Rocking it!
Who's up for some disjointed thought on the first day of the national convention?
There was early paperwork:
Voice vote now to take all your freedom and liberty and guns and heterosexual marriage away. Passes unanimously. #dnc2012
— @pourmecoffee via TweetDeck
And then the convention really kicked off, so follow me below the fold.
Rep. Barbara Lee began by yelling at me. I'm not sure why. Then Newark Mayor Cory Booker decided to yell at me too which made me feel like I did something wrong. Maybe he was angry at this time slot: He was buried early on Tuesday evening either to punish him for being Bain Capital's biggest defender this side of the aisle, or (a more charitable interpretation) convention planners wanted him to fire up the crowd early.
Turned off the sound on my TV in San Diego and can still hear Cory yelling in Charlotte.
— @tbogg via web
Whatever the reason for his less-than-optimal time slot, and despite all the yelling, fact is he got the delegates really fired up. Republican delegates didn't really get going until Condi Rice's keynote speech on Wednesday night of their convention. In his Tuesday night keynote, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie had to
beg the delegates to get off their feet. Thanks to Booker, our convention was off to a rocking start.
At the GOP convention, speakers were pained to mention their nominee Mitt Romney. They were more than happy to talk about "me, me, me" as they positioned themselves for 2016, but the guy running for president in 2012? There seemed to be little incentive to align themselves too closely to a person who will be radioactive after Nov. 6. Thus, it wasn't hard to forget who their convention was for.
It was the exact opposite in Charlotte. Speakers actually mentioned Obama because, you know, Democrats don't hate the guy. In fact, I was shocked the first time I heard someone mention Romney. Oh yeah, that guy still exists!
Harry Reid taunted Romney on his taxes because that's Harry's role this cycle, and he's doing it well. "Trust comes from transparency. Mitt comes up short on both," he said to big cheers. Mitch McConnell wishes he'd gotten a fraction of that love.
After some uneventful speakers and a video from former Pres. Jimmy Carter, we got the first big hit of the night: the Teddy Tribute. Oh man. If you haven't seen it, here it is again:
The clips of Kennedy eviscerating Romney in their 1994 debate are priceless, and led to the second feigned GOP outrage of the night (the first was the omission of the word "god" from the Democratic platform).
Their attempts to turn this video into a new Wellstone Memorial ran into a wall of mockery.
Your dude talked to a chair. Go sit down. RT @Reince Classless Dems use tribute video of deceased Ted Kennedy to attack Mitt Romney.
— @KatInWilm via web
Flipping over to Fox, I saw Bill O'Reilly flipping out at the video, so I knew then for sure that convention planners had scored a direct hit. But really, no one with working brain cells would doubt the appropriateness of the Ted Kennedy video. The only thing better would've been to have a hologram Teddy speak to the convention. But just like my broken dreams at the RNC, there would be no hologram anybodies at the conventions this year.
As speech after speech rolled by, it was amazing to realize that just about every speaker mentioned marriage equality. Remember, it was just eight years ago that Howard Dean was considered unelectable because of civil unions in Vermont. Now, in less than a decade, one of the two major parties went far beyond civil unions to full marriage equality. Meanwhile, Republicans did their best to sweep their platform under the rug, afraid of the electoral repercussions of being so radical on choice and equality. For conservatives who claim to be winning the culture wars, they weren't acting like winners. And for Democrats typically afraid to confront those issues, they were, dare I say it? Out and proud.
Meanwhile, speaker after speaker also spoke of the sacrifices made by our men and women in uniform, another topic virtually ignored at the GOP convention. Perhaps Republicans were afraid that mentioning our troops would remind people of the elimination of Osama Bin Laden. Or perhaps they weren't a necessary prop in an election being decided mostly on domestic economic issues. But for Democrats, our troops aren't props. And they got their due respect.
So what are we? 8,000 more words on the sacrifices of service men and women than the GOP managed in their Convention?
— @emptywheel via TweetDeck
Back to the lineup, NARAL President Nancy Keenan spoke of freedom. You know, the kind of freedom that allows women and their doctors to make decisions without government interference, and the kind of freedom that allows couples to get married without the government vetting their suitability. In other words, the kind of freedom that is real, and not fake and pretend like the GOP's.
Of course, all these women talking about rights got cranky conservatives even crankier, like this CNN contributor:
Can we blame them, though? I'd be cranky too if my entire convention had been upstaged by the Democrats on Day One even before prime time!
Text from RNC delegate: "I'm officially jealous. The DNC looks way more exciting"
— @PeterHambyCNN via web
Lily Ledbetter had one of the lines of the night:
Maybe 23 cents doesn't sound like a lot to someone with a Swiss bank account.
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick brought down the house. I needed a cigarette after his speech, and I don't even smoke. Then 2016 hopeful Martin O'Malley spoke, but didn't talk about himself in preparation for 2016. What a concept! Had Republicans given that a shot, maybe their nominee would have a real bounce this week. On the other hand ...
Maybe O'Malley's job is too say, "See, Dems have boring white guys, too."
— @mmcauliff via web
The Castro twins opened up the Democrats prime-time coverage, which means that the three networks that no one watches anymore were carrying the hour. First the twin who isn't a mayor of San Antonio spoke, then the other one who is. Or vice versa. Who knows. They were IDENTICAL. While not as dynamic as Deval Patrick, Julian Castro was pretty damn good and a great sign of our party's bench. He was also really good at mimicking Obama's speaking style from the 2004 convention. Hmmm ... The dude has been breaking down tape.
But doing your homework and learning from the greats isn't a fault. It worked. And since he's in his early 30s, he's got plenty of time to make a statewide run plausible as Texas demographics turn the state Bluer. Best of all? He wasn't a token brown guy like what we saw at that other convention.
With his Tweets per minute peak at 11,503, @JulianCastro drove more conversation than any #GOP2012 speaker than @MittRomney.
— @gov via web
Then Democrats did this crazy thing:
I don't get it--Dems have an emotional video on during primetime; not old white person yelling at furniture #p2 #DNC2012
— @cliffschecter via web
The video was quite the tearjerker (for other people, not me. It was my allergies!). After being introduced by a mom with four kids in the military, one each in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines (and one more in high school she hoped would join the Coast Guard), Michelle Obama hit the stage. Unlike Ann Romney, who had Chris Christie follow her to declare that her ideas about love were stupid, Michelle was the headliner. Which is something we can do because we actually like our nominee and his wife.
After Michelle's speech, my brother texted me:
This isn't even fair.
It was enough to start feeling sorry for that sad little pathetic thing the GOP did last week.
A Politico editor wondered on Twitter whether the Democrats could follow such a strong program for two more nights. I look forward to seeing him pleasantly surprised.