She ran a wooden campaign that was drastically overfunded at the expense of some of our great candidates (including Charlie Brown), but she’s giving a decent speech here about veteran’s issues and Obama’s commitment to military families.  She was actually an Obama constituent when she was injured in Iraq, and she told of how he visited her in the hospital without fanfare.  McCain’s positions on veteran’s issues are really awful.

I have to say that I like this night of speeches.  The reason that convention bounces are shrinking is because media coverage of convention speeches at the expense of bullshit issues is shrinking.  But this has been a good night thus far.

Biden is coming right up.

I don’t want to rush past this moment too quickly.  Today Barack Obama became the first African American nominee of a major party in history.  That is a tremendous accomplishment that I honestly wasn’t sure I’d see in my lifetime.  I talked to some California electeds about the meaning of this moment.

Steve Westly jumped aboard with Obama early.  He told me that he decided to support him in 2006 when he saw Obama appear at a rally in 2006 for Phil Angelides.  All that year prospective Presidential candidates were coming through the state to campaign.  John Kerry got maybe 100 people to events.  Hillary Clinton got 300 or 400.  Barack Obama had practically the entire USC campus out on the Quad that day.  And Westly saw that this was something special, the kind of moment that you saw with the Kennedys.

My seatmate Debra tells me that this whole election cycle has almost been beyond belief.  These are things that she never thoght she would see.  “I was a girl who wasn’t allowed to take a drafting class in high school.  The world has changed.”

Kamala Harris has her own story.  She was the first African-American district attorney in the history of San Francisco.  In a speech for the new majority PAC Vote Hope, she spoke on this, and the fact that Obama’s nomination represents a hope for every person of color in America.

Let’s stop and reflect on this for a second.  An African American nominee.  Of our party.  The party of inclusion.  The party of all Americans.

He’s supposed to rip into McCain, so let’s see how it pans out.  Debra told me that, when he ran into Kerry along with Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, he said to her, “where were you in 2004?”

The Bush/McCain Freudian slip was kind of funny, in a “Kerry can’t give a great speech” kind of way.

This is definitely a red meat speech.  He said that Bush misled us into war, that Obama and Biden would shut down Gitmo, respect the Constitution, and never, ever torture.  He started slow but he’s got some passion tonight.

“Every day now I learn something new about candidate McCain.  To those who still believe in the myth of a maverick… look at candidate McCain and Senator McCain.”

This is good.  “Talk about being for it before you’re against it.”

“Before debating Obama, he should debate himself.”

Explicitly calls out the Rove-McCain tactics… mentioned how McCain said “next stop, Baghdad” after 9/11.

“Who can we trust to keep America safe?  Barack Obama!”

Now he’s headed into how the Bush foreign policy is now finally coming around to Obama’s position time and again…. this is a magnificent speech.  “McCain-Bush Republicans have been wrong again and again… they can’t win on the issues so they go into the gutter.”

Great stuff.  I don’t know if TV is even showing this, but Kerry just introduced Obama’s gerat-uncle, Charlie Payne, the WWII vet who helped liberate Europe.  The room is really liking this speech.

“You don’t decide who loves this country, you don’t decide who’s a patriot… that flag doesn’t belong to any ideology or party, it belongs to all of us.”

Well, that was a SPEECH.  

I expect him to hit McCain hard.  They’ve given out flags to the whole audience.  Debra has eighteen of them.

…he comes out to “Don’t Stop.”  It must be interesting to be personally associated with a pop song.

…Wow, that was a LONG standing ovation.  And after he announces his support for Obama, even longer.  “I love Joe Biden, and America will too.”

…”Last night, Hillary said she’d do everything she can to elect Sen. Obama.  That makes two of us.  Actually, that makes 18 million of us.  Like Hillary said, I want all of you who supported her to vote for Barack Obama in November.

…Clinton is making the argument.  Why America is in a perilous moment in history, and why we can’t afford more of the same.  He explicitly says that Barack Obama is the man for this job.  But what about his facial expressions?

…This has gone into a direct testimony, and the Obama campaign must be beaming.  He is making the national security argument, the economic argument, and the argument that Obama has been tested by the primary wars and is ready to lead America.  “He is ready to honor the oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

…I like that he specifically cited Obama’s desire to fight AIDS/HIV at home.

…FANTASTIC LINE: The world is always more impressed by the power of our example than the example of our power.

…it would be better if he tied this stuff to Bush and McCain and not Republicans for political purposes.  Now he’s getting into it, of course after saying that McCain is wrong on the two key issues of the day.  It is GOOD for the country for him to paint this as a REPUBLICAN failure, though.  Because Republican orthodoxy, the wrecking crew, is the key problem.  “Despite all this evidence, their nominee is promising more of the same.”

…Good framing: they want us to reward them for the last eight years by giving them four more.  In this case, the third time is not the charm… they said I was too young and inexperienced.  It didn’t work in 1992 because we were on the right side of history.  And it won’t work in 2008 because Barack Obama is on the right side of history.

…Debra Bowen’s reaction: “He’s still awesome.”

…The final point: “I still believe in a place called hope.”  Showing that, as we know, all political themes are timeless and repeated over and over.

Secretary of State Debra Bowen.   She just gave me a Fig Newton!

Antonio Villaraigosa’s son is to my right.

Everyone was looking up at one point, but it was unclear at what.  I asked Debra what the commotion was, and she said “I don’t think anyone knows what they’re looking at.”  It’s a herd mentality to the extreme. (Turns out they were looking at the Clinton box.  Maybe the press was studying the facial expressions of those assembled for signs of disunity).

…if anyone has questions for Debra, she’ll answer them in this thread.  Liveblogging!

It's working!  

Shum reported in his comments to the Del Marin post that the ongoing boycott on the Manchester Hyatt is really hurting the bottom line of its homophobic owner, Doug Manchester, who gave $125,000 to support Proposition 8 – the anti-marriage initiative.  

The San Diego Union-Tribune got its hands on an e-mail from Manchester's Chief Financial Officer to Manchester himself. The e-mail states "this boycott effort will cost you millions of dollars of lost revenue and possibly tens of millions of dollars in lost value for both the Manchester Grand Hyatt and The Grand Del Mar."  The Union-Tribune reports that:

Since the boycott began, several groups, including the county retirement board and the Association of American Law Schools, canceled events at the Manchester Hyatt, one of the largest hotels on the West Coast.

More on the flip

Shum suggests – and I could not agree more – that one way we can honor Del Martin this week is to give the Manchester Hyatt, or Doug Manchester himself, a call and let them know what we think of what he thinks of Del's right to marry the woman she loved for 55 years.

From Shum:

Why not call his office directly?  619.231.3800

His assistant is Holly.  She said she'd have Doug call me.

Let me check…nope not yet.

I love it when a boycott works.  Keep it up, kids!  Oh, and when traveling to San Diego, stay at the Lodge at Torrey Pines.  They're giving money to oppose Prop 8.