Obama The Nominee

If you were hoping that Barack Obama would throw a tire and flub his acceptance speech at Mile High Stadium in Denver, you were betting on the wrong longshot.  Nothing seemed to go wrong as the Illinois Senator made history.

Democrats can head home today with a big smile on their faces, because their convention came off very well, even if they stumbled and bumbled their way to political happiness.

When the delegates began arriving late last week, they were greeted with talk of demonstrations by Hillary Clinton delegates and maybe some trouble for the Obama forces.

The talk was all Bill and Hill.  What would they say?  Why was Obama giving them so much time to talk?

In the end, the Obama and Clinton teams finally got on the same page, though it took a lot of growling, hissing, snapping, kicking and crying.

Several delegates said to me Thursday that Hillary's speech really started a wave of cooperation between the two sides, which was then completely cemented by Bill Clinton's speech on Wednesday.

Barack Obama must have felt some of that same thing, because he went out of his way at the beginning of his speech to thank both of the Clintons.

One thing is for sure, Obama can make a speech.  The event was more than flashy with just the high tech, Hollywood style acceptance speech in a stadium that brought in an estimated 84,000 people.

Obama elevated his game as usual and one would expect him to get a bump in the polls.

John McCain's acceptance speech can only pale in comparison.  Maybe a Hurricane Gustav might actually help the GOP by keeping the attention off McCain.  Just kidding.

Obama didn't just light the place up with 840 people, or 8,400.  The number was 84,000.

Most professional football teams can't draw 84,000 people.

But think back to the primaries, where Obama would draw huge crowds and then he would lose the primary vote to Hillary.

I'm not quite sure what to expect out of the polls in coming days.  It was a good speech, well delivered, the picture on TV looked great and the Greek stage didn't seem to cause any guffaws that I noted.

Now we'll see how many people decided to watch the guy who referred to his different "pedigree," and how many of them will pull that lever for Obama in November.

Next stop: St.Paul.

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