Let’s start this month’s reflection by rolling out the reliable cliché that ‘a week is a long time in politics’. With so many elections taking place this year, I may regret using that line now, but the week in question – August’s Democratic National Convention – is worth mentioning.
The Americans sure know how to throw a political jamboree and the August event in Chicago was pure Hollywood in rewriting a script which had looked flawed and predictable just a month before.
Against expectations, the momentum of Kamala Harris’s initial ‘novelty’ bounce, as new Presidential candidate, became a runaway train which hit the Democratic National Convention in Chicago at full throttle. And it didn’t stop there! The DNC became a masterclass in how to revive a political campaign and the key to its success was the effectiveness of its speakers.
Sometimes, when you’re on a roll, you’re on a roll and the atmosphere that electrified the Chicago convention seemed to fizzle across America and the world. So what did the Democrats do differently?
For much of 2024, the US Presidential campaign had resembled a mud wrestle – two opponents grappling ungracefully, slugging it out verbally to drag each other further down into the sludge. For an illustration, look no further than two old guys arguing about golf!
It says much that Biden had made Trump look good, in spite of The Donald’s increasingly rambling speeches which veered off script and into places which are more associated with the kind of dictators the US have had a history of targeting in the name of freedom.
Negativity had drained the energy out of the campaign and was a huge turn off for the electorate. What Kamala has done for this campaign – helped in no uncertain terms by the addition of everyman, ‘political dad’ and coach, Tim Waltz – is to bring some normality back to the contest.
In Chicago, we saw humility, humour and speeches which engaged with people way beyond the convention centre floor. In Kamala the Democrats have a candidate who can square up to Trump from a different angle. She’s a canny prosecutor whose verbal jabs cut through the Trump haymakers to damage her opponent whom she described in Chicago as an ‘unserious man’ who would ‘serve the only client he has ever had: himself’.
Her running mate, Tim Waltz, is the perfect counterbalance. His demeanour is one of the teacher (a former career path) who is respected and listened to. He’s a man who can speak with empathy and knows how to connect also but knows how to talk tough when he has to.
However, it wasn’t just Kamala and Coach Tim who got the crowd going. Conventions forever sing along to greatest hits and so it was no surprise that the likes of Bill and Hillary Clinton and Barack and Michelle Obama got rapturous ovations. But their speeches were pure convention gold too.
The secret weapon the Obama’s brought was a sense of humour which no doubt inflicted cuts upon the Trump campaign. Obama made the best of a joke about Trump’s obsession with crowd sizes, using two fingers to maximum effect, while Michelle nimbly played Trump’s attempt to exploit the race card against him. The takedown was assured and came with a wicked punchline.
Trump can’t do humour, unless it resembles that of a classroom bully scoring laughs at another’s expense. Humour, when done right, provides any presentation with a magic ingredient and the Obamas stole the show by playing with laughs so effectively.
And finally, a word about Oprah Winfrey, a national treasure who knows a thing or two about the febrile atmosphere of the controversial TV talk show circuit. First Oprah belittled the comment made by Trump’s running mate (same vein of bully’s humour) about Harris being a ‘childless cat lady’ and then ended her speech by imploring the DNC convention – and the country – “Let us choose joy!”
Contrast this uplifting and relatable approach and appeal to normality with the negativity used by the Republican team. Their language, aimed at dragging the conversation down to the lowest denominator, suddenly seems out of step with what people want.
Is there a cultural shift underway, and an increasing fatigue with conflict politics? Whether the joy offensive can sustain until November remains to be seen. However, in an era characterized by mean politics and division, perhaps the DNC’s new sense of optimism will be enough to put the Democrats back in the White House for a second term.
