With one word, Barack Obama summed up the appropriate response to the last eight years under George W. Bush.

It was an historic speech. Some have quibbled that the Democrats were not tough enough on Bush, Cheney and McCain during this convention. Barack Obama took it upon himself to deliver the toughest punch.

For all the bluster from Republicans, the images from the stadium are incredible. They’re expecting over 80,000 people, as poeple are still in line thirty minutes before Obama is scheduled to speak.

Meanwhile, John McCain’s campaign is having trouble getting 10,000 people to attend his event tomorrow in Dayton to introduce his VP.

No wonder the Republicans are trying so hard to distract everyone with idiotic talking points like the stage in the stadium.

At what point do they start to look pathetic and desperate?

Nice job from Al Gore, though again the delivery was mediocre at best.

He did, however, lay out the choice at hand in very stark terms. The Bush presidency is a failed presidency, and John McCain offers more of the same.

As pointed out by Josh Marshall, John Kerry’s speech might have been the best one of the convention. The “brain trust” at MSNBC didn’t show most of it, so I caught it on CNN but didn’t get to see the whole thing. Later, MSNBC replayed parts of it, though they didn’t even have a camera covering Obama’s uncle who Kerry singled out in the crowd.

Kerry rips into McCain and the GOP, mocking them for some of the pathetic personal attacks we’ve seen so far despite McCain’s claim that he would run a respectful campaign.

Here’s the speech. It’s worth watching.

The media is raising the question of whether the Democrats have been tough enough so far. Biden had some tough language, but his delivery could have been much better. Both Clintons were great and they also took good shots at McCain, but they were focused more on unifying the party than ripping McCain.

I suspect Al Gore will be the guy to rip McCain to shreds tomorrow night. Gore has nothing but contempt for the current administration, and he will gladly link McCain to Bush’s failed presidency.

Obama needs to be tough as well. I have no doubt he’ll rise to the occasion given his history with speeches. He needs to show some passion, and he needs to draw very clear distinctions with McCain.

Joe Biden took some good shots at McCain, and overall the speech was pretty good. Frankly I was hoping for a little more. He’s just not as polished as the Clintons, and he could have drawn better distinctions. That said, he introduced some powerful themes about John McCain’s lack of judgement on national security. The delivery could have been better, but he made some strong points.

The best part of the speech was his authenticity and sincerity. Biden is a regular Joe with an inspiring family story, and that came across in the speech. He demonstrated how deeply he cares about the issues at hand.

Having Obama join him onstage was a great idea. Obama and Biden look very comfortable together.

Overall it was a good night.

In a dramatic moment at the Democratic convention, Hilarry Clinton appeared on the floor during the roll call to move that Barack Obama be nominated by acclamation.

I always said she would do what was needed at the convention. She did more than anyone could have expected. Great job.

Amazing speech. It was probably the best speech she’s ever given. Frankly, it’s one of the best convention speeches I’ve ever seen.

The speeches are getting much tougher tonight at the Democratic convention, though so far the cable networks haven’t been showing all of them.

Bob Casey actually introduced a pretty good line. After pointing out that John McCain voted with George W. Bush over 90% of the time, he said that McCain shouldn’t be referred to a “maverick,” but instead should be referred to as the “sidekick.” Frankly, if this was written by the Obama campaign, they probably should have had a better speaker deliver it, but at least Casey did a decent job with it.

Going back to last night, I disagree with those who feel that the Democrats blew it by not attacking McCain. It’s important to attack John McCain, but last night wasn’t the night to do it.

Michelle Obama gave a great speech, which was capped off with a great moment when the Obama daughters came onstage. Michelle needed to soften her image, and she accomplished that last night. I suspect the speech went over very well with Hillary’s female supporters.

I know he’s not speaking in prime time, so the crowd really wasn’t ready for a big speech, but Ed Rendell laid an egg with his speech on energy.

The substance was great, but the delivery was terrible. He rushed through it, and didn’t give the crowd a chance to get involved.

He made some great points that hopefully he’ll repeat in interviews. He focused on John McCain’s record of voting against initiatives for clean energy or energy independence. These themes need to be repeated over and over again. Hopefully other speakers will pick up on the theme and do a better job.

For example, McCain keeps saying that he favors a strategy of “all of the above,” meaning that he favors drilling and all other approaches. The problem is that he has consistently opposed ALL of these in the past. He’s a total fraud on this issue. On this point, Rendell’s speech just didn’t go far enough.

Nancy Pelosi did a good job explaining some of the issues where John McCain opposed popular initiatives like the minimum wage and health care for children, but overall the speech wasn’t very impressive.

The best thing to come from the speech was an indication that the Democrats are serious about going after McCain and drawing distinctions on policy. They need to keep repeating this theme, and hope that others speakers deliver the message more forcefully.

This is a good choice. Mark Warner would have been the perfect pick for Obama’s running mate, but he’s running for the open Senate seat in Virginia, and he’s practically guaranteed to win.

Warner has tremendous appeal to white, Southern voters, and he is very respected on economic issues. Expect him to drive home the theme that middle class voters should be voting with the Democratic Party this year.

It’s also helpful that Warner’s keynote address will happen on the same night that Hillary Clinton speaks. He’s a unifying figure, and will give the press many talking points to blunt the invitable Clinton drama stories we can expect to hear from the press that night.

MSNBC is reporting that Bill Clinton will speak on Wednesday night at the Democtratic convention, the same night that the Vice Presidential pick will speak.

The media is having a field day talking up the “rift” between Obama and the Clintons. Naturally, the Clintons can’t do anything without a heavy dose of drama, but as usual this is all overblown.

I would have been shocked if Bill Clinton wasn’t asked to speak at the convention, so this is not a surprise. Of course, it should have happened sooner, and we have no idea if this is the fault of the Clintons or the Obama campaign.

In any event, expect great speeches from both Bill and Hillary, which will be a big boost for Obama.