Bill Clinton Reactions: He Love You Long (Long, Long) Time
Lust, love and a little bit of loathing dominate the reactions to former President Bill Clinton's speech at the Democratic National Convention last night in Charlotte, North Carolina. Although reports that Clinton is still speaking this morning could not be confirmed by press time, many observers seem to have wanted even more of the nearly 50-minute peroration. Some reactions:
Jim Ridley, Nashville Scene
Were you watching former President Bill Clinton's nomination speech just minutes ago for incumbent President Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention? More to the point, what were you doing while you were watching it? Judging from the humid torrent of tweets — and a peculiar similarity in the language and tone — we suspect nine months from now we'll be greeting the first generation of Clinton Boomers.
If you missed it, via the wonder of Storify, we present below: The Stages of Arousal During Bill Clinton's Speech. Dim the lights, put on a little Marvin Gaye, and let's get it on.
Dolph Ziggler, @HEELZiggler
WHAT A SPEECH! Im so turned on right now! @BillClinton for PRESIDENT 2012 #DNC #DNC2012
Associated Press
Clinton is counting on voters to recall the 1990s wistfully and to cast a vote for Obama in hopes of replicating those days in a second term. But Clinton leaves out the abrupt downward turn the economy took near the end of his own second term and the role his policies played in the setting the stage for the historic financial meltdown of 2008.
Josh Barro, Bloomberg
Clinton is the only living president who presided over a strong economic expansion. His sincere seal of approval on the Obama jobs record could go a long way with the "angry, frustrated voters" he was addressing.
Alexandra Petri, Washington Post
His speech went on for 50 minutes. It was like Return of the King, except that you kept thinking Return of the King was about to end, and the longer Clinton spoke, the more convinced you became that his speech wouldn't.
John Podhoretz, NY Post
Like any fast-talking defense lawyer, he made the weakest parts of his case sound as plausible as the strongest part of his case — the idea that the economic disaster the president inherited was so severe, he couldn't have cleaned it up in four years.
Molly Ball, Atlantic
Clinton evoked nothing more than a country lawyer earnestly trying to save his client, and willing to exhaust every argument at his disposal to do it.
Peter Suderman, Reason
The whole speech was a masterful bit of sleight of hand: He touted his own economic record, attacked the Republicans for their hypocrisies — and then concluded that the correct response is to vote for Obama. Essentially, he tried to transfer his own economic record to the current president.
Dori Toribio, @DoriToribio_Rne
Clinton: En tiempos dificiles, la confrontación puede funcionar en política.. pero no en el mundo real. Lo que funciona es la cooperación
Jim Geraghty, National Review
Clinton has a gift for making the unreasonable sound reasonable and making the reasonable sound unreasonable, and it worked for the first . . . ten to fifteen minutes or so. But somewhere around "partnership, not partisanship" — a sentiment completely at odds with every other speech given at this convention, and about 99 percent of the messaging from the Obama campaign and its allied super PACs — the speech became a bridge too far. And then it went on. And on. And on. Longer than Clinton's much-mocked 1988 keynote address.