Takeaways from Day Two of the Democratic National Convention

The first-ever virtual Democratic National Convention resumed on Tuesday, with the party showcasing its elder statesmen and up-and-coming political stars to press the case for electing Joe Biden as president in November.

Here are two takeaways from the second night of the convention:

A CROWDED KEYNOTE

The keynote speech that opened Tuesday’s program featured 17 voices, a departure from a tradition that most famously anointed Barack Obama as a rising Democratic star at the 2004 convention.

That speech, in which Obama argued there was no true Red-Blue divide in the country, paved the way for the largely post-partisan presidential campaign he tried to run in 2008.

The previous two keynote speakers, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Julian Castro, then the mayor of San Antonio, also later ran for president.

This time around, the party said it wanted to accommodate as many young Democratic officeholders as possible given the time constraints of the virtual convention.

But the slot of “rising star” may have already been filled at this convention – either by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who also spoke on Tuesday, or Biden’s vice presidential pick, Kamala Harris, who speaks on Wednesday.

AN IRONIC MODEL

Jimmy Carter and Donald Trump could not be more different people, but there was a certain irony to the former Democratic president speaking at the virtual convention.

Carter’s tenure as president from 1977 to 1981 is the model that Democrats hope now fits the Republican Trump, a single term marked by economic turmoil and a loss of U.S. standing in the world.

The two men faced sharply different crises in their fourth year in office – Carter with the Iran hostage drama and Trump with the coronavirus. Democrats hope that the end result in 2020 will be the same – voters picking someone new.

Carter was followed on Tuesday night by former President Bill Clinton, who won a second term despite a shaky first – in part by running against a much older nominee, Senator Bob Dole, then 73.

Clinton is now 74. Biden, whose nomination Clinton touted, is 77 and would be the oldest person to become U.S. president if he is elected on Nov. 3.

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