First night of convention goes about as planned.

August 26th, 2008 at 02:15pm Chuck Sweeny

 Convention line: I thought Monday night’s offerings at the Democratic Convention did what they were supposed to do: Introduce Michelle Obama to the public. She took a softer tone by far than she did on the primary campaign trail, emphasizing her role as mom, wife and daughter and how she’s just the same as you and me.

I think that worked. I’ve talked to Michelle Obama before, in Rockford, and she’s as nice a person as you’d ever want to meet. Unfortunately, the right-wing spin machine has cast her as a dangerous radical who hates America. That would be funny if it weren’t so maddening, because it aint’ true, folks. Any mom or dad would be darned proud of a daughter who turned out like Michelle.

The Ted Kennedy speech was a unifying influence on a party nervous about whether the Obama-Hillary split will truly be healed. (I think this mostly a media-made controversy because conventions no longer have real news to offer.) The buzz all day Monday was that Ted, who’s suffering from  brain cancer, wouldn’t be well enough to speak. But speak he did, and if you didn’t know he was ill, you wouldn’t have known it from seeing him last night.

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