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A Tale of Three Conventions

Ruth Marcus on

PHILADELPHIA -- The Democratic National Convention here was Broadway to the summer stock production that Republicans put on in Cleveland. The Democrats' show was polished and uplifting, while the grand spectacle Donald Trump had promised to produce was amateurish and angry.

The chants of "USA! USA!" -- even if they were, at times, a device to drown out protests by Bernie Sanders' supporters -- and the impassioned waving of flags, were more reminiscent of past Republican gatherings than the typical Democratic convention. You half expected Lee Greenwood, the country star omnipresent on the Republican political circuit, to pop up, joining Katy Perry in a "God Bless the USA" duet.

Yet this was not simply the tale of two conventions. It was, rather, a tale of three: Republicans versus Clinton Democrats versus the Sanders wing.

The Clinton team confronted the delicate task of presenting -- or re-presenting, or re-re-presenting -- their nominee to the country as an acceptable, if not exactly cuddly, alternative to the threat of Trump.

"I get it that some people just don't know what to make of me," Clinton said in accepting the nomination. That is the sanitized version of the skepticism, if not outright hostility, she faces from some voters.

And the campaign had to do this all while assuring -- or re-assuring or re-re-assuring -- the Sanders crowd that she would behave as their kind of Democrat, not the incrementalist moderate they suspect she is at heart.

 

The intraparty tensions that erupted at the convention's opening, inflamed by the WikiLeaked Democratic National Committee emails, were salved by the swift, even if not swift enough, dispatch of party chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Still, protests lingered on the floor, like a trash fire that is never entirely extinguished.

And the underlying strains remain, reflected in the duality of the Democrats' message, pitched simultaneously to swing and Sanders' voters. Both are essential to Clinton's fate in November, and while it is possible to forge a common appeal to the white working-class and left-leaning Democrats in the anti-trade, raise-the-minimum-wage message, these remain two distinct constituencies.

Thus the appearance Wednesday by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who endorsed Clinton even while noting that he has often disagreed with her and advising, "I know what it's like to have neither party fully represent my views or values."

Thus the testimonial from Doug Elmets, a former aide to Ronald Reagan, albeit an obscure one. Thus the remarkable display of patriotic, even militaristic, themes, capped by Thursday's speech by retired four-star Marine Gen. John Allen, flanked by other retired military leaders.

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