She was as gracious as she could be. I mean that literally. It was the closest she could come to grace. It was all about her – I, me, me, I – and not about the man who needs her support. When she referred to Obama it was all poker-face and passive-voice. . . .
. . . When she got to the parts of the speech in which she endorsed Obama, she seemed to be making a point of reading.
She lowered her eyes to the text and read with a comparatively flattened voice, and with little expression.
When she spoke of her own campaign, her own "challenges", her own supporters – there her voice warmed. It glowed. There was also an overall flatness to her argument in favor of Obama: she is endorsing him because he supports her issues. They're hers, not his.
When she spoke of him as a person, as a man, she merely recited the facts everyone knows: he comes from a particular place and has a particular history with regard to public service.
It was all so fully amped and so very tepid. It was more kabuki: "I'll support him and I'll say all the words I have to so you can't accuse me of being grudging, but watch my face and voice and tone: I'm the one I've been waiting for."Something revealing: When you are conceding that you have lost a political race, you know the people you're speaking to will boo when you ask them to support your rival. That's how fervent supporters are; it's how the people who bother to go to concession speeches are. So you have your people spread word in advance: No booing.
If they boo anyway, you put up your hand and say, "No booing here, my friends, we are together as a party and if you support me you support him. Do you support me?" Yay!, they will say. "Then together we will go forward and support our nominee."
I noticed the absence of this. There were boos, and Mrs. Clinton did not try to stop them.
She didn't look like someone who thinks she's going to be his vice presidential nominee. . . .