The Obama Magic Can't Change a Close Election

It was that kind of night. The Obama Magic was on prime display.

Warning the country of the kind of attack that they should expect Kamala Harris will be on the receiving end of, Michelle Obama said:

"My husband and I sadly know a little something about this. For years, Donald Trump did everything in his power to try to make people fear us. See, his limited, narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hardworking, highly educated, successful people who happen to be Black."

And as the hall erupted, "I want to know," she said, "who's going to tell him, who's going to tell him that the job he's currently seeking might just be one of those 'Black jobs'?"

Trump sees himself as the real victim of the "coup" that took the nomination away from Joe Biden and brought Kamala Harris into his life.

In his subsequent speech, Barack Obama continued the theme, comparing Trump to "the neighbor who keeps running his leaf blower outside your window every minute of every day."

"Here's a 78-year-old billionaire who has not stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago. It has been a constant stream of gripes and grievances that's actually been getting worse now that he's afraid of losing to Kamala."

Obama mocked Trump, calling out his "childish nicknames" and his "crazy conspiracy theories" and "this weird obsession with crowd sizes" -- at which point he made an unmistakable gesture with his hands relating to another size issue.

They nailed him. And it's easy when he gets nailed with such finesse and, really, genius to lose sight of the fact that so many people are committed to voting for him. Which they are. Kamala Harris has just had the best three weeks a politician could dream of, and she's running neck-and-neck with Donald Trump. There is a sizeable chunk of America that knows exactly who Donald Trump is and is planning to vote for him anyway. Nothing that is happening this week is going to change that reality.

Which was, and needs to be, the second theme of this convention. Both Obamas emphasized that this would be a close election as well as a hard-fought one.

We true believers are continuously shocked by the misstatements and lies and whining and complaining coming out of Trump's mouth. It's hard for us to fathom how anyone could want this man to take control. But Trump's supporters do.

The national horse race numbers tell you how the race is heading in a general way but, as have all come to understand, that is not how close elections are won or lost. It's the swing states that matter, unless you get a landslide, and there is no reason to predict a landslide against Donald Trump. What more can we possibly tell his supporters that they haven't already seen and heard?

As things stand, this election will be decided by the swing voters in the swing states and by who turns out the voters they have in the greatest number. That's why all the signs Tuesday night said "VOTE." The most promising result of the last three weeks has been the explosion of volunteerism -- of literally hundreds of thousands of people signing up to volunteer 90 days to change history. The ground game. Do you have enough people on the ground in the swing states to ensure you contact every person who is at least leaning to Harris and stay in contact to make sure you get that person to the polls on Election Day. Doing that effectively takes an army of volunteers. Harris just might have them, and I'm betting that the Biden-turned-Harris operation is ready to absorb them.

The Obama Magic may not convince Trumpers to abandon ship -- they'll tell you that they've heard it all before -- but it adds their energy to fuel the momentum that has become this campaign.

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To find out more about Susan Estrich and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.