Ok, so I am so sick and tired of the punditocracy attributing the Obama bounce to Bill Clinton.
Sick and tired!
To Lorne Michael and SNL, if you want to play kingmaker, you are going to have to come harder.
I know I am stirring up the hornet's nest here, but hear me out before you flame me to oblivion.
No doubt Clinton's speech helped. It was a great speech superbly delivered.
Clinton was in his element. He made a compelling case for choosing Obama over Romney but he didn't have to clinch the deal.
President Obama had to and he did it brilliantly.
To hear the pundits talk, you'd think that if Clinton had advocated for Romney, then Romney would have had the bounce.
Another problem with giving all the glory - or an oversized portion of it - to Clinton,
is that it ignores the brilliant, emotional, powerful speakers who came before him.
The Democratic convention was like a great concert; it was one excellent act followed by one excellent act.
Have we forgotten Michelle Obama?
“Well, today, after so many struggles and triumphs and moments that have tested my husband in ways I never could have imagined, I have seen firsthand that being president doesn’t change who you are. No, it reveals who you are.”
Cory Booker?
Deval Patrick?
if we want to earn the privilege to lead, it's time for Democrats to stiffen our backbone and stand up for what we believe. Quit waiting for pundits or polls or super PACs to tell us who the next president or senator or congressman is going to be. We're Americans.
We shape our own future. Let's start by standing up for President Barack Obama.
Lilly Ledbetter?
The lively Ted Strickland with one zinger after the other?
“Mitt Romney, he lives by a different code. To him, American workers are just numbers on a spreadsheet. ”
“Barack Obama is betting on the American worker. Mitt Romney is betting on a Bermuda shell corporation.”
“Barack Obama saved the American auto industry. Mitt Romney saved on his taxes.”
Julian Castro and his cute as a button daughter?
Jennifer Granholm?
John Lewis?
Emmanuel Cleaver?
And who can forget Gabby Gifford and that moment we saw her bravely walking out on stage?
Did Clinton do more for Obama than Obama did for himself? What do the facts reveal?
All quotes from Reuters:
Nielsen said an estimated 25.1 million viewers across seven cable and broadcast networks watched the second night of the convention in prime time, when Clinton delivered a lengthy, humorous and detail-heavy defense of President Barack Obama's first term in office. The total figure however was down from the 26.2 million TV audience for first lady Michelle Obama on Tuesday night.
According to the same report,
Clinton sparked 22,000 tweets.
Note that Clinton didn't even beat Romney's speech:
For Republican challenger Mitt Romney's speech last week, 30.3 million people watched on television.
Compare that to President Obama's speech:
More than 35.7 million people tuned in on three broadcast and 10 cable networks to watch Obama accept the Democrats' nomination for president, according to Nielsen ratings data.
President Barack Obama's acceptance speech on Thursday night drew the largest television audience of this year's political conventions and ranked as the biggest political moment ever on social media site Twitter.
The president's speech prompted 52,756 tweets per minute just after it ended, a new record according to Twitter.
It is worth noting that the president went up against the VMAs. I know for certain that a huge percent of young people (maybe even the majority) who ordinarily would have watched the president live, chose to watch the VMAs live and catch the Speech on YouTube later. Among them was my own daughter and her group of friends all of whom are very loyal Obama supporters.
I am not saying that Clinton has not contributed to the bounce the president is currently enjoying.
He did. I loved his enthusiastic take-down of the president's critics. There is something beautiful about watching someone doing that which he so obviously enjoys.
But the bottomline (at least for me) is this: The Democratic Convention was a symphony with Clinton as the Third Movement; Barack Obama - and only Barack Obama - was the Fourth.
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