Where's my sign?

Political conventions are a very strange beast. It used to be a lot more interesting in the good old days back when men were men and women weren't allowed to vote. Back then there was no such thing as a year long primary process and you went into the convention with no idea who was going to be the candidate. It typically went to whoever complained the loudest, or twisted enough arms, or, in one unfortunate incident, Rutherford B. Hayes went to the bathroom at an inopportune time and came out to discover that he was now the nominee because everyone else just wanted to go home.



Thanks to the political theater of the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago when Mayor Daley gave the order to the police to just knock the crap out of any guy with long hair (which, to be honset, isn't bad advice) we now have a very organized political system and the conventions now consist of four days of well rehearsed speeches surrounded by arguments over party platforms and Robert's Rules of Order which is thankfully not televised.



What this means is that the conventions are essentially four days of political advertisements covered by all the networks. I don't really have a problem with this as by watching the major candidate speeches you do tend to get a good sense of what type of candidate they will be. What interests me more now is the created theater for the event.



Such as the "Michelle" signs for when Michelle Obama spoke tonight. This is a common convention tactic. Hand out coordinated signs to the crowd. Now signs in the crowd are a great thing and show the enthusiasm of people who will find posterboard and markers and use it to write something witty. But everyone with identical placards is just simply a coordinated backdrop. It's a beautiful backdrop and it works but it is nothing more than a backdrop.



What was important tonight though wasn't that level of theater but what was created by Ted Kennedy's speech. View that as the last act of the handing of the torch from one generation of democrats to the other. The Greatest Generation and the Silent Generation have officially passed the baton to the Boomers and the Gen Xers. Teddy was the last icon from that era. As others have pointed out, this is also the end of the Kennedys as a dominant political force. They will still be heard but they will no longer be a cornerstone. Tonight marked the end of that era and I'll have to admit I am a little saddened by it.