DNC Day 2: a Hilloric Event

Finally, An American Flag On Stage!

Last night, officially, Hillary became the first woman nominee of a major party. A group of Sandernistas had a secret plan to have a mass-walkout when she was announced. They exited the building and occupied the press-tent in protest of not being heard getting their losing candidate nominated.

The convention went on, the press (at least on twitter) was fairly amused with the protesters.

Bill Speaks

The headliner today was President Bill Clinton (apparently you never technically lose the title, or something). He gave the spouse-speech: a set of stories meant to humanize the candidate. This is the first time we've ever seen this from a First Dude and he was, according to the responses, pretty effective.

The Omnivore's wife noted a tremor in his thumbs and gave a TV-diagnosis of possible Parkinsons. Whatever the case, he was clearly having a good time and looked good. He has been an uneven surrogate, but last night he did what he needed to.

BLM Appears

It wasn't quite #BlackLivesMatter but rather Mothers of the Movement. A group of women of color who have had sons killed under unfortunate circumstances (the circumstances vary, including Sandra Bland who was categorized as a suicide). This corrects the "not saying Black-Lives-Matter" thing from yesterday.

Presumably they'll talk about ISIS tonight with President Obama.

Is It Working?

The Omnivore thinks it is. While the bump may be temporary and may not be a hell of a lot--who knows--the vibe that is being generated is positive. The star-power--all of Hollywood, it looks like--is reasonably potent. The direction is uplifting (including showing Sander's Looking-For-America campaign Ad cut to end with him and Clinton on stage together).

The praise for America is something that would be traditionally a Republican strong-point. This includes the above picture of Meryl Streep dressed as/in an American flag. The backdrop of renewed tension with Russia, further flips the scripts: in the 80's, it was Rambo-Republicans who were virulently anti-Soviet.

Today it's the Republican Trump-Faction with good things to say about the Russian leader. There's even an Olympics doping scandal. Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, heroes of the left for exposing Big Government, are now showing up on Conservative's timelines on social media.

The Omnivore isn't sure this is a sustainable strategy: Trump's unwillingness to release his tax returns might show that he has interests in Russia. It's also unclear if Russian intel, meddling in American elections, will play well, whatever the "scandals" they've uncovered.

A Note On The Scandals

The DNC Leaks, the Election Rigging, the Silencing of the Lambs (the Bernie Delegates)--this is all first-order bullshit. The DNC Leaks show no material actions. The Election Rigging is nonsense for the credulous, and the 'Silencing' is self-imposed.

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