I stuck to watching C-SPAN for most of the convention so I missed most of the pundit reaction to Kerry's speech, but I did hear tell that on PBS for a bright and shining moment, David Brooks removed his head from his ass.

Unfortunately he has reassumed the positionor rather he never really removed it in the first place.

So far, I think Josh Marshall has the best first-hand take on the convention. I'm glad I'm not there (Bono's presence notwithstanding). It sounds like chaos. But back to Josh. Having watched most of the speeches last night, I'd have to agree that the dems seem to understand their base a bit more than we give them credit for.

When it first occurred to me to write this post I was going to say that partisan Democrats have decided to give Kerry a free hand in appealing to independents and swing voters. But that doesn't get it quite right. That was the case in 1992 when the party's core voters, after twelve years out of the White House, were willing to give Bill Clinton all sorts of leeway with what most viewed as his DLC heterodoxies. But something different is at work here.

Among Democrats, the rejection of this president is so total, exists on so many different levels, and is so fused into their understanding of all the major issues facing the country, that it doesn't even need to be explicitly evoked. The headline of Susan Page's piece in USA Today reads: "Speakers offer few barbs, try to stay warm and fuzzy." But the primetime speeches were actually brimming with barbs, and rather jagged ones at that. They were just woven into the fabric of the speeches, fused into rough-sketched discussions of policy, or paeans to Kerry.

Gore’s Speech

I always enjoy watching Gore speak. I also hate it. I hate it because seeing him reveals in stark relief exactly what should have been. Seeing him makes it harder to hear Bush speak, to open the paper and see how far we have fallen. I hate it because the man who spoke tonight is not the same man who conceded the election nearly 4 years ago. This man would have fought tooth and nail. This is a man who hit his stride too late to himself any good.

Seeing Gore reminds me that I don’t ever again want to feel the way I did nearly 4 years ago.

Convention Blogging

Not much of this from me. All the cool kids are in Boston. I might blog on some key speeches throughout the week.

And apparently someone's crashing our party. Ann Coulter in Boston, during the Democratic Convention? She must be breaking out in hives. I hope she gets all scabby.