By: Brad Listi
Lately there has been a lot of talk about the need for Barack and Michelle Obama to properly introduce themselves to the wide swath of America that doesn't yet feel that it knows who they are. There has been much talk about the need for the Obamas to present themselves in a way that America's many undecided voters can relate to.
And let's be honest: There has been plenty of discussion---much of it private---about the Obamas' (desperate?) need to connect on a visceral, human level with America's (white) older voters and (white) working class voters who still feel a bit leery about casting their vote for an African-American man in November. This is the subtext. This is the plain truth.
I'm sitting here in the Pepsi Center just moments after the evening's closing benediction, and I can't help but wonder whether tonight's marquee sequence was successful. Did Michelle Obama's speech help or hinder the cause? Did it alleviate or exacerbate the concerns of working class white Democrats in, say, Pennsylvania steel country? Or in the wilds of northern Georgia?
The speech was utterly inoffensive, of course. Autobiographical. Absent of all hot-button issues. And stuffed to the hilt with applause lines and gracious dispersals of unity-building praise. Aside from that, it was generally well-delivered. I can't imagine that it would have a negative impact.
But I suppose time will tell.
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