Clinton, cont.

Rob’s absolutely right, Bill Clinton is a brilliant speaker, in terms of rhetoric, content and delivery. The best thing about the speech was the brilliant conceit of taking the actions and policies of the Bush administration seriously as if they were the product of some sort of principle. To point out that they’re corrupt and incompetent has been done to death and would get him called a shrill Bush-basher. To treat them as principled and well meaning and examine their policies in that light makes them look even worse, and Clinton even more fair.

Clinton’s handling of the deficit was a moment of political brilliance as well. It’s well known that Bush’s huge deficits are not terribly popular, and fiscal responsibility should be a winning issue for the Democrats. It’s not necessarily going to be a big winner for them, though, as the election will more likely turn on Iraq and the health of the economy. However, the deficit might sound a whole lot worse to significant portions of the electorate if they knew where that money came from–namely, Social Security and the Chinese. This should be part of Democratic discourse about the deficit from here on out. I could almost sense a hint of discomfort from Clinton the internationalist when he delivered the crack about the difficulty of negotiating a trade deal with your bankers, but he delivered it well nonetheless.

He also managed to balance the tasks of energizing the base and speaking to moderate independents while minimizing the extent each might get in each other’s way. He came up with a great way to actually effectively tie Kerry’s Vietnam service to his political career. He came up with a pithy slogan about the complementarity of wisdom and strength that should serve as the narrative hook for Kerry’s articulation of his foreign policy. In short, he did a bunch of stuff I’ve been waiting for the Democrats to figure out how to do for months.

Am I getting carried away? Probably. But that’s what great speeches do. Thank you, Bill.