July 26th, 2016 – Second Reading Podcast

[0:00:00 Introduction] Welcome to the second reading podcast from the University of Texas at Austin. The Republicans were in the Democratic Party because there was only one party chart. Tell people on a regular basis there is still a land of opportunity in America. It’s called Texas. The problem is these departures from the Constitution. They have become the norm. At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over the male colleagues in the room

[0:00:32 Jim] And we’re here for the second reading podcast for the week of July 18th. I’m Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project here at the University of Texas at Austin. I’m joined by my colleague Josh Blank, who was up past his bedtime last night for the Democratic convention

[0:00:49 Joshua] and every night last week. And, yeah, I’m dragging

[0:00:53 Jim] These conventions are hard on a family man, So this week the big political news is coming out of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, and we’re gonna talk about that. But before we get to Hillary Clinton’s big moment, we want to close out the Republican National Convention in Cleveland last week, which was just getting underway as We did last week’s podcast, um, and was in Cleveland, where, as expected, Donald Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination. And Ted Cruz? Well, he didn’t. And he made some news by not endorsing Donald Trump. So we’ve got some audio, but let’s start. So what do you make of? What do you make of the Ted Cruz thing, Josh?

[0:01:31 Joshua] Well, I mean, nobody expected Cruise to endorse Trump’s. I mean part of me. My initial reaction was watching it live, and I was texting with you because you were out and about and just sort of asking you a play by play. And on the one hand, it was totally unsurprising because Cruz, it’d no point indicated that he was going toe. Endorse Trump, right? Ah, But what was somewhat surprising was, you know the reaction, because in a lot of ways, Cruz, not endorsing Trump, wasn’t really news. It was the reaction in the hall to Cruz not endorsing Trump that made that such a big spectacle. And part of it was the fact that the New York delegation was front and center in the hall. Ah and Cruz during the campaign and famously sort of derided Trump because of his New York values. Right?

[0:02:14 Jim] Right. And so he got in that speech itself. Some push back, shall we say, from the New York delegation, which was seated front and center right in front of the stage. And so we didn’t We didn’t accept the cruise speed. It was pretty heavily excerpt that I think from the, you know, from the perspective of Texas and in the country. Really? You know, Cruz really made a lot of headlines. Took kind of a hit. We’ll talk about poll numbers. Maybe after we do the audio, I think, Um, but the next morning, at every morning that these conventions and the political conventions are like a bunch of people that are really into politics hanging out there

[0:02:49 Joshua]  they’re a weird scene. You never goto one.

[0:02:52 Jim] Exactly. And so the state delegations, at least the big ones. They have a breakfast for their delegates. And so the local news outlets in Texas or the political the big political ones, anyway, are have video, have people taking video at thes breakfast that they have every morning. So the next morning, crews showed up at the Texas delegation breakfast, having been kind of the man of the moment and and kind of explained himself. So let’s let’s let’s play a couple of of excerpts from that cruise visit to the Texas delegation breakfast.

[0:03:25 Video] I am watching and listening to make that decision, and when I talked about holding people accountable, I think that applies to all of us. That’s what I’m doing. I am watching and listening. The election isn’t today, and I am listening to the Canada now. What I don’t intend to do is go out and throw rocks at Donald and don’t intend to criticize down. I. I intend, like a voter, like all of us, just to listen and make the best judgment I can. And every one of us, I think, has to follow our conscience when, when friends of mine, when supporters of minor asking what to do, The answer I give it to everyone is follow your conscience, do what you believe is right. Do what you believe, defends your Children and defends this country.

[0:04:23 Jim] Now that came in in response to a question from the audience, I’ll give Cruz this he, as he did his spoken piece. It was pretty clear both from the night before and from that morning that even in the Texas delegation, you know, the opinion was divided. Not everybody was happy with him. And he got a question from the audience saying, You know, are you gonna endorse you? Should you know, we all need to come together? And he echoed the conscience line that you thought was important from the night before,

[0:04:50 Joshua] right? I mean, the line that really said everyone off and it’s again, it’s not really thought. Direct repudiation. Its’s not me, he said. Basically gonna quote to those listening. Please don’t stay home in November. Stand and speak and vote your conscience. Vote for candidates up and down the ticket you trust to defend our freedom and to be faithful to the Constitution and basically right at that moment. That was when the hall erupted with boos, and but he’s sticking to his guns. That’s that’s his position right now, Um, you know the thing about for cruises? You know, the response to this is, you know, it’s It’s based on the context of sort of his political rise in his trajectory, and much of this was sort of seen as, you know. Yeah, he’s invoking principle and, you know, in the way that sort of trump kind of went after his family in various ways. But really, you know, everybody’s saying this is because he’s interested in running again in 2020

[0:05:41 Jim] and I think there was no way around that. I mean, I think he wound up basically, you know, threading the needle in a way that was interesting on that, because he is. You say his brand has been the conscientious conservative, and he didn’t say, Don’t vote for Trump. No. And and he does. And he did urge people to show up from in November he could, he could arguably say, in his own defense. Look, I was just making sure that we don’t lose people.

[0:06:07 Joshua] Yeah, I would also say, Honestly, what kind of gets lost in a lot of the discussion after this was, you know, really, all the focus was on the that one line, But the truth is, he actually gave a very good speech. I mean, before that, he had kind of gone into Hyperion. At least if you’re a conservative Republican voter, I mean, he had gone into hibernation since dropping out of the race for the most part, hadn’t been doing a lot, hadn’t been making a lot of public statements. And he came out and he actually, you know, I said to you at the time, he had actually taken a lot of the terms of progressivism and actually turned them in a way towards conservative principles. And a very, you know, I would say, You know, if your serve previewing his 2020 run, you could actually see how he could use that language in a general election and still, you know, certainly competitive with that kind of approach until this all happened. And then

[0:06:57 Jim] way, look, we’ll talk. Let’s talk about like, this all happened after, So let’s go to the next that we have one more clip from that morning, which also speaks to this, was also in response to a question from the audience that really does raise some of the criticism that Cruz was getting, that he had been one of the people that took the pledge, which is a kind of a big deal during the primary, in many ways, because of Trump, that he would support the tickets.

[0:07:23 Joshua] A funny quirk. I mean, we should point this out that, you know, all the Republican candidates were basically asked you pledge that you’ll support the eventual Republican nominee. And the reason this pledge came up was because early in the primary, when Trump had a small but very committed set of primary voters, he had indicated that he didn’t win the primary. He was gonna potentially, you know, basically watching independent bid because he has, um I didn’t

[0:07:44 Jim] get a fair shake.

[0:07:45 Joshua] If you don’t get a fair shake or whatever from the Republican establishment, he was gonna run, you know, basically have his own independent bid, which would surely have sunk any Republican chances in November. So they came up with this idea of this pledge, which everybody so wholeheartedly jumped onto, not thinking that Trump would actually become the nominee. Right? So this box cruise in

[0:08:03 Jim] solicitor what Cruz says? The senator Cruz says when asked about not keeping the pledge.

[0:08:08 (video) Cruz] Thank you, ma’am. And thank you for speaking and speaking. Speaking from your heart. I will tell you when I stood on that debate stage and they asked every candidate there If you don’t win, will you support the nominee? I raised my hand and I raised my hand enthusiastically with full intention of doing exactly that. And I’ll tell you, the day that pledge was abrogated, the day that was abrogated was the day this became personal. And as I said at the time and I’m not, I’m not gonna get into criticizing or attacking Donald Trump, but I’ll just give you this response. I am not in the habit of supporting people who attack my wife and attack my father on that pledge was not a blanket commitment that if you borrow and slander and attack Heidi, that I’m gonna nonetheless come like a servile puppy dog and say thank you very much from maligning my wife and maligning my father.

[0:09:16 Jim] I just have to add the puppy dogs were not servile. We won’t have to. We’ll just go from there. But otherwise that That is a telling kind of ah response from Cruz. And for somebody wasn’t an attack and, you know, wasn’t upset. He starts yelling into the mic,

[0:09:29 Joshua] right? He’s a little upset.

[0:09:31 Jim] Yeah, and you know, understandably so. So you know Donald Trump?

[0:09:35 Joshua] Yeah, to wrap up this week. I mean, so remember this happened on Wednesday night, was Trump’s. It was Ah Cruz’s speech on Thursday morning. This was sort of Cruz’s response. Thursday night was Trump’s big night, you know. He had his very, very long speech acceptance speech, and then Friday morning became Cruz came up again,

[0:09:53 Jim] right? Cruz came up again and at a press conference that are at an event that Trump did with Mike Pence. And you know, to set this interview just briefly. I mean, this is kind of Trump’s triumphant moment. It’s the morning after he’s accepted the Republican nomination. Um, you know, he should run rough shot over a big field, and he’s asked about Cruz. And this is his response. I

[0:10:16 (video) Mike Pence] I have to tell you, I think Heidi Cruz is a great person. I think it’s the best thing he’s got going and his kids. If you want to know the truth, I don’t know his father. I met him once. I think he’s a lovely guy. I think he’s a lovely guy. All I did is point out the fact that on the cover of the National Enquirer, there’s a picture of heart, him and crazy Lee Harvey Oswald having breakfast now. Ted never denied that it was his father. This was a magazine. But frankly, in many respects, should be very respected. They got O. J. They got Edwards. They got this. I mean, if that was the New York Times, they would have gotten Pulitzer Prizes for their reporting. I know nothing about his father. I know nothing about Lee Harvey Oswald. But there was a picture on the front page of the National Enquirer which does have credibility. And they’re not going to pictures like that because they get sued for a lot of money. If things were wrong, Okay, a lot of money and there was a picture. And that’s the only thing. I know

[0:11:23 Jim] what to say about that.

[0:11:24 Joshua] Well, he’s just defending himself, right?

[0:11:27 Jim] You know, this is a man who likes to have the last word. Ah, but it also is, ah, emblematic of what the exchange between Trump and Cruz has been like. And one of the things that makes Donald Trump stand out in a way

[0:11:41 Joshua] well is emblematic of the Republican National Convention as a whole. Right, you know, you know, they had a Siris of of, you know, small to medium size. Let’s say mishaps or I mean, this happens in exactly the right word. But, I mean, I guess you could say mishaps for the person from the perspective of those organizing the convention misfires, maybe misfires, whatever. Um, you know, and usually what you’re trying to do is you’re trying to minimize the damage, minimize the coverage of it, and kind of, you know, put a lid on it. But just is like a little girl. Trump can’t couldn’t help himself, but to bring it back up again,

[0:12:14 Jim] right? Just Yeah, I just I just to be clarify that in other words, you know, if you come out of the convention, you’ve been the nominee. The biggest negative story really has been how one of your candidates is not in one of your competitors has not endorsed you. The day before You get the nomination, you move forward. And the last thing you want to be talking about at least according to conventional wisdom, is Ted Cruz. And yet the news that came out of that press conference was Trump talking about Ted Cruz with lots of people noticing how uncomfortable his vice presidential candidate looked behind him.

[0:12:51 Joshua] Right, So So this lead to you know basically the next set of questions as well. You know the convention benefit Trump. Did it work in his favor? And what people are really looking to at this point is polling. Did he get what’s called a convention bump? Usually, candidates of both major parties after their convention see an uptick in their support in the public. Basically, you know, from things we talked about last week, they get an entire week where they directly get to dominate the media narrative. Ah, on the one hand, so people were sort of unfamiliar, at the very least, art to become familiar with them in a very controlled setting. But also, it’s a reminder to the partisan faithful that Republicans or Democrats of either Republicans or why they’re Democrats or people who either have been paying attention or who may be supported another candidate usually tend to to greater or lesser degrees come in line with the party and with the party candidates. So the question was was, you know, there’s basically this question following the way that the Republican National Convention played out as to whether there would be a bump for the Republicans.

[0:13:47 Jim] Right? So, you know, three or four polls, one in the field, you know, immediately after and collected data after the convention. Most of those polls got rolled out than Monday morning Teoh to make the weekly to make the news. During the week, the results were a little mixed. Overall, it did look like, um, Trump got something of a bounce, the biggest bounce and the one that was covered most widely. And that, of course, the Trump campaign has talked about the most was the CNN poll. So between mid June and the poll right after the convention in mid June, CNN had Clinton up by seven in the post convention poll. They had Trump up by three. So you do the math kind of a 10 point swing. There was another poll by morning consult Mawr Maurin the range of about a 55 point bounce. And then the CBS poll essentially showed no change. Had Clinton and Trump tied in both, and I think there was another. There’s an L a Times poll, but I think also had a small bounce. So

[0:14:45 Joshua] it’s about it’s about the five points we kind of expected if you’re listening Last week. Historic

[0:14:50 Jim] big bounces I mean, I think in 90 and 80 A is kind of one of the biggest ones in recent memories. Basically, George,

[0:14:59 Joshua] some people’s recent memory.

[0:15:00 Jim] Yeah, H w Bush got, ah, you know, got a plus, Stainer. Like between 10 and 12 point bounce. Really big one. This kind of bounces seems to be to fall about with what you would expect. And what we also expect is that the Democrats will also get one, and that neither will matter that much. And neither will you know the immediate post convention polling almost never has any relationship to what happens in the general election.

[0:15:25 Joshua] Right there. Something isn’t really important to make, you know, important point to make here, which is that, you know, we don’t have a national election. And so the fact is this is really early in the process. These air, you know, national polls. And you know how well these translate to the very to the competitive states. Because remember, most states are not gonna be competitive come November. And amongst the subsets of states that actually are competitive, the battleground states Ah, you know, those are all their own elections. And the fact is they have their own sit ups or partisan and demographic characteristics that campaigns are gonna, ah, you be active in those states basically from now until Election Day. And really, you know, it’s those sort of amalgamation of sort of state level attitudes that actually end up determining who wins the election in a lot of ways. So these national polls, you know, while it’s going to give some sort of sense of what you know it will, I don’t know. It will relate to the state polls, but it doesn’t really tell us that much right now,

[0:16:17 Jim] Right? Once we get past the conventions, there’s two things that we’ll talk about this a lot. One you need to follow the battleground polls and to you have to wait till it gets closer. And it’s there’ll be a lot of national polling and really just trying to get some sense of that where the country stands really comes from, you know, some way of processing all those polls together rather than anyone pulling particularly thing this early.

[0:16:38 Joshua] So let’s turn back to Texas and Ted Cruz now,

[0:16:41 Jim] okay, Much fun. So what do you want to say about Ted Cruz now.

[0:16:44 Joshua] Well, so in the same CNN poll, uh, Cruz is favorable. Rating dropped among Republicans from 60% before his speech to 33% afterward. So it’s a it’s a 27 point drop. So, you know, this is sort of the instantaneous got level racks. Now, how much of this is Israel? You know, the fact is, he just got a lot of negative coverage, and and then, you know, they have to remember. Most people aren’t thinking a lot about Ted Cruz. I think about Ted Cruz a lot. You think about Ted Cruz a lot, but most people don’t. And if you’re were different,

[0:17:15 Joshua] were a little different. But if you’re a Republican voter in say, you know Minnesota, right, and you don’t think about Ted Cruz a lot and you basically just watched three days of negative coverage on Fox News. And really wherever else about Ted Cruz is you know,

[0:17:33 Jim] Ted Cruz is negative coverage transcended the usual ideological divide in my network coverage

[0:17:38 Joshua] and then you get Then you get called for a telephone pole and they say, Hey, what do you think of Ted Cruz? Well, yeah. You think that you have a negative feeling. You know, that’s not That’s not abnormal, but this is sort of interesting. I think you know, there’s this question of, you know, Ted Cruz 2020. You know, looking ahead, How does this How does this work out for him in the long run, this decision cause, like, it’s a regardless of the principal principles part of it. But it’s a political decision,

[0:18:03 Jim] for that matter. Ted Cruz, 2018 in Texas, which is when he’s up for reelection in the Senate and you know, every expectation or most expectations, or that he will run for re election for a Senate seat cause he does. He wants to run for president again in 2020 and he will want to run from the Senate.

[0:18:19 Joshua] You won’t want to run after basically leaving office or losing. I mean, in some ways there are advantages to not actually being in office and running. I mean, you could just talked only focus on a beats, but what I think is interesting. This doesn’t happen too often, but you and I have kind of have opposite instant reactions to cruises. Move Ah, you know, and whether this is you know is gonna work to his advantage in the long run or not. So why don’t you do that work to his advantage?

[0:18:40 Jim] But yeah, I mean, I think I think it’s predictable that for the reasons you talked about, he gets an immediate negative hit on this and people think he’s a jackass and he’s not. He’s not getting on board with party unity. It would have been like, you know, toe, you know, to foreshadow been like Bernie Sanders not endorsing Hillary Clinton. Everybody would have thought he was really just being self serving. On the other hand, you know, in this case, I think, you know there is going to be, you know, some blowback about the Trump candidacy, particularly if he doesn’t win, which is kind of the odds on BET right now. And I think the cruise guys do the math and they play long term versus short term. And so you take a hit and there’s some people that will never forget this. It’s probably the people that, to my mind, are not inclined to support Ted Cruz now or later anyway. And if Donald and if Donald Trump not only loses, but then loses badly and say the Republicans lose the Senate. Ah, they’re in the same election. You go and you blame everything on Donald Trump and you say, I told you so and you do so in the tone that we were discussing earlier, which is, you know, Ted Cruz wants to be the conservative conscience and more practically, the flag that the standard bear for conservatives in the Republican Party and for seeing the Republican Party as a Nen, hair innately conservative party. And so I think while it’s a gamble, I mean, it could be that this doesn’t work out. It’s a reasonable gamble.

[0:20:14 Joshua] Yeah, I think that all makes a ton of sense, and and I agree with it. You know, generally, I think you know the in the grand scheme of things. I think Ted Cruz, like most good politicians, really, really aware of his brand on his brand is this sort of conservative Kat conscience and also this consistency. I mean, one of the things that we had talked about it at various points throughout this election season is you know, if Cruz were to win the nomination, would he pivot going into the general election candidates often do pivot towards the middle to some degree because they’ve locked up their party’s votes. And now you’re looking to expand. And they’re sort of hard to imagine how its head crews could pivot, you know, right, given his brand and everything. In some ways, this is a consistency of that approach, you know, not being shackled by actually a general election, he allows. He’s allowed to basically say, Yeah, I’m still the content of conservative conscious of the party, You know? My initial reaction was, I don’t know if this works out well for him in the long run on Lee, because Cruz is sort of notable for how many enemies he’s made in the Republican establishment. Now, maybe that doesn’t matter, right? I mean, obviously there sort of indications that maybe you know, having the sort of elite you know consensus around you is not nearly as important as it used to be. And that’s certainly the case. I think this election cycle on the lease on the right, But, you know, you could just see sort of, let’s say less, um, less cautious politicians after Cruz’s speech, namely, you know, Chris Christie and New York’s Peter King or representative in the House, longtime representative in the House, basically flagging down cameras so they could, you know, excoriate Cruise in the sharpest terms,

[0:21:44 Jim] although not a new habit for either of those.

[0:21:46 Joshua] Now, did you have it for either of those guys, but not in front of a national audience, either? Yeah, and the truth is, you know, the one thing I was sort of was couching My, you know, is this a negative? Increased. How many other? You know, how many other let’s say Republican elected is take this chance to let people know how they really feel about Ted Cruz. Because, remember, you know, in 2013 Ted Cruz, another sort of, you know, you could say, stunned in a way which we shut down the government. Ah, over the affordable care act in a way that really rubs. You know, it’s a Republican leadership the wrong way because they sort of felt there was no plan behind it, and in the end, it helped him help Cruz. That hurt Republicans nationally. But it helped Cruz and I think a lot of Republicans, you know, sort of see this released Republican elites. See this and say, You know, could see this is an opportunity to point out that Cruz isn’t really in this for the Republican Party or the good of Republicans. He’s in it for himself and the in the, you know, the going back on the pledge will I think it will haunt him. Going for it will have any effect. Probably not.

[0:22:41 Jim] Well I mean, I think you will. The quite you know it will. I mean, I think it will have an effect,

[0:22:46 Joshua] but it is electoral well, and in his electoral fraud, well, I mean, that’s why I think the comments are so important in the sense that now you’ve got, you know, basically Republican statewide on camera that any, you know, basically saying what? Ah, what a liar Ted Cruz is and how he says he’s so principle it is not. And though that that exists for eternity and existed by attorney, I mean, for every campaign ad of

[0:23:07 Jim] everyone I misspoke. There don’t Republican statewide but Republican leaders. But I think I think there’s the rub. In some ways, you know, Peter King may still be around. Chris Christie’s pretty much done.

[0:23:18 Joshua] I catch it on it depends on who else joins the bandwagon. It looks like most were being more cautious,

[0:23:23 Jim] and you know people do have, you know, people make. People can be really mad at Ted Cruz, but if it and any real even dislike him. But if it works, too, you know, in a couple of years Teoh make up. I think a lot of them will. And, you know, even if they’re, you know, waiting for the opportunity to stab him in the back later on. In the short run, there has been lots of of of talk about it’s It’s led to a little blips in terms of Cruz Ah, Joaquin Castro, one of the telegenic Castro brothers that are seen as the among the leading future prospects among Texas Democrats. You know, sending up traveling today about running against him in Texas in 2018

[0:24:05 Joshua] there’s some interest in funding a primary challenger

[0:24:07 Jim] Trump making you know noise about fundings, a super packed, you know, toe primary to him in Texas in

[0:24:15 Joshua] 2018 and even some more establishment minded Republicans are talking about. So there’s, you know,

[0:24:20 Jim] there’s something to your position. I don’t think either of those things are are much of a threat to Ted Cruz and particularly Donald Trump, actually spending the kind of money he was talking about. But we’ll see. So before we run just extremely long, let’s turn a little bit to the Democratic convention, and we’ll we’ll talk more about the Democratic convention next week. Like we talked more about the Republican convention this week. Since you know, we still as of this recording, haven’t heard from Bill Clinton. Haven’t heard from Hillary Clinton. Haven’t heard from a lot of people yet. Um, but on opening night, Democrats had a had a pretty, ah event full. But I think ultimately successful opening night last night. You know, the rial Ki last night. I think you know that the two storylines one during the day and going into it. How would the Bernie Sanders supporters behave at the convention? Could they be brought on board? And you know, it was a rough weekend and start to the day. There was a release of all these emails illustrating You can’t even say suggesting illustrating how a lot of the formal party organization at the Democratic National Committee heavily favored Hillary Clinton and and did not appreciate, shall we say, Bernie Sanders? And you know, those emails came out re inflamed, already kind of boisterous and and dissatisfied Sanders supporters led to the resignation as kind of lead story going into the convention of DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz from Florida. That kind of sets the stage for the convention. Taking off are actually getting off to a start during the day yesterday, the news coverage really was all, you know, people booing the speakers and the Sanders folks,

[0:26:01 Joshua] one in particular, Bernie Sanders himself getting booed when mentioning Hillary Clinton in a like a some some of his supporters

[0:26:09 Jim] yet, and he was clearly trying to smooth way. I mean, the stories today came out that there have been lots of back channel communication between Sanders, campaign Democratic officials and dissenters. People were acknowledging that there people might get out of hand and they would try to smooth it. Yeah, Sanders tries to do that, you know, mentions that people have to get behind Hillary Clinton gets roundly booed by his own folks, that which, if you watch the video, you can see he’s kind of taken aback. He’s kind of like, you know, This is the world we live in. Brothers and sisters, I think, was the quote

[0:26:40 Joshua] that was that was the contacts going into the evening’s. Everybody was pretty much ready for it to be a bit of a mess,

[0:26:45 Jim] right? And it was a little messy that you could hear if you were watching the televised coverage. You could hear what were probably small but certainly vocal groups of Sanders supporters booing when Hillary Clinton was mentioned and chanting various things. You know, it got a little better. Some of the speakers develop without doing a blow by blow. But what really turned the tide was when Michelle Obama spoke. And if you know any of you’ve watched the media coverage since then, you know that became the story was really how forceful on how effective Michelle Obama was in both making the case for Hillary Clinton talking personally about her experience, that kind of galvanized people’s views and also, really, you know, making a dinging Donald Trump without mentioning his name. So let’s play an excerpt of Michelle Obama.

[0:27:33 (video) Michelle Obama] But here’s the thing. What I admire most about Hillary is that she never buckles under pressure. She she never takes the easy way out, and Hillary Clinton has never quit on anything in her life. On when I think about the kind of president that I want for my girls and all our Children, that’s what I want. I want someone with the proven strength to persevere, someone who knows this job and takes it seriously. Someone who understands that the issues the president faces are not black and white and cannot be boiled down to 140 characters. Not because because when when you have the nuclear codes at your fingertips and the military in your command, you can’t make snap decisions. You can’t have a thin skin or a tendency to lash out. You need to be steady and measured and well informed.

[0:28:58 Jim] So that really encapsulates in that 92nd or so excerpt kind of everything I think she accomplished in that speech. There’s a strong personal element about you know what she wants for her and her girls. And there was a big theme last night about family and parenthood and girls, I think, actually makes the case for you know why Hillary Clinton is a good candidate. Dings trump with the thin skin and the and the Twitter comment and then also introduces just how high the stakes are to wrap it all up, you know, pretty good speech writing and pretty amazing delivery when you come right down to it.

[0:29:33 Joshua] Yeah, I mean, the thing that I think again, you can go and there’s a 1,000,000 places you can read, you know, analysis of why and how she did say so well, but one of the things that I think that she did was you know, she was ableto Do you find that nobody else has sort of done so far? Which is she tied this sort of narrative thread between, you know, President Obama’s historic candidacy and presidency to Hillary Clinton, but without tying her to his agenda. Right? And she did that very, very carefully. And so I mean, people are basically saying Now, this is one of the best you know, DNC speeches of all time. It’s up there on the list of, you know, whatever top speeches. And so, you know, she basically just subsumed all coverage in a lot of ways. The whole days coverage was this discord between Bernie supporters and the Clinton, you know, basically Clinton. And then Michelle came in and just became about what a great speech that WAAS, which is an interesting sort of looking to serve. And I guess how the media operates and you know how conventions get covered in some ways.

[0:30:30 Jim] Yeah, I think that’s right. I think that. And I think it was done in a very strategically sound way by the people

[0:30:37 Joshua] behind, because originally I think Sanders was gonna actually open up a two primetime hour and then Michelle was gonna come later and they flipped it during the day, which pretty good decision. It turns

[0:30:48 Jim] well, and they and they flipped it in a way that sent the signal that they were actually giving Sanders pride of place, even though ultimately it was Michelle Obama being prior to Sanders, I think really helpful on there were some other people who did a pretty job in their of smoothing out the crowd, you know, I mean, I think Paul Simon’s raspy bridge over troubled troubled Water and the Al Franken Sarah Silverman thing with Sarah Silverman kind of now very pay mus. Li admonished the Sanders supporters, but their behavior in the hallway

[0:31:20 Joshua] Booker yelling over testers. Basically,

[0:31:23 Jim] exactly So all of that did set up Bernie Sanders and Sanders. You know, I think, also did a not as flamboyant job. There are parts of the Sanders speech very familiar, but I mean, he he accomplished a lot in addressing the hall and addressing, in particular his supporters. I think you put it while giving them the chance for a little bit of catharsis by playing a kind of Bernie Sanders greatest hits in terms of talking about Wall Street and and citizens united cetera,

[0:31:54 Joshua] Yeah, I mean, the 1st 2/3 of this speech in a lot of ways, I mean, you could have you could have said way to see the nominee. I mean, I think that was the point, right? It gave his people the chance to sort of have that feeling that he was getting that spot that, you know, in prime time and that if he were the nominee, this is what the speech would look like. And, you know, I think that probably a

[0:32:12 Jim] very good job, though, that of doing that and then saying and tying that tube, you know, saying essentially, you know, we got a lot here because we’ve all these things. We’ve affected the platform, and Hillary Clinton supports these things, too. And that’s why we should all you know, come together and support her. So let’s let’s just places basically the last this is in the wind up. This is the wind up of Sanders speech about the last 90 seconds.

[0:32:39 (video) Sanders] Our job now is to see that strong Democratic platform implemented by a Democratic controlled Senate by a Democratic House and a Hillary Clinton presidency. And I am going to dough all that I can to make that happen. I have known Hillary Clinton for 25 years. I remember her as you do as a great first lady who broke precedent in terms of the role that a first lady was supposed to play as she helped lead the fight. The universal health care. I served with her in the United States Senate and know her as a fierce advocate for the rights of Children, for women and for the disabled. Hillary Clinton will make an outstanding president, and I am proud to stand with her tonight. Thank you all very much

[0:34:10 Jim] so that does what he is expected to do. It’s in some ways. Ah, pretty stark contrast, shall we say with Ted Cruz and it sets the stage for the rest of the convention, So we’ll come back next week. We’ll see whether the Democrats get a bounce. Look, see what unify we’ll see. You know, if the if last night really let off enough pressure, if you will, for the convention for Hillary Clinton to unify the party behind her candidacy. So I encourage you to keep an eye on those things, and we’ll talk to you next week. Second Reading Podcast is a production of Texas Politics Project and the Project 2021 Development Studio at the University of Texas at Austin.