Kerry's Great Performance

I have to disagree thoroughly with Senor C. Even Mickey Kaus felt good about the speech. It's easy to critique Kerry from the pundit perspective, but that wasn't the target audience of this speech. Most of America, those not paying attention to the primaries and who haven't been following the campaigns, had no idea who Kerry was. Last night, I think he gave a solid (though not on the concise-side) summary of who he is and what he stands for. Kerry sped through the speech, but that was GOOD, not bad! I mean, do you really want John Kerry to talk more SLOWLY? The speed actually I think made him seem relentless. And, with all the criticism Kerry has received for being dull and wooden and that sort of thing, I felt like we had a "George W. Bush Debate" effect. The bar was lowered so much for Kerry and his delivery among many people that I think he played it out by being semi-animated.

As for him not being Clinton, well, we KNOW this. Anyone who expected John Kerry to transform into a great speaker is deluding themselves. I think, despite that, this was his best oratorical performance probably in his whole career. I would easily rate his performance as better than Edwards' convention strut. For panders to the left, well YEAH. He's a democrat, but there were plenty of panders to the right. The question of how he's going to pay for it, well we all know every candidate does that and we can expect that he won't have to pay for it all because only part of his agenda will actually pass (if any). I was disappointed he came out so stridently against Social Security privatization, but I think he's finally articulated a coherent response for Homeland Security to the American public with his talk about first responders. If anything, Kerry's idealism about budget issues is not nearly as DELUSIONAL as Bush's, and people will easily recognize that.

Most of all, I rate the speech a success because for all the cheesy lines, it's full of GREAT SOUND BITES. Most people who see any bit of this speech will be seeing clips on cable news, and this speech was full of them. The speechwriting team was genius in that regard. It's perfectly adapted to today's superficial politics because there are great one-liners and phrases that will drive the point home. It was theatrics, and it was long, and it was short on details, but this is politics. He's a candidate, not a think tank. I rate Kerry's performance as great because it was exactly what it needed to be. Anyone who hadn't been paying attention before got a decent notion of the kind of guy Kerry is and what he stands for, and he is BETTER THAN GORE, something last night really confirmed.