Biden Night

by digby

I’ve been taking part in a poll done by the National Journal all week. They asked us which of the following things Biden should do in his speech:

Tying McCain to the Bush administration

Criticizing McCain on national security

Boosting Obama’s national security credentials

Criticizing the Bush administration

Tying McCain to Bush/Criticizing Bush/Criticizing McCain on security

I said he should speak to middle class anxiety and talk about conservative failure. He did that and I thought it was the best part of his speech. (I’ll comment on some of the disturbing aspects of the foreign policy rhetoric another time…)

I haven’t been able to discern any overarching theme and I’d have loved to see more Republican bashing, but overall I still think it’s been a good convention for the Democrats and not because the so-called rift has been healed. (It’s always been almost impossible for me to imagine that even Democrats would be that self destructive after being out of power for eight years and facing a party with a -4% approval rating.) It’s been a good convention because the “civil war” storyline actually ended up revealing that the Democratic leadership, for all their faults, has far more firepower than the tired freakshow the Republicans are going to throw out next week. The young generation, from Obama to Beau and the older generation from Bill and Hillary to Joe are all politicians of stature compared to the D-list of oddballs (even by Republican standards) who will be on the stage in Minneapolis — Giuliani, Romney, McCain, Huckabee, Lieberman etc.

That’s why the GOP is working so hard to turn the Democrats into empty suits. While they were blowing all credibility during this long period of conservative dominance the Democrats built a strong national team in terms of political talent, appeal and experience. These Dems really shouldn’t have any trouble beating that rag tag mob of leftover wingnuts. God help us all if they don’t.

.