mai.naem.mobile: Repubs can’t take a step without falling on their faces, but a sea of hands wait to catch em and prop em back up…a Dem stumbles slightly near the end of an impressive marathon, and a sea of legs reflexively stick out right in front of the finish line. IOKIYAR

  352. 352.

    Adam L Silverman

    @bmoak: I’ve never seen BBC’s Sherlock. I don’t like Cumberbatch and I find his co-star just tolerable. So I don’t watch the show.

  353. 353.

    Emma

    @Adam L Silverman: It’s a cultural tectonic shift. It will need quite a long time to settle into a new configuration. No easy answers anywhere. Sometimes it sucks to be an adult :D.

  354. 354.

    karen marie

    I’m starting to really dislike Rachel Maddow. She did nothing but whine about how Bill’s speech “wasn’t feminist.” Screw her. As far as I am concerned, he hit it out of the park.

  357. 357.

    jenn

    I loved Clinton’s speech. I was also struck by some crazy tweets – whoEVER would have expected Erick son of Erick to write this:

    Erick Erickson Verified account
    ‏@EWErickson
    GOP shouldn’t be questioning the motives of keeping a marriage together. They kept a vow that Trump broke twice.

  359. 359.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Adam L Silverman: It’s an interesting version I think, pretty well done, a couple of cheesy bits, though they do a better job with Mycroft than any other film TV version I know, but I don’t want Holmes in modern London, I want fog and carriages. I miss Jeremy Brett.

  360. 360.

    Groucho48

    @Adam L Silverman:

    The few times O’Donnell has been around in the Convention he’s been very good. Last night, after MSNBC did its usual endless interviews of All Bernie-Forever Folks All The Time, he mentioned that he’d just come from a focus group of Bernie supporters and all of them were planning on voting for Clinton in November. That seemed to boggle the minds of the other commentators.

  361. 361.

    amk

    @karen marie: Last week, she was waxing eloquent about one of the trumplets’ speaking ‘style’, substance be damned. Suddenly today, it’s all about ‘substance’.

  362. 362.

    ? Martin

    @guachi: The challenge the Dems have is that non-college whites are probably the fastest declining demographic out there. That’s not just a problem of identify politics but it’s also a problem of identifying policies that are seen as targetted to that group. (Worth noting to all that all of those Arkansas achievements that Bill went through primarily benefitted poor whites. That coal miners are arguing that Clinton doesn’t care about them is a bit infuriating – they were the Clinton base for years). Anyway, policies particularly on manufacturing, which are the most directly targetted to non-college whites just don’t reach as many people as they would have a few decades ago. Free trade that benefits tech and white-collar workers will carry greater economic benefits to more people. Complicating this is that a lot of these non-college whites have firewall themselves behind Republican state legislatures which are routinely engaging in race-to-the-bottom economic activities which is doing more to drive down labor benefits and wages than the federal government would be able to make up for. How can the president fix problems that the states have more power to undermine, granted by the very people demanding a fix?

    That’s not a defense for not having more attention given to these voters, but it’s a dynamic that makes it very difficult for Democrats to provide a set of policies that would be meaningful. And the demographic truth is that there has been a pretty clear inversion of college educated and non-college educated workers from GOP/Dem to Dem/GOP and a lot of that has to do with affinities that both parties have cultivated – the climate change/gun control/abortion/religion issues have become natural alignments with the white blue collar/white collar split. It’s increasingly difficult to see those alignments reversing.

  363. 363.

    Mike E

    @Adam L Silverman: Hey, I’m down! Easier here than at work, where diversity makes the good ol’ boys nervous… I’m trying to enjoy the ride these next few months.

  364. 364.

    James E Powell

    @guachi:

    But I find the constant dismissal of white male voters by liberals to be just bizarre.

    Do you have an example you could cite so I could understand what you are talking about here? Because I’m not familiar with liberals constantly dismissing white male voters.

    I am familiar with white male voters dismissing liberals. It’s an industry that’s made several people quite wealthy.

  366. 366.

    RAM

    I NEVER watch convention speeches, but for some reason I happened to tune in to Obama’s 2004 speech, live, and was completely blown away. I knew he was one of our state senators here in Illinois, but that was all I knew about him. I told my wife that night, “You know, that guy could be President some day!” I was proud to vote for him for the U.S. Senate, and even prouder to vote for him for President. That was one helluva speech.

  367. 367.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Emma: I’ve been thinking about that a bit. What helped get it straight in my mind is the idea of balance. Are unions sometimes corrupt? Of course they are. And they’re out for the good of their members, not always for the collective good. But everyone knows corporations are like that too. They’re sometimes (not always) corrupt, often amoral in their pursuit of profit.

    But nobody except for some out-there radicals is actually proposing getting rid of corporations. We think that, for all their faults, they serve some purpose. But corporations have all the power in negotiations with workers, unless the workers have some similarly powerful organization that can give them leverage. That’s the union. There’s balance.

    I’ve done fine my whole career in an industry that is basically non-unionized, but I’m not a typical worker. And it’s always possible there will be a time when my luck runs out.

    I think part of the problem is that unionizing is considered so difficult that people basically don’t think it’s an option that’s open to them–employers hold all the cards in preventing people from doing it. So when people see union members on strike for benefits they don’t have, they don’t think they could organize too, they just get angry at the strikers. “Why should they ruin my day picketing for benefits I don’t get? I don’t have a union–you don’t see me striking! They’re just being greedy!” And there’s a race to the bottom.

  368. 368.

    Linnaeus

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Labor will clearly have to become something else, something new and different. It is not that the labor movement isn’t needed, it desperately is, but it has to find its new form and focus.

    Trust me, labor has been trying to do this for years. It’s hard for a number of reasons, among them weak US labor laws and the inherent advantages that capital has over labor in our economy. We’re seeing some fruits of labor’s recent efforts, e.g., the fight for $15, etc., but it’s very, very hard work.

  369. 369.

    MomSense

    @MisterForkbeard:

    I was reading some of the crap “friends” post today and joking with my son that “I’m a donkey on the edge”. I do feel like I’m either going to lash out one of these days or I’m going to sign up for a boxing class and punch it out of my system.

  371. 371.

    divF

    @Comrade Scrutinizer:
    I’ve been out all evening, being a science policy footsoldier, so I missed the convention – although I did spend my time on Metro back to the hotel reading the BJ commentaries.

    Anyway, one variation on this theme. When Madame and I got married (1981, two witnesses at the courthouse at lunchtime), it was a several years before we did not feel a certain amount of awkwardness in referring to each other as husband / wife. On the other hand, our pet names for each other were (and are) a riff on a classic film from the 40’s – “his with a ‘y’, mine with an ‘ie’ ” (Let’s see if anyone gets it).

    ETA: FTR, even though I didn’t see Bill’s speech, I think that Rachel is missing the boat on this one. At that age, they seem to them now to be a boy and a girl.

  372. 372.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’ve heard its well done and I believe it. I just don’t like the two leads. I don’t enjoy watching them in anything I’ve seen them in. So I largely don’t watch anything with them in it if I have the option.

  373. 373.

    MisterForkbeard

    @MomSense: I had the sense to pre-emptively apologize to all my friends on facebook back in January for eventually fighting with them about politics and to say that the arguments we’re going to have don’t matter in the long run – we’re all friends and family.

    But holy shit, some of these people I’ll never look at the same way.

  375. 375.

    japa21

    @karen marie: What could be more feminist than describing the history of a girl/women who did it all against major odds. Jeez, Maddow needs to get a grip. For the most part I like her, but when gets something a fixation in her head, she almost never lets it down.

    If Bill had talked about how he had nurtured Hillary along and how he played a major role in her career Maddow would have a point. She didn’t.

  376. 376.

    Comrade Scrutinizer

    @jenn: First Chuck Todd, now Erick son of Erick.

    Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
    To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
    A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
    Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?

    Obviously I’m hallucinating all this.

  378. 378.

    BruceFromOhio

    @RAM: I remember the crescendo that followed his remarks. That was one of those goose-bump moments when you knew, just KNEW, that things would change.

    ETA; for those watching the click-baiting ratfucking on the news channels, just turn that shit off. CSPAN is the only way to watch this tuff. When the session is gavelled out, you leave. Simple.

  379. 379.

    different-church-lady

    Wasn’t it TBogg who said something along the lines of “The worst crime a liberal can commit is ‘Using words wrong'”?

  382. 382.

    lamh36

    So tomorrow is POTUS and VPOTUS?

    Prediction: POTUS speech will be good, but analysis: he won’t have connected with low educated whites.

    VPOTUS speech will be good and likely same as POTUS…but still, analysis: unlike Obama, Biden’s speech will be lauded as speaking right to the heart of blue collar white America.

    Bookmark this comment folks.

  384. 384.

    guachi

    @lamh36:

    Let’s focus on Presidential: 1976 – 2012… Dem Presidential Candidate won 1 time.

    Which should tell you there’s a disconnect between what the national Democratic party is offering and what the state Democratic party is offering. Democrats still win for statewide offices. Governor, Lt. Governor, SoS, Insurance Commissioner, Superintendent of Schools – all Democrats. The only statewide office held by a Republican is AG.

    Though at the federal level Republicans have the only Representative and one Senator

    But I could turn around and say that six of the seven most black states in the union are Republican and all seven of them have Republican Governors.

    Heck, the two whitest states in the US are blue.

    My point is, because of the widely varying demographics of the US the Democrats are forced to appeal all sorts of people.

    Also – I loved Bill Clinton’s speech. It was one part corny one part politics.

  385. 385.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Ronald Reagan is a deity, “41” is a living legend.

    Brian Williams knows nothing about Iran-Contra, I guess. Just for starters.

  386. 386.

    Elie

    @karen marie:

    Amen. He hit it way out of the park. His was the most important speech that she will receive this convention and the love and care he took in constructing it was evident. I am so sorry that the core of it seems to have been missed by too many…

  388. 388.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    @guachi: Thanks for taking the time to write that up. You do make some good points. I didn’t hear all the speeches tonight, but Bill touched on some of your concerns.

    Also, it seems to me that Hillary has written and talked about the problems in rural areas, and actual ways to address those problems, more than anyone I recall. See, e.g., what she’s said about Appalachia.

    The convention isn’t over yet. ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  390. 390.

    Old Dan and Little Anne

    @RAM: My story is similar except I told my wife, “That guy is going to be President.” : )

  391. 391.

    Keith P.

    @Elie: I’m still ticked at watching a “Live Stream” replay instead of most of Bill’s speech, but I was expecting a homerun. It had to be, given how good a speech he gave in 2012 for Obama.

  393. 393.

    lamh36

    @guachi: So you never answered my earlier comment.

    Barack Obama has routinely spoken in the same terms as Bill Clinton during his campaign and his 8 years in office.

    Yet he still routinely lost the votes of low educated whites to both HRC and his GOP competition.

    Why is the same words from Barack Obama’s mouth, not resonating to the voters you represent?

  395. 395.

    MomSense

    @lamh36:

    Yup. I personally love it when they talk about how aloof he is, how he just can’t connect. Then I see photos of him working the rope lines with people hugging and kissing him. I wish these pundit jerks would stop hiding behind “some say” and imagined people and admit they are talking about how they feel. I’m sick of it.

  397. 397.

    Matt McIrvin

    @MisterForkbeard: Now reading some commenter arguing that there are telltale secret signs that Hillary stole the primary by tampering with all the voting machines, which is how she could beat Bernie with lower favorability ratings. After a long thread in which the OP explained why that is vanishingly improbable up at the very top. It never, ever ends.

  398. 398.

    Elie

    @Keith P.:

    This to me, was the deepest public (yet private) attestation of love that the big dawg could have ever given his wife and partner of many years. It was an amazing tribute and the power of it just blew me away. If I were Hillary, I would still be just crying with joy and humility of what it means to be respected and loved that way… He saw her soul and shared its essence with us so that we could better understand what she brings to us… and how important it is and how he knows — he knows what it takes her to give it… I know he has been so — incredibly obtuse at times. But this night, he showed how much not only 1) how much he loved her — way beyond selflessness but 2) he shared her most private self with us to let us see the woman he loves and deeply respects.

  399. 399.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Omnes Omnibus: Most of mine is, but I have quite a few BoB people post, or a lot of ‘friends of friends’ posting ludicrous crap as comments on liberal stories.

    This stuff is just so ignorant it’s infuriating.

  400. 400.

    Mnemosyne

    @guachi:

    Here’s the thing:

    You are making a special pleading that there should be an issue at the convention that’s directly at working-class whites the way that the issue of gun violence is being directed at African-Americans and the issue of immigration is being directed at Latinos, but you can’t seem to articulate WHAT THAT ISSUE IS.

    What is the issue you want directed at working class whites that appeals primarily to them and not to other groups?

  401. 401.

    NoraLenderbee

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Bill was the first POTUS that I voted for that won.

    Me, too. I first voted in 1980. 1992 was such a huge relief after 12 years of Reaganism.

    And now Hillary, for real. I am verklempt.

  402. 402.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @RAM: I liked Geraldine McEwan (sp?), that was an updating of the original that worked for me.

  403. 403.

    different-church-lady

    I remember TBogg saying something along the lines of “The worst crime a liberal can commit is ‘Using Words Wrong.'”

  404. 404.

    Quinerly

    @Oldgold:
    Rachel is fixated. Honestly, I found the beginning of his speech endearing…romantic. I can be a sap, though. There is nothing wrong with calling a chick in her early 20’s a “girl.” Christ, it was a boy meets girl story. It’s an odd discussion considering the things Trump says about women. I agreed with Chuck Todd when he cut Rachel off…clearly what they are doing works for them. They are still married. I thought Chelsea looked beautiful.

  406. 406.

    FlipYrWhig

    Can someone fem-splain to me what the fuck the supposed issue was with the speech? Because it kind of seemed like for Rachel Maddow it was the use of “girl” (say, what’s the name of that show Lena Dunham is on with Brian Williams’s daughter?) and for Nicole Wallace it was that it evoked Monica Lewinsky(?) but they both thought they were agreeing? What the what? I heard a story about a guy who was completely overwhelmed and outclassed by a powerhouse woman, only that guy was THE FUCKING PRESIDENT LATER. I mean what the hell was that about?

  407. 407.

    dogwood

    @dmsilev:
    You have to admit that the immediate reaction to the Kaine pick here and on other liberal blogs was “Fuck, she picked a boring white southern moderate.” I read that reaction all over, mostly from bloggers and commenters who had never heard of him. He is a white Virginian with Midwestern roots, but he’s not boring and he’s not a moderate.

  411. 411.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @guachi:

    But I find the constant dismissal of white male voters by liberals to be just bizarre.

    You know, there are times when the complaining about white men rankles me. I mean, I’ve been a liberal Democrat since I was old enough to hold a political opinion. But we aren’t the majority white men. When I hear the complaints, I think “Am I supporting racist policies, etc.?” and, when I realize the answer is no, I calm down and recognize that they aren’t talking about me. They are talking about the 60% or so of white men who do support that shit.

  412. 412.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Bernistas were lining up to touch the microphone Bernie spoke from (MSNBC just now).

    I think this is when twitter Nixon would say, “Do you ever think about death?”

  413. 413.

    ruemara

    @guachi: Jesus Christ. Those blackest states have suffered under voting suppression. You sound exactly like the axiom that when you’re used to privilege, equality feels like oppression. You are getting something for that empathic DNC vote, higher wages, healthcare laws, a trustworthy banking system and a Supreme Court that will take your side. Sanders and Trump ran on the “Poor, abused white guy” plank. One had progressive daydreams; one had rancor and hatred. Guess who won that? You’re not being ignored, you’re just not being catered to, for once. From someone used to not being catered to, calm down.

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: vomit. And these are the same superliberals who yammered about Obama worship.

  414. 414.

    Emma

    @Elie: Whenever I hear someone bitching about their marriage I have to dig my nails into my palms to keep from going all Jaquette the Ripper on them. What is more beautiful than two people so much in love after so many years? Yes, I am sure that she’s thrown the odd vase or two at his head, but they hung on and pushed through all the bad stuff. How dare you complain about the loss of sanctity in marriage when you badmouth the perfect example of it?

  415. 415.

    Quinerly

    @Adam L Silverman:
    His hair has been like that for awhile. It’s terrible. He’s dying it…and badly. He’s not that old and looks like a fool. Howard Fineman was doing something weird color wise with his awhile back but I think he got it out of his system or someone told him.

  416. 416.

    Matt McIrvin

    @MisterForkbeard:

    And that’s on top of the otherwise intelligent people who’re doing the ridiculous “pox on both their houses vote Stein/Johnson” thing.

    The thing I try to keep in mind is that the most insistent ones who do that were never Democratic voters to begin with; they’re longtime Libertarians or Greens who consider voting for a major party a betrayal. And I just twigged to the realization that a disproportionate number of them seem to live in California (home of the yelling Bernie delegates), where they know for damn sure their protest vote won’t flip the state anyway. I guess it actually could if this kind of tantruming became huge enough, but it won’t.

  418. 418.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    Rachel Maddow has lost her fucking mind. Maybe the madcow has finally taken hold.

  420. 420.

    Adam L Silverman

    @FlipYrWhig: I can’t fem-splain it, but I think an argument could be made, as I did facetiously in the previous post’s comments, that the recounting of his becoming smitten and pursuing her romantically could be spun as: The NY Post will cover this on tomorrow’s front page with: “Confessions of a Presidential Stalker! How Bill Stalked Hillary Until She Agreed to Go Out With Him!”

    Now I don’t think that’s what upset Maddow. She seemed to be upset with his using the phrase reaching out to touch her because she (Maddow) interpreted it as him touching her without her permission. And that this, coupled with calling her a girl when reminiscing about them in their 20s, as creepy. She was also upset because her takeaway is that he only defined her in relation to him and his career, which was not the impression that everyone else on that panel or here in the comments seems to have come away with. With the exception of one specific commenter.

  421. 421.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Quinerly: I quit watching ABC Sunday right around when Brinkley left, so hadn’t seen George Will in years till he made a splash by cutting and running to Fox when he had to argue with people who weren’t as easy to push around as Sam and Cokie. I was shocked to see that while his face looked like an old coconut, he still had the perfect hair of a small market anchorman from 1982

  423. 423.

    guachi

    @lamh36:

    and yet the Obama has repeatedly talked and spoke in terms as Bill C has…and yet he still got less votes from non-educated whites than Romney or McCain.

    Obama, in 2008, did amazingly well in heavily white states where Democrats had been routinely weak in Presidential elections. The closest state in 2008 Obama lost? Montana. Obama saw heavy gains in ND, SD, Montana, Utah, Nebraska, and Vermont compared to 2004. But massive losses in WV, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, and Louisiana.

    That is, if you compare the margin of victory in a state to the overall margin of victory. E.g. ND was 25% worse than 2004 margin but only 16% worse than 2008.

    The 2008 gains had disappeared by 2012, though. But, still, there was something appealing about Obama in 2008 in the heavily white Plains and Mountain West.

  424. 424.

    Matt McIrvin

    @dogwood: My reaction was “Oh, I hadn’t even thought of her picking Tim Kaine! He’s not Perez or Liz Warren, but he’s all right.” But I follow Virginia politics a little because I’m from there and my parents still live there. And there’s the relief that even though she’s poaching a Senator, he’s not my Senator.

  427. 427.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Quinerly: I was beginning to wonder if he’d been taken over by a parasite from the same species that has taken over Trump, Rand Paul, and Dan Rostenkoswki,

  429. 429.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Omnes Omnibus: I saw Biden is gonna be Morning Joe tomorrow. If he remembers Scarborough as the snotty Gingrichite backbencher as I do, that could be fun.

  431. 431.

    Quinerly

    Let’s hope Chris Hayes can enlighten Tweety about “the speech.” With Joy Reid assist. I’m old enough to remember Tweety’s fixation on, well, you know….

  432. 432.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    She seemed to be upset with his using the phrase reaching out to touch her because she (Maddow) interpreted it as him touching her without her permission.

    But one of his points was that he didn’t touch her. It wasn’t until she walked the length of the law library to introduce herself that they first touched — and that, if I remember his anecdote, was a handshake. Rachel must be suffering severe sleep deprivation.

  433. 433.

    different-church-lady

    Ah, here it is:

    Every few months or so progressives (the term of choice for high-maintenance liberals) launch a jihad on an unsuspecting ally for the crime of “not using their words properly,” and the focus shifts from real world problems to semantics and this, to put it politely, is why shit doesn’t get done.

  434. 434.

    hueyplong

    I guess my pro-Democratic bias makes me receive something like that speech a little bit more generously. It was 1971. Of course he thought of her as a “girl.” He thought of himself as a “boy.” That’s probably how they thought and spoke, certainly how he did. But the point of the whole thing was that she was and is a whole lot more than that, and that he had clearly underestimated her, in many ways, on first sight. I wish Bill had rambled a bit less, but the slow and meandering first part made the second half all the more effective in contrast, and it seems pretty clear that he owned the audience down the stretch.

    I could see Rachel Maddow pointing out the awkwardness of the opening. But to call it “shocking” is a bit much. Like some others, what I found “shocking” is that Chuck Todd, of all people, seemed to have a better grip on what was going on in that speech. I don’t think his take can be simply dismissed as mansplaining.

  435. 435.

    Mnemosyne

    @dogwood:

    In our defense, here’s my brief re-enactment:

    Hillary: I picked Tim Kaine to be my VP!
    Democratic voters: Who? Wait, did he have something to do with the DNC?
    Hillary: No, you’ll love him (intro speech followed by Kaine’s own speech)
    Democratic voters: WHERE HAS THIS MAN BEEN OUR WHOLE LIVES?!?!

    The only person here who was vehemently arguing against Kaine after that intro was an acknowledged troll who many commenters suspect of bwing a white dude in blackface.

  436. 436.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @Adam L Silverman: he’s appealing to people who still have small town values re: gender and courtship. Smart move. The rep who tweeted about Warren asking her husband to marry her comes to mind.

  438. 438.

    hovercraft

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:
    I’m boycotting them today, CNN panel was much more positive, their giant panel 6 or 7, Jeffrey Lord a Trump sleazebag thinks it was okay but will be overshadowed by something Terry Macauliff said about TPP, and David Axelrod only liked the first half of the speech, and also thinks Bill should have mentioned his infidelity. Second panel with Wolf, Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, Dana agrees he should have mentioned the elephant in the room, and she thinks that it should have been more like his 2012 speech. I’m not sure she knows that he’s not married to Obama but is to Hillary. And as Paul Begala said to Axelrod, people in Mongolia know all about his penis, why would you expect him to bring it up on national tv? Gloria Borgia and Van Jones were most complimentary of the speech. I don’t count Begalla and Sollis Doyle, because both are former Clinton aides.

  439. 439.

    BR

    @guachi:

    I think it was that the Bush administration was such a disaster that in 2008 it scrambled the political affiliations and 2008 wasn’t a strictly base-driven election. Obama had a clear and obvious campaign slogan — change — and I think the circumstances made the difference. By 2012 everything was back to the usual base election and those voters you say found Obama appealing were back to the GOP. (Four years of GOP attacks on him probably made a big part of the difference in hardening partisan lines.)

  441. 441.

    Adam L Silverman

    @SiubhanDuinne: I got it when I heard it. As I’ve written numerous times: she purposefully plays the naif and is a useful idiot. I do not think she really understands how the US government works despite a doctorate in government. She’s an overrated hack who is very well paid to play a part and she plays it to the hilt.

  442. 442.

    Elie

    @FlipYrWhig:

    I did not hear Rachel Maddow or Nicole Wallace’s “take” so I felt and perceived the speech on my own terms. Would that we could all have our mate of many years speak about us in such deeply sensitive and knowing terms. They are just jealous. Anyone with an intact soul would know the tribute and testament of what was being said and given. He not only revealed his own but “invaded” a little of his wife’s very important zone of privacy to reveal the quality of the leader she will be for us. Hillary is not about pumping herself up. She is a Spartan warrior queen for justice and for protecting the true home and hearth of our nation– our families, children, women, social security, jobs, healthcare — also the environment and the broad social progressive agenda related to our overall wellbeing… Because she is not a showboat, she can take a lot of heat and abuse and still have an eye for the kill when necessary.

    Fuck Rachel Maddow. I haven’t listened to her in a couple of years and don’t intend to start now. What a fraud… she is no different than any of the other MSM ass kissers — superficial and irrelevant.

  445. 445.

    Mnemosyne

    @guachi:

    Frankly, I suspect the same thing is going to happen this year, in Hillary’s favor, and for the same reason it happened in 2008: Clinton/Kaine are not bugfuck crazy. Sarah Palin was bugfuck crazy in 2008, and it scared people who would normally have voted for McCain. Now the bugfuck crazy person is at the top of the ticket, not the VP.

  446. 446.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @FlipYrWhig: I know women (successful, educated, successful, feminist women) who use boy and girl in relationship terms. We don’t change that much.

  448. 448.

    Miss Bianca

    @Dog Dawg Damn: You know what? I mean this in the best possible way of course, but: fuck you. I wouldn’t even bother to poke fun at O2 if I didn’t think well of him and his understanding.

  450. 450.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Dog Dawg Damn: I have a friend who is a print journalist focusing on business issues and economics for a major newspaper that knows her. When he brought her up one time and I made the point about her playing the naif he shrugged his shoulders and basically said it was an act that she was being paid to give.

  451. 451.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @Omnes Omnibus: exactly. There’s room enough in the tent to allow people to have different lexicons and cultural values, especially when those people’s feminist and social justice credentials are beyond reproach.

  454. 454.

    Quinerly

    Not to go on, but has anyone mentioned Bill’s reference to Hillary’s mom? That made me tear up. It was genuine emotion…also his mention of Hillary’s friend who was on the floor with the Illinois delegation. He’s long winded..we know that. I just read that most of it was off teleprompter..he just left the speech. I truly think he was speaking from the heart.

  456. 456.

    Elie

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I have no idea.. Its immediacy to me would be central…. This wasn’t just some speech. For that reason, it was somewhat —- can’t think of a word for it but it would be about the ephemeral quality of our deepest values: the meaning of love, deepest respect and profound understanding of the complexities of who we are as individuals. He may not have settled on all of what he was gonna say and reveal until just that moment as he said different parts. Like the scraped chalk art of Budhist priests, you observe and appreciate its beauty in the moment….

  458. 458.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Miss Bianca: Then I assume they got the wrong end of the stick. I know I am #NotAllWhiteMen the vast majority of the time, and, if I am not, I hope that I notice it and work on it.

  460. 460.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    So given Clinton didn’t do the full eviscerarion of Trump, is this gonna be reserved for Biden and President Obama? We really need to have that happen. There’s almost too much to say, so I hope its coordinated and focused and focus grouped.

  461. 461.

    Elie

    @Quinerly:

    That about her Mom — and other points as well. Deeply, deeply personal and meaningful to them way beyond what we could appreciate. She KNOWS what he meant… We are witness to what we heard from him. To me, he was near tears at least a couple of times — his voice waivered with emotion….

  462. 462.

    z

    @Mnemosyne:

    What is the issue you want directed at working class whites that appeals primarily to them and not to other groups?

    I’d like to see Dems take back unionization as a major national issue — Trump’s promising to bring glory back to the blue collar economy with trade wars… Dems should be out there saying “Trade wars don’t help workers. Strong unions help workers.”

    It’s a lot more straight-forward way to slow-down the displacing effects of global economic churn on the working class than whatever the hell Trump’s proposing.

  463. 463.

    Elie

    @Dog Dawg Damn:

    Relax. That will happen. So sad that you could not appreciate what big Dawg brought tonight and how important that was for setting up her campaign.

  464. 464.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Quinerly: Haven’t heard any of the commentators. Of course the first hour after the speech was panelist after panelist trying to talk sense to Maddow over the start of the speech, so…

  466. 466.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @lamh36: Me, I expect that POTUS will get hella competitive with Ex-POTUS and bring down the house. Biden will do his workman-like job as he always does.

  467. 467.

    dogwood

    @guachi:
    A lot of states in the West just aren’t on the radar of people who blog or comment on blogs. Because of this there are a lot of assumptions made. One seems to be that since many of these states are predominately white republican states, then the white democrats in those states must be moderates. Or they must be bigots. That’s not my experience at all, but it doesn’t fit the narrative of what people might assume about someone like me, a white female democrat from Idaho. But to be fair, a lot of the excitement that came out of states like Montana, Idaho etc. in ’08 was directly related to the fact they were part of Obama’s path to the nomination. He campaigned in those states. Pay attention and people will respond.

  469. 469.

    FlipYrWhig

    I forgot that Rachel Maddow a few months ago went on a tirade about how Bill Clinton didn’t do enough for gay people. Bill Clinton! Maybe she’s got a grudge against the guy.

  471. 471.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @Elie: clod maybe. Stupid, definitely not.

    Clintons 2012 refutation of the GOP was powerful and has yet to be unleashed in a similar fashion against Herr Trump. I assume it is coming. Do you not ?

  472. 472.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Elie: No, my point was that is was so personal and intimate that he would not risk any bit of it being leaked.

  475. 475.

    FlipYrWhig

    Anyway, I thought the whole point of the first part of the speech was to say that Bill was a lovesick puppy dawg while Hillary Rodham was busting her ass helping people who no one else cared about, and she put it on hold for him, and then kept finding ways to bring that original energy into her public role as a politician’s spouse. I thought it was an intriguing and winning way to downplay himself.

  476. 476.

    dogwood

    @Dog Dawg Damn:
    I don’t know if this convention is going to be all that much about Trump. I think the daily campaign trail in the battleground states, and the ads that run there is where you are going to see most of the Trump attacking. Trump’s voters aren’t going to change their minds, and people who don’t want to vote for Hillary, but hate Trump need to feel comfortable moving to her camp. This convention seems to be about working on those voters. And I think that’s a wise decision.

  477. 477.

    Quinerly

    @Adam L Silverman:
    Don’t get me started on that tie. Had to look away quickly. Can’t imagine what’s up with Howard. He, too, is a clotheshorse. I always thought he was attractive. He must be trying to find himself.

  478. 478.

    Elie

    @Dog Dawg Damn:

    I see a campaign as a combination of hard and soft power. Coercion and persuasion each have their impacts and roles. I apologize for impugning your intelligence, but your comment to me asked: so when do we start clubbing them in the head” when you have the means to undercut their influence without having to swing clubs…. Just so —Neanderthal. Why should we use that kind of energy? What would be the benefit?

  479. 479.

    Gelfling 545

    @japa21: In fact, it would, in my opinion, be wildly inappropriate to bring such a thing up in this situation. This is Hilary’s nomination, not Bill’s deathbed confession.

  480. 480.

    Matt McIrvin

    @FlipYrWhig: I know at least one person whose distaste for Hillary Clinton comes from some sense that she was a traitor to LGBT people; over what specifically, I didn’t pry (maybe one of the times she disavowed supporting same-sex marriage, before reversing herself?) I remember back in 2008 some people thought she would be better for LGBT rights than Obama.

  481. 481.

    Mnemosyne

    @z:

    As a union member myself, I do tend to agree that Democrats really need to step up their support for unions, so that’s a good one.

  484. 484.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @Elie: no I mean the scalpel taken to him one layer at a time by a seasoned pro. Not giant flip flops or purple band aids, but eviscerating critique from someone who the country trusts. Clinton played this role in 2012 (marvelously), and I’m guessing Biden will play it this year. It will definitely happen!

  485. 485.

    dogwood

    Exactly. How many persuadable voters watching this convention want to see an anti-Trump hate fest? Most of these people already don’t like Trump. They!re trying to figure out if they can be comfortable with this woman who has been presented to them as a caricature for decades.

  487. 487.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Matt McIrvin: Kate McKinnon on SNL zinged HRC to her face about being slow to come around on same sex marriage. “Betrayal” seems rather harsh a way to view that, but it’s not really my call.

  488. 488.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @dogwood: there are undecideds watching who haven’t been exposed to the fully stench of the Donald and need to have someone spell out for them what it means exactly to have such an ignorant bully leading the greatest economy on the planet. Michelle laid the groundwork for this, but Bill didn’t raise it hardly at all. I assume someone else has this task.

  489. 489.

    Mnemosyne

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Yep. The whole thing was, This kickass woman married me! Can you believe it?

    I also think, as I said above, that it was Bill putting his official Dude Seal Of Approval on her like James Cameron did for Kathryn Bigelow when she was up for a Best Director Oscar and the first woman to really be a contender (may have been the first American woman).

  490. 490.

    Matt McIrvin

    @? Martin: Assange reminds me of harasser trolls like Weev. They get off on cultivating an image of omnipotence, making people believe that they’re terrifying god-men who can destroy anyone at a touch. And they’re particularly fond of going after women. The media help them. Watch him get a big old swastika tattoo in jail.

  492. 492.

    Elie

    @Dog Dawg Damn:

    But my point is that the negative cutting you describe is balanced with other tools — the soft power of persuading people to see things that they cannot be coerced to see. One frequently does not have to make your opponents do things.. you just have to allow them to have things happen to them…

  493. 493.

    satby

    Anecdata to be sure, but all the old white union guys I know are backing Clinton loudly and proudly. They backed Obama too. And these guys weren’t huge fans of diversity or anxious to live in integrated areas, if you get my drift. Some of them were probably Reagan Dems for a while, but the Bush years brought them back into the fold and they’ve stayed. They’ve even started to catch on to racism (their own too) and sexism. Don’t write all the non-college educated white guys off; quite a lot of them are on the right team. Ours.

  494. 494.

    dogwood

    @Dog Dawg Damn:
    Ok. I was kinda reading you the way Elie did. Biden is probably the one because he can go after someone in a way that isn’t offensive even if he is pretty brutal. People just like Uncle Joe and think he’s a good guy. POTUS is going to get some digs in on Trump, but I suspect he is mostly going to vouch for her as ready for the job because he has the job and has worked with her. He’s also likely to remind Democrats of what we’ve accomplished and the importance of Hillary in protecting that and continuing the progress on things that didn’t get done.

  495. 495.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Mnemosyne: I almost felt like he was saying that if she hadn’t gotten suckered into marrying a schmoe like him she’d have been changing the world on her own, because SHE was the one doing big things.

  497. 497.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    @dogwood: Biden can do this because he’s the real deal Trumo pretends to be. Obama can get under Donald’s skin like no one else, so hoping he helps Donald’s mental breakdown along. Donald is one tweet away from blowing it all, and sorry, we should help him do it. Not by sinking to his level, but by speaking the truth and extending a hand to the Trump curious voters we need to win.

  498. 498.

    Elie

    @Mnemosyne:

    I agree to much of what you say but also feel that the emotions behind a many year, complex and at times troubled marriage, were much deeper. You present it as more of a “sales pitch” — which it was at a certain level. But it was much much more. As a veteran of a long and many times difficult marriage, I saw a different level of meaning perhaps It was a true love statement to Hillary and a private look behind of who she really is, beyond the superficial wonk, from the man who knows and knew her intimately and profoundly.

  499. 499.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Dog Dawg Damn:

    Donald is one tweet away from blowing it all

    I’ll believe that when I see it. He’s posted about two hundred tweets that ought to have blown it all already.

  500. 500.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @efgoldman: Remember the Teamsters endorsed Nixon in 1972. The Republican positions on law and order became much more acceptable during the 1960’s.

  501. 501.

    Groucho48

    I think the Dems are playing Trump perfectly. Have Warren mock and insult him, as she does so well, then, pretty much ignore him the rest of the time. I’ll bet every speech in which he isn’t mentioned drives his blood pressure up another 5 points. Obama can slice people to pieces without them even being aware he has a knife, so, he should get in a few jabs, but, other than that, continue to ignore him. The best thing this Convention can do is show people the real Clinton, and, it’s doing a very good job of it.

  503. 503.

    Applejinx

    So Big Dawg went on at length about how wonderful Hillary Clinton’s mother was? Really? (I missed it, was at a meeting)

    Very interesting and enlightening contrast between Republican women being upset that not one of the Trumplings ever mentioned their mother (nor did Donald mention his mother).

    I hope that was noticed, it sort of jumped out to me. (I talk to MY mom weekly ;) )

  504. 504.

    Caravelle

    @DanR2: I thought that line was hilarious. “Now, fast forward – In 1999, …”.

    @Groucho48: Hell, every speech included not-very-veiled rebukes to Trump. Michelle Obama’s was pretty much made of them, and Bill Clinton also included some. I don’t think you need more than that – Trump is already quite unpopular, the problem is that Hillary is too. The place where there is good ground to gain isn’t in convincing people who are attracted to Trump to change their minds, it’s to convince people who *aren’t* attracted to him to go to the polls. And I think being inspired by a candidate is probably a more powerful motivator for getting off one’s ass than fear and having to vote for the lesser of two evils.

    Of course you can have both, but there will be plenty of opportunities to bash Trump (every time he opens his mouth, for instance); it makes sense for the DNC where the candidate is nominated to be about building up that candidate.

    In fact I’d be a bit worried if the convention spent too much time bashing Trump as opposed to fluffing Clinton; it would be an indication that they have trouble making a positive case for her. Which clearly isn’t the case.

  505. 505.

    Caravelle

    @Applejinx: He talked about her a bit, I wouldn’t say at length but his admiration for her was clear (I think he said something to the effect of one of the best things about meeting Hillary was getting to meet her mother).

    There has been a big theme of motherhood in the DNC speeches hasn’t there ? Michelle talked about it a lot, and Bill Clinton, aside from talking about Hillary’s mother, also talked at length about how great a mother Hillary was. It’s interesting, it feels a bit nth-wavey. Like, we’ve established that women can be more than just mothers, but hey here is why MOTHERHOOD IS INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT, not just as an excuse to get women to be happy with it but with actual political/social arguments for how important it is. Also a good reminder of what the actual party of “family values” is.

  506. 506.

    low-tech cyclist

    @muddy:

    I think people across America were saying, “That man will be president some day” after Obama’s 2004 speech. I know I was, and whenever I related that was told, Me too. I was surprised that it happened so soon, but thank the gods for it!

    I remember waving my wife in to the room while I was watching him give that speech, and saying exactly that to her. And yeah, I too was surprised (but elated!) when ‘some day’ proved to be the next election.

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