“After decades of Clinton’s scandals, lies, and hypocrisy, we know she will do or say anything to get elected”, Hayes added. “I, as you know, am not”, she said. “Your cause is our cause”. Hillary Clinton is the corrupt insider. “We wrote it together”.
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President Barack Obama painted a picture of contrast colored heavily by Clinton’s formidable résumé. Instead, she worked to scare Americans about the prospect of Trump in charge, all but calling him unbalanced. Clinton asserted that Americans have to decide if they are willing to work together, in an effort to thrive together.
What was most dramatic about the speech was the early prominence she gave the anti-Trump message, a recognition that, at least right now, her strongest argument isn’t who she is, but who she isn’t: She’s not Donald Trump, a risky, bullying, democracy-eroding demagogue.
In a speech created to draw as sharp a contrast as possible with Trump, Clinton said Americans are “looking for steady leadership”, a shot aimed at Trump, who has vowed to build a wall along the Mexican border and shatter a bipartisan post-World War II consensus that America has a major role to play in keeping the world safe. Obama noted his own bruising contest with Clinton in 2008, hailing his erstwhile rival’s toughness as a candidate and “her intelligence, her judgment and her discipline” as a team member. “That’s why we are stronger together”.
A pro-Clinton delegate tried to calm the unrest by bear-hugging one Sanders supporter.
Then she called for a moment of silence.
But after the history, the speech needed to start building a position where she can demonstrate she understands the pain ordinary working families have felt with stagnant wages and falling living standards. And she made sure I learned the words from our Methodist faith: “Do all the good you can, for all the people you can, in all the ways you can as long as ever you can”. But Clinton’s real challenge, Curtis said, would be the turnout.
“The truth is, through all these years of public service, the “service” part has always come easier to me than the “public” part”, she said.
Clinton said she was inspired by the Dallas, Texas, community for its response to a tragic shooting that killed five police officers.
“I’m here as a proud American, a proud Democrat, a proud mother, and-tonight, in particular-a very, very proud daughter”, Chelsea Clinton said, sharing childhood memories of her “wonderful, thoughtful, hilarious mother”. So you’ve got to talk about the future.
“Don’t believe anyone who says, ‘I alone can fix it, ‘” Clinton said. Twenty million more Americans with health insurance. Beaming, she told little girls, “I may become the first woman president, but one of you is next”.
She argued that Democrats are the party of working people but have failed to acknowledge the depth of the problem.
But the most effective arguments came Thursday from actual Republicans who took the stage. “Wall Street should never be allowed to wreck Main Street again”. Clinton’s acceptance speech sounded less like poetry than a rerun of Comedy Central’s 2011 “Roast of Donald Trump”.
None too subtly, the music selections played before Clinton’s arrival included Sheryl Crow’s “Time to Put A Woman in the White House”.
As Clinton continued about Trump, the crowd booed.
She further criticized what she called “the bigotry and the bombast” of the Trump campaign and cast his temperament has unfit for the presidency.
“I’ve been watching these speeches at night, and boy am I getting hit”, Trump said at an event Thursday in Iowa.”I am getting hit and they don’t mean it and there’s a lot of lies being told”. “And I promise you, our strength, our greatness, does not depend on Donald Trump”.
She also addressed the notion that she wants to infringe upon the Second Amendment. “Donald Trump can’t even handle the rough-and-tumble of a presidential campaign”.
Almost 41 per cent of likely voters favour Clinton, 35 per cent favour Trump, and 25 per cent picked “Other”, according to the new July 25-29 online poll of 1043 likely voters, which overlapped with the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
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Clinton wrapped up her message by emphasizing service and planting seeds for the future.
