Obama's Convention Speech Widely Panned; Campaigns Move to Next Phase, Debates and Political Ads

Obama's uninspired stump speech to the DNC is being widely panned today.

Joe Klein of Time says it was "a fine speech that didn't close the deal."  The Atlantic says the speech was an "anticlimax," and that "Barack Obama got up and just sort of didn't do anything special."

Peggy Noonan wrote:

Barack Obama is deeply overexposed and often boring. He never seems to be saying what he's thinking. His speech Thursday was weirdly anticlimactic. There's too much buildup, the crowd was tired, it all felt flat. He was somber, and his message was essentially banal: We've done better than you think. Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes? 

Noonan added:

It was stale and empty. He's out of juice.

Charles Krauthammer said the speech was "flat" and "empty":

I was stunned. This is a man who gave one of the great speeches of our time in 2004, and he gave one of the emptiest speeches I have ever heard on a national stage. Yes, it had cadence, and yes, there were deceptions in it, but that is not what is so striking about it. There was nothing in it. This is a man who believes that government can and should do a lot. There is nothing in here that tells us how he's going to go from today to tomorrow.

NBC's Chuck Todd described the speech as just going through the motions, i.e. uninspired.

 "I'm in the workmanlike camp ... it seemed at times they were methodically playing the notes instead of lyrically playing the notes."

Michael Tomasky, an ardent Obama supporter, wrote at the Daily Beast:

Let’s be blunt. Barack Obama gave a dull and pedestrian speech tonight, with nary an interesting thematic device, policy detail, or even one turn of phrase.

John Podhoretz of the New York Post described the speech as "O's Surprise Flop."

Back in 2008 I noted that the public was suffering from Bush and Clinton fatigue, and just wanted someone new.  They got the newness in Barack Obama.  Now four years later, the public has Obama fatigue.  He's an old story.  New promises don't make up for older, failed promises.  Barack Obama is no longer the magical light worker.  Now he is just another politician, and even Obama seems tired of Obama.   Not even he believes what he is saying up there behind the podium.

Now that the conventions have ended, the campaigns move to the next phase: televised debates, television ads and stump speeches. I expect Romney and Ryan will do very well in this phase. Unfortunately for me, I won't get to see a lot of Romney-Ryan television ads. I live in California, a deep blue state where common sense and economic reality are simply not tolerated. I doubt that Romney wants to waste much of his campaign funds here, and I don't blame him.