Triple Header

Political observers were treated to a triple header of sorts yesterday, as all three remaining candidates for President of the United States gave three very different speeches. One would be hard pressed to determine who had won what if you only went by the first few remarks of both McCain and Obama and took Clinton's speech in it's entirety. Let's break down what the three candidates had to say.

John McCain went first, using the big audience the Democratic primary would bring in to try to distance himself from Bush. His first comments, however, were directed squarely at Hillary Clinton supporters. In fact, one of the most telling lines of his speech was when he said that the pundits and party leaders had declared Obama his challenger, playing up to the incorrect assertion that somehow the primary was stolen from Clinton. He has undoubtedly heard the cries of some Clinton faithful that they will vote for McCain over Obama to spite the presumptive nominee and the party, and his pandering apparently knows no bounds. McCain's speech overall was quite poor in both substance and delivery. The only real blow he delivered to Obama, in my opinion, was when he decried him for willing to meet with foreign leaders but he hasn't setup a meeting with General Petreaus. This is something Obama must do in the coming months.

Next up came Hillary Clinton, speaking in what appeared to be an underground bunker of some kind. I also am to the point of wondering if Terry McAuliffe lives in our world or merely comes here to visit during campaign season. He not only introduced Clinton as the next President of the United States, but also was on The Daily Show and told Jon Stewart that they wouldn't mind if Obama was on the ticket with her. I digress. Clinton's speech was very confusing to me. In one breath she was calling for party unity to defeat the Republicans in the fall, and in the next breath she continued to justify not conceding the primary. News flash: We can't have party unity when one candidate and her supporters don't believe we have an official nominee.

There were conflicting reports all afternoon about whether Clinton would concede, admit and congratulate Obama on reaching the number of delegates necessary to secure the nomination, or possibly suspend her campaign. None of these happened last night. Even as polls closed in South Dakota and the networks were declaring Obama the official presumptive nominee, Clinton was stating she was not sure which path she would take now that all of the contests were over. In another telling moment, the crowd of enthusiastic supporters began chanting Denver, Denver, Denver, an indication that her biggest supporters want her to take the fight to the floor of the convention this August. It was also leaked by full time Clinton surrogate, and sometimes journalist, Andrea Mitchel, that Clinton wanted to meet with Obama privately as soon as possible. Perhaps as early as today when they are both scheduled to be in New York.

Obama, for his part, gave another powerfully charismatic speech in front of a raucous crowd in St. Paul. He declared himself the nominee only after first acknowledging Clinton and how she had inspired millions of voters across the country. He had not a bad word to say about her and in fact touted her as one of the reasons we will have universal health care in this country. He then pivoted to take McCain to task for embracing the policies of George Bush during the past few years, and especially during his campaign for President. Obama landed a couple of blows to McCain, the first coming as he said he honored the accomplishments of the Senator from Arizona, even if McCain did not honor his. The second was when Obama challenged McCain to start spending time in some of America's hardest hit cities rather than in Baghdad, so that he might have a better understanding of the issues facing ordinary Americans.

The presumptive nominee will get little time to savor his primary victory, as pundits and supporters will all be clamoring for him to pick his VP candidate, and of course everyone will have their own idea as to who that candidate shall be. I'll give you a hint as to my preference. It rhymes with Schmill Wichardson.