Big Speech

Man. If you’d asked me yesterday to list Barack Obama’s strengths and weaknesses, I would have told you he’s much more impressive giving a formal speech than on a debate stage. But it’s doubly-impressive all over again when you see him giving a big formal speech — he’s much better in this format. I somehow doubt that a broad swathe of Americans are sitting at home on a Saturday night (though maybe in California where it’s only a quarter past six), but if they are I think they’ll be very impressed. When forgotten element of this campaign is that even though Obama’s given several speeches that are quite well-known among political junkies, most voters have almost certainly never sat and watched him deliver one.