Magic of 2008 eludes Obama after flat convention

◼ link - Michael Barone/Washington Examiner

The consensus on Barack Obama's acceptance speech Thursday night, and in effect on the Democratic National Convention as a whole, is that it was a bust.

...The Democratic Party throughout its history has been a coalition of disparate groups that, at their strongest, add up to a majority. But when the party has to rally them with appeals that turn off moderates and independents, it's hard to get to 50 percent.

Especially when you make unforced errors, like writing a platform that didn't mention God -- or Jerusalem as the capital of Israel -- and then having the oversight corrected to resounding boos on the floor.

Polls tell us that the Obama Democrats were at the cusp between victory and defeat after Mitt Romney's selection of Paul Ryan and before the two conventions began.

Polls next week will tell us where the race is now. Pundits are looking for bounces, but polls conducted over weekends, and especially over the holiday weekend that separated the two conventions, are problematic.

Two events after the Democratic convention threaten to undermine any positive bounce.

One is the unemployment numbers released Friday morning. The unemployment rate is down to 8.1 percent but only because the labor force is shrinking. Fifty-somethings are going on disability, and twenty-somethings are living with their parents.

The other is the devastating portrait of Obama in Bob Woodward's latest book. "Presidents work their will -- or should work their will -- on important matters of national business," Woodward writes. "Obama has not."