Finally, something went right for the Democrats in Philadelphia on Wednesday night.
It started out horribly as Leon Panetta—one of the most deservedly respected men in the last 20 years of government—gave a good, serious speech about national security. And was nearly booed off the stage by a large group of malcontents screaming “No more wars.” In one of the oddest juxtapositions in I’ve ever seen: A senior Democratic figure was making a conservative critique of the Republican nominee that caused him to be heckled by the progressives in the audience—and then the rest of the attendees attempted to intervene by chanting “USA! USA!”
As David Frum quipped, it was the sound of realignment.
But after Panetta’s disastrous reception, the Democrats got four excellent—though very different—speeches, all of which presented different tactical variations on the strategic goal of disqualifying Donald Trump.
The first was by Joe Biden, who followed up his 2012 DNC stemwinder—which produced the only memorable line of the convention: “Bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive”—with a blowtorch critique of Trump. Biden’s remarks were pitched not at the Democrats in the room but squarely at middle-class voters, the kind who lean Democrat or Republican but self-identify as independent.
Biden went after Trump’s TV fame, turning his Apprentice catchphrase against him:
Biden was explicitly non-partisan in his attack:
And after Biden came Michael Bloomberg, who spoke as an independent and openly acknowledged that Hillary Clinton “isn’t perfect.” His critique of Trump was also beyond either partisanship or ideology—meaning that it could be heard by anyone. And he chose to hit Trump’s business.
“I built a business, and I didn’t start it with a million dollar check from my father,” Bloomberg said. Pointing to Trump’s serial failures and bankruptcies, he said, “Trump says he wants to run our nation like he runs his business? God help us.”
“I’m a New Yorker,” Bloomberg grimaced, “and I know a con when I see one.”
He even hit Trump in his no-go zone, questioning his actual net worth: “The richest thing about Donald Trump is his hypocrisy.”
Then came Tim Kaine. In what was probably the first time 90 percent of the audience has heard him speak, Kaine made a weird, but weirdly effective, argument that Donald Trump is a compulsive liar who cannot be trusted.
Kaine’s affect is that of a low-key suburban dad: the kind of guy you don’t mind standing next to while watching the kids’ soccer game. Everything about him is geeky, and his dorkiness radiates authenticity. He’s like the anti-Bill Clinton.
Which made him, in a way, the perfect prosecutor for charges of dishonesty. And what he did to Trump was brutal:
Throughout, Kaine used a Trump impression that was so terrible that it obscured his subtle but devastating mockery.
This passage may pay dividends down the line. “Believe me” is Trump’s great language tic. He says it all the time. Seriously—he even said it four times during his acceptance speech in Cleveland.
If Kaine and Clinton harp on it, they might well poison the phrase for Trump, so that every time it slips out of his mouth, voters will instantly be reminded of how much trouble he has with the truth. Imagine, for example, what Clinton could do to him during a debate when Trump mutters “believe me” in passing. In short, what Kaine did to Trump was the rhetorical equivalent of slipping plutonium into hand sanitizer.
And finally, there was Barack Obama.
One of the curiosities about Obama is that his political career was largely built on three great speeches, but since being elected, he hasn’t given a single iconic, classic performance. On Wednesday night, he was the best he’s been since his loss in the New Hampshire primary in 2008.
For 40 minutes Obama managed to tone down his moral superiority and historicism. Instead, he made a forceful, independent-minded case against Trump.
“What we heard in Cleveland week wasn’t particularly Republican,” Obama said. “And it sure wasn’t conservative.” After a convention that had been long on progressive culture war, this was the first sign that the campaign may have figured out that they can’t beat Trump by painting him as a conservative Republican.
And from there, Obama criticized Trump and praised America in terms that would have been totally at home at any Republican convention prior to 2016.
“The American Dream is something no wall will ever contain,” he said. A little later, in a (richly ironic) flourish that could have been delivered by Ted Cruz, he explained, “Our power doesn’t come from some self-declared savior promising that he alone can restore order. We don’t look to be ruled. Our power comes from those immortal declarations first put to paper here in Philadelphia itself.”
The entire close of Obama’s speech, in fact, was an ode to traditional American values, casting Trump as a “demagogue” not out of step with progressivism or history’s long arc or any of Obama’s usual favorites—but with the ancient American values of freedom and honor.
Obama said it explicitly, but what made the third night of the convention so remarkable was that all of the principle speakers refrained from tying the Republican party to Trump. Instead, they constructed a pathway for Republican-leaning independents to turn away from Trump without feeling like they were abandoning their place.
It’s just one night, and Hillary Clinton still has to give her speech. You will never go broke betting on her awfulness as a campaigner.
But for the first time this cycle, there was a ruthless intelligence behind the Democratic game plan. Which, if nothing else, is a sign that they’re taking Trump seriously.
