Hillary Clinton formally accepted the Democratic nomination Thursday night with a speech as confident, authentic, and accessible as any she has ever given.
“The truth is,” she admitted, “through all these years of public service, the ‘service’ part has always come easier to me than the ‘public’ part.”
“I get it that some people just don't know what to make of me,” she added, before going to explain the humble roots of her grandfather, who worked in a Scranton lace mill for 50 years in order to provide a better life for his children.
Clinton got an assist from her daughter, Chelsea, who introduced her to America as the Mom who was “always, always there for me.”
My earliest memory is my mom picking me up after I had fallen down, giving me a big hug, and reading me Goodnight, Moon.
Yes, Hillary Clinton has lived an extraordinary life by any measure, but the mother-daughter bond between Chelsea and her mom was obvious and relatable to women young and old across the country.
Clinton also did not shy away from her experience, her time in Washington, or the many political battles she has fought, admitting she was not “new to the national stage.” She highlighted her wonkiness: "It's true, I sweat the details of policy," she said, "Because it's not just a detail if it's your kid - if it's your family." And she exuded absolute ease when calling out the ignorance of Donald Trump.
“Now Donald Trump says, and this is a quote, ‘I know more about ISIS than the generals do,’” she said, turning to look straight into the camera. “No, Donald, you don't,” she concluded, with a knowing smile.
But perhaps most importantly, the combination of her common humanity and battle-tested grit set her up to capitalize on the yuuuge opening that Donnie Doom left her with his RNC speech last week (which has proven practically repellant to a large swath of voters). In an acknowledgment that has entirely escaped her billionaire opponent, Clinton talked kitchen table and pocketbook issues because some Americans are still worried about putting food on the table and securing an education for their children.
“In my first 100 days, we will work with both parties to pass the biggest investment in new, good-paying jobs since World War II,” she pledged. “If we invest in infrastructure now, we'll not only create jobs today, but lay the foundation for the jobs of the future.”
And in one of her biggest applause lines of the night, Clinton promised to work with Bernie Sanders to “make college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all!”
Clinton rounded out her speech with calls for tolerance, listening to one another and trying, for a moment, to walk in another person’s shoes.
Let's put ourselves in the shoes of young black and Latino men and women who face the effects of systemic racism, and are made to feel like their lives are disposable.
Let's put ourselves in the shoes of police officers, kissing their kids and spouses goodbye every day and heading off to do a dangerous and necessary job.
Along with promising to reform the criminal justice system and build a pathway to citizenship for the undocumented, she took on the issue of gun violence. For decades, she acknowledged, politicians have found the politics “too hot to touch.”
“But I ask you: how can we just stand by and do nothing?” Clinton posited. “I refuse to believe we can't find common ground here.”
In fact, common ground or, rather, “stronger together” was really the animating theme of the weeklong Democratic convention. The entire event was a bet that, to our core, Americans still fundamentally believe we need one another more than we want a tyrant who tells us what to do.
“I know that at a time when so much seems to be pulling us apart, it can be hard to imagine how we'll ever pull together again,” Clinton observed as she wrapped up her speech. “But I'm here to tell you tonight—progress is possible.”
Hillary Clinton is the embodiment of someone who has been pulled apart a million different times and, yet, she has always risen again.
Watch Hillary diss Donnie: