The First Lady was the most polished speaker opening night at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
"Don't let anyone ever tell you this country isn't great," Michelle Obama told a full-throated crowd in the Wells Fargo Arena, "This, right now," she said,” is the greatest country on earth." Take that, Donald Trump, with your meretricious slogan, Make America Great Again.
Ben Slimm, a young student from Ireland, was in the crowd during the First Lady's speech when a handful of delegates began shouting "Bernie! Bernie!" in delirious praise of Bernie Sanders, the man Mrs. Clinton defeated for the party's nomination. "Immediately they were hushed by the crowd around them," he said, "In Ireland, we wouldn't shush, we'd look the other way."
Mrs. Obama can shush people. She managed to shush uproarious Sanders delegates and keep them from making perfect fools of themselves.
Barack Obama will find plenty to do when he retires – write books, build a presidential library, do good works. What about Mrs. Obama, though? She's 52 years old (Mrs. Clinton is 68, Mr. Trump 70). She'll soon be an empty-nester. One possibility: she is, after all, a lawyer (Harvard) and I doubt there is a law firm in the land that wouldn't welcome her as a partner. Imagine this smart, eloquent lady appearing before the Supreme Court and arguing a case of national importance. Imagine her, for heaven's sake, sitting on the High Court.
After Monday night's smash performance, Democrats must be wondering if they could talk her into running for high political office, U.S. senator perhaps. The unspoken truth is that none of Bernie's pie-in-the sky proposals or Mrs. Clinton's more realistic ideas has any chance of becoming law as long as the House and Senate are controlled by strident hard-line Republicans.
Other speakers Monday night did their duty. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts (introduced by a Kennedy) urged Democrats to vote for Mrs. Clinton and warned that Mr. Trump "must never be president of the United States." Bernie Sanders was the day's final speaker, rambling on about his campaign (you might have thought he'd won) before telling the delegates that "Hillary Clinton must become the next president of the United States."
The kerfuffle earlier in the day was over leaked e-mails from the Democratic National Committee that weren't kind to Sen. Sanders. The DNC chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, resigned and the committee apologized. No big deal. DNC chairs sometimes resign to give the nominee a chance to name his or her own person to the post. My all-time favorite party chair was Ray C. Bliss of Ohio, who took over after the Goldwater debacle and managed through his much-touted nuts and bolts strategy to put the party back together.
Post-Trump Republicans might be advised to seek advice at the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron.
James M. Perry, a prominent veteran political reporter, contributes regular observations to post-gazette.com. Mr. Perry was the chief political correspondent of The Wall Street Journal until his retirement. Prior to that, he covered national politics for the Dow Jones weekly, The National Observer. He can be reached at erieperry@aol.com
First Published: July 26, 2016, 2:59 p.m.
