PHILADELPHIA-In the most important speech of her long and decorated political life, Hillary Clinton accepted the Democratic nomination for president Thursday night by working to offer the American public a more optimistic look at what she had in store for the country. “She’s just got a very well-oiled and efficient campaign machine”, Lake told me in a recent interview.
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“Bernie Sanders and I will work together to make college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all”, Clinton said.
The classic Chris Matthews distinction is that Democrats are the Mommy party and Republicans the Daddy party. She tells the Democratic convention that the achievement is special “for grandmothers and little girls and everyone in between”. Clinton called the ouster “legal” in principle, and condemned any attempt by Zelaya to return to power. “When any barrier falls in America, for anyone, it clears the way for everyone”, said Clinton. Perhaps the most persuasive, or at least intriguing, of these forecasts strongly suggests that Clinton will nearly certainly win her bid for the White House, but with one big caveat: the first female president will only serve one term.
“This is the moment, this is the opportunity for our future”, said retired Marine Gen. John R. Allen, a former commander in Afghanistan. Others in the Wells Fargo Center convention hall shouted: “USA, USA”, in support of Panetta, also a former defense secretary. They were quickly drowned out by competing chants of “Hillary!”
She embraced her reputation as a studious wonk, a politician more comfortable with policy proposals than rhetorical flourishes.
“I believe that our economy isn’t working the way it should because our democracy isn’t working the way it should”, Clinton said.
But strategists acknowledge the difficulty of changing opinions about public figures who are so well known and so polarizing. What good old days do they want to take us back to? On Wednesday, Michael Bloomberg, a disaffected Republican who has shunted a party affiliation, made a powerful case for why Clinton was the best – and only – alternative to a Trump victory. In an earlier statement, he accused Democrats of living in a “fantasy world”, ignoring economic and security troubles as well as Clinton’s controversial email use at the State Department. “Anyone, whether man or woman, who says the spouse doesn’t have influence is insane”. The WFP angered many Democrats this election cycle when it endorsed Sanders and then worked hard to give him a primary victory in Clinton’s adopted home state of NY, where the WFP has its biggest operation.
She also relished in taking swipes at Trump in a campaign that has already been highly combative.
Reeling off his greatest hits as president, from the auto industry bailout and health care overhaul to landmark deals on climate change and Iran’s nuclear program, Obama said the choice was between Trump vision of “a country where we turn against each other, and turn away from the rest of the world” and “the America I know”.
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As she prepared to deliver her speech, sources familiar with the matter said the FBI is investigating a cyber intrusion at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) that may be related to an earlier hack at the Democratic National Committee. A parade of speakers – gay and straight, young and old, white, black and Hispanic – cast Trump as out-of-touch with a diverse and fast-changing nation. Please explain to me what part of America First leads him to make Trump ties in China, not Colorado. Wednesday saw addresses by Lee Daniels, Angela Bassett and Sigourney Weaver, with Vice President Joe Biden and President Obama finishing out the day with impassioned speeches against Donald Trump and for Hillary Clinton. For me, it will be up to the people of NY to decide whether I’ll have the privilege of serving them in the United States Senate. Whether you voted for me, or voted for Barack, the time is now to unite as a single party with a single objective.
