“All this week it was, ‘can he do it again? Can he do it again?’ He did it again,” said county attorney Janet Lyness.

Sen. Barack Obama accepts the Democratic nomination at Invesco Field (Photo: Flickr/Barackobamadotcom)

Expectations were high, between Obama’s oratorical skills, the 75,000 seat stadium, and the calendar coincidence of the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech, and kept getting higher, as Al Gore extended an analogy between Obama and Abraham Lincoln.

But for most Johnson County Democrats, Obama delivered. “Obama challenged the conventional wisdom by challenging his opponent’s record directly, without being disrespectful,” Johnson County Democratic chair Brian Flaherty said after the speech.

About 125 Obama supporters, a mix of the usual political suspects and newcomers, attended the party at the North Liberty community center. It was one of many speech parties across the state, as events were planned in all 99 counties. Attendees quickly demanded a channel change from CNN to the pundit-free version on CSPAN, and thus got to see the succession of Regular People who filled a half hour or so before Obama’s speech. The best reaction, both in Denver and Iowa, went to the woman who says “I voted for Nixon, Reagan, Bush and Bush, but I can’t afford to vote for McCain.”

Organizers were well prepared, lining the walls with poster sized sign-up sheets for phone banks and yard signs. And a text message urging Obama supporters to volunteer now landed just before the speech.

West High student Zach Wahls is going to miss voting age by about eight months, but he’s volunteering. “School’s important, but this seems bigger in the grand scheme of things.”

Flaherty disputed my take that a subtle age theme was present in lines like, “Washington’s been talking about our oil addiction for the last 30 years, and John McCain has been there for 26 of them,” or “We need a president who can face the threats of the future, not keep grasping at the ideas of the past.”

“I think he’s playing off the same theme that’s been successful for Democrats in the past,” said Flaherty. “In many ways this election is similar to 1996. When it comes down to it McCain’s policies are based in the 1980s and 1990s. If people really want a change from the ideologies of the past, the only way we can do it is by walking forward with Obama.”

The conversations of the faithful were crowded with anxieties about slipping poll numbers, soft messaging, elusive unity, and the omnipresent Clintons. Memories of disastrous Augusts (John Kerry in 2004, Al Gore in 2000 and Michael Dukakis in 1988) pinched the party’s imagination.

Sen. Barack Obama accepts the Democratic nomination at Invesco Field (Photo: Flickr/Barackobamadotcom)

Tonight those hemmed-in feelings dispersed into the breezes of mammoth Invesco Field where an adoring throng of 84,000 cheered Barack Obama as he accepted his party nomination with a speech — none too lofty and none too soft — that reinfused his historic campaign with sense of history and horizon that had seemed lacking in recent weeks.

Early on Obama declared “enough,” and that word resonated throughout his 48-minute speech. So did the phrase “Now is the time.” Those simple sentiments bookended a comprehensive indictment of the presumptive Republican nominee as honorable but clueless (“It’s not that John McCain doesn’t care. It’s that he doesn’t get it.”) and a challenge to his own party (“Democrats, Democrats, we must also admit that fulfilling America’s promise will require more than just money.”)

Tough talk on Afghanistan (“we must take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights.”) was combined with tender feelings toward his grandmother (“She poured everything she had into me.”)

After delivering a laundry list of specific policy proposals, Obama returned to the post-partisan message that enabled him to prevail over the more traditional style of Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries. “These — these are the policies I will pursue,” he declared. “And in the weeks ahead, I look forward to debating them with John McCain.”

“But what I will not do,” he went on, “is suggest that the senator takes his positions for political purposes, because one of the things that we have to change in our politics is the idea that people cannot disagree without challenging each other’s character and each other’s patriotism.”

“I’ve got news for you, John McCain,” he finished. “We all put our country first.”

Obama thus put a partisan edge on his postpartisaship. He both sharpened the choice facing voters 68 days from now without closing off his ability appeal to Republicans and independents. He again demonstrated the political agility that brought him to this historic occasion and almost certainly restored his supporters’ confidence that was a little shaky just a few hours earlier.

On our Michigan site, editor Todd Spencer covered a discussion between T. Boone Pickens and leading environmentalists.

On the Washington Independent, Spencer Ackerman assessed the Democrats’ efforts to engage on national security.

And the Colorado Independent, playing with a significant home field advantage, provides thorough coverage of the whole convention experience, which doesn’t end at the security perimeter’s edge.

“I’m getting on board with Barack Obama. I think he’ll be an excellent president,” said Kathleen Krehbiel, of Solon., who came here as a Clinton delegate. She said she no longer wanted to carry out the “pretense” that Clinton could win.

Krehbiel and Stephanie Imhoff, another Clinton delegate, got up before the delegation this morning and urged people to vote for Obama, even engaging in his signature rallying cry: “Fired up. Ready to go.”

When they walked back to their seats, Obama delegate Sandra Pope of Ottumwa, opened her arms and said, “Welcome girls. That’s all I’ve got to say.”

Nielsen also reported the Hillary Clinton pulled a bigger TV audience than Michelle Obama and that a higher percentage of African-Americans are watching the convention than the population as a whole. On Monday night, 24 percent of African-American homes that had a TV on were watching the convention. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s wife, Michelle, spoke on Monday.

Here is Nielsen:

Almost 26 million people watched the second night of the 2008 Democratic National Convention — a 16% increase from 22.3 million viewers on the opening night of the convention.

Tuesday night’s speeches, which featured Senator Hillary Clinton’s much anticipated keynote address, continued to draw a large proportion of African Americans (12.7% of all African American viewers tuned in).

Viewers age 55 and older also continued to dominate Tuesday night’s TV audience, with 20% of all Americans in that age group watching the convention coverage on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, FOX News Channel, MSNBC, BET, and TV One.

Rich Peters called the speeches a powerful “one-two punch” for Democrats. With access to the Pepsi Center in Denver, site of the convention, Peters talked to dozens of female party activists throughout the day Tuesday, looking for someone to express the widely reported anger and disunity associated with the Democratic nomination fight between former First Lady and U.S. senator Clinton of New York and Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, a U.S. senator from Illinois.

“I couldn’t find a single one,” Peters said.

Peters said the crowd Tuesday appeared pleased that Clinton was taking the fight to U.S. John McCain, R-Ariz., the Republican presidential candidate.

Clinton had several well-timed barbs aimed at McCain.

“It makes sense that George Bush and John McCain will be together next week in the Twin Cities, because these days they’re awfully hard to tell apart,” she said, referencing the Minnesota site of the GOP convention next week.

“I thought, no way was she going to be that aggressive,” Peters said.

Peters is a supporter of Obama who earned entry to the Democratic National Convention by winning a video contest sponsored by the party and Internet giants Google and YouTube.

His winning video is expected to be shown sometime this week at the convention. Peters has posted a number of political videos on YouTube.

Katherine Marcano, a 22-year-old college student from Cedar Rapids, told the story of her family's plight to attendees at the Democratic National Convention in Denver. It was the same story she told Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama during a roundtable discussion in December of last year.

Marcano, a student at Mount Mercy College, was one of five local residents invited to sit down with Obama in December 2007 to discuss his white paper on reclaiming the American dream.

“I work night shift so my days start at 1 a.m.,” she told Obama. “That’s when I get up every morning. I never go to bed before 10 p.m. because I’m raising my two siblings.”

Marcano says she is able to function on an average of three hours of sleep each night by drinking coffee and energy drinks. One of the most looming issues in her life is health care because one of the relatives she is caring for is restricted to a wheelchair because of cerebral palsy and her employer’s health care plan refuses coverage.

“Right now, you just can’t pay the fees to get through the process of naturalization for her?” Obama asked and Marcano responded with a nod. “In the meantime, she is a legal resident, but because she is a legal resident, she doesn’t qualify for government benefits. So, basically, any help she needs in terms of her medical care — if she was going to get it — would have to be paid for out-of-pocket.”

Marcano agreed that this is the situation she and her family faces.

“You are doing heroic work,” Obama said. “I’m worried about you because I don’t know if you should be drinking that Red Bull all of the time. In the meantime, there are a couple things I think we should do. No. 1 is: I’m a strong believer that people who are legal immigrants should be getting basic health care. That is something I think is important. These are not illegal, undocumented workers. These are legal immigrants … they should get care.

“Obviously, in terms of school, helping you pay for your college education is very important.”

Marcano, who recently had the added stress of the flood placed on her already full plate, traveled to Denver to tell her story to those attending the convention.

“This is the greatest nation in the world,” Marcano said during her speech. “Yet people like me and my younger sister, Barbara, are going through real hard times. Barbara has cerebral palsy and she is developmentally disabled and in a wheelchair. I took her under my wing because our mother has heart problems and is physically unable to take care of my sister’s needs.”

In addition to attending classes at Mount Mercy, Marcano works the night shift. She is determined, she said, to obtain her degree so she can earn a better wage and provide for her family.

Katherine Marcano, shown at the far right, was one of five Cedar Rapids area residents who were invited to tell their personal stories of pursuing the American dream to Illinois Sen. Barack Obama during a discussion held at Kirkwood Community College in December 2007.

“ABC, CBS, and NBC did not air any of Leach’s speech, while MSNBC and Fox News aired only seconds of it,” notes Media Matters for America. MSNBC cut away from Leach and instead aired an interview with Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and a panel discussion that degenerated into a shouting match between Rachel Maddow and Pat Buchanan.

That made for more entertaining television than Leach’s professorial address, but Media Matters says it was unfair compared to the massive play networks gave Georgia Democratic Sen. Zell “Get out of my face!” Miller’s speech endorsing George W. Bush at the 2004 Republican convention.

Of course, Leach didn’t do anything nearly as dramatic as Miller did in challenging MSNBC’s Chris Matthews to a duel. But Media Matters predicts that ex-Democrat Joe Lieberman, speaking next week at the Republican convention, will draw far more attention.

In a speech that lasted only a few minutes to an audience that included fewer than half of the states’ delegations, Culver highlighted Iowa’s role in the nomination of Sen. Barack Obama, but he shied away from making a direct appeal to maintain Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucuses in future election cycles.

“The long journey to this historic convention began on a cold winter’s night in the great State of Iowa,” he said in prepared remarks. “I’m honored to join you, more than seven months and 700 miles from the site of that first contest, as we unite to make Barack Obama the next President of the United States.”

The governor also mentioned the floods Iowa faced early this summer. “Despite three tornados and 500 year flood levels, countless Americans rallied to help us,” he said. “So, on behalf of every Iowan, I want to say ‘thank you’ for assisting us in our time of need.”

But, with the status of federal funds to aid Iowa’s recovery efforts still unknown, the thanks may have been premature.

The main subject of Culver’s speech, which aired on C-SPAN but no major networks, was renewable energy. “McCain has voted against tax credits for renewable energy eleven times, and his only idea to solve our energy crisis is to keep doing what we’re doing as we watch prices go up,” he said. “Only Barack Obama has a detailed plan to give us the change we need – lower energy prices and more green-collar jobs.”

“Our choice is to stick with the status quo or move our country forward. On energy, the stakes couldn’t be higher.”

New York Gov. shares kind words

When New York Gov. David Patterson took the stage after Culver, he praised the state of Iowa for its response to natural disasters.

“The citizens of Iowa taught America a lot about answering the challenge,” said Patterson, who visited Iowa to support Sen. Hillary Clinton on caucus night in January. “Thank you Gov. Culver and all of you in Iowa.”

“In troubled times, it was understood that country comes before party,” Leach said after listing several examples of bipartisanship in U.S. history.

Former Rep. Jim Leach addresses the Democratic National Convention (Photo: Flickr/Barack Obama)

“As a Republican, I stand before you with deep respect for the history and traditions of my political party,” Leach said at the beginning of his speech.  “But it is clear to all Americans that something is akilter in our great republic.  In less than a decade, America’s political and economic standings in the world have been diminished.”

Clearly reluctant to throw the crowd the partisan red meat it was accustomed to, Leach maintained a bipartisan attitude throughout his speech.  He cast U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, whom he publicly endorsed two weeks ago, as a “transformative figure,” whose platform is more “change” than “Democratic.”

Leach was introduced to convention-goers by U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, Iowa’s Democratic senator.  Harkin, who began his speech in sign language, highlighting his support for the Americans with Disabilities Act, called Leach a “strong, proud, influential Republican.”

“You know, we Iowans have a strong, vibrant, two-party political system.  However, we don’t genuflect ideology,” Harkin said.  “We value thoughtfulness.”

If Leach engaged in any genuflection, it was at the altar of bipartisanship, which he got to know well during his long career in Washington, D.C.  To a crowd of rowdy Democrats in Denver, it was not altogether welcome.  Delegates used his speech as an opportunity to talk amongst themselves, which they did during nearly all of the speeches not delivered by a Kennedy or an Obama Monday night.

After comparing the Democratic presidential nominee to former president John F. Kennedy, Leach emphasized the difficulties our next president will face.  “The portfolios of challenges passed on to the next president will be as daunting as any since the Great Depression or World War II.”

“Little is riskier to the national interest than more of the same,” he continued.  “America needs new ideas, new energy, a new generation of leadership.”

“Hence I stand before you,” he concluded, praising both his own party and the party whose delegates he was addressing, “proud of my party’s contributions to America’s history, but, as a citizen, proud as well of the good judgment and good people of this party in nominating a transcendent candidate, who I am convinced will recapture the American dream and be a truly great president.”