People watch Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden on a screen in Washington on Friday. Photo / AP
Thirty-five years ago, Mario Cuomo spoke a famous line about American politics: "You campaign in poetry; you govern in prose".
The former New York Governor, who died in 2015, was a leading potential presidential contender who never actually became one.
In 1984, a year earlier, Cuomo had delivered an eloquent takedown of President Ronald Reagan's soaring rhetoric of America being a "shining city on a hill".
At the Democratic National Convention that year, the governor said: "There is despair, Mr President, in the faces you don't see, in the places you don't visit in your shining city. This nation is more a tale of two cities than it is just a shining city on a hill."
For the first time, perhaps even since he began this campaign, Biden showed why HE should be president, rather than it simply being NOT Trump.https://t.co/zuiTlEbEjx
— Domenico Montanaro (@DomenicoNPR) August 21, 2020
In this dark year, with 176,600 Americans lost to the coronavirus and 5.6 million infected, that grim theme of structural inequality is more apt for the United States than ever.
Studies have shown that black and Hispanic Americans have disproportionally suffered from the pandemic.
Special federal money for millions of unemployed people has lapsed and a moratorium on rental evictions is expiring. People who never thought they would need food charity have found themselves accepting it.
On Friday, former Vice-President Joe Biden addressed the situation the country finds itself in with a steely, urgent delivery and short, blunt sentences as he accepted the Democratic Party's nomination for the November presidential election.
He did not mention his opponent, President Donald Trump, by name.
The convention was Joe Bidens' chance to make their case to America. Did he pass the test?
— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) August 21, 2020
Here are the main takeaways from the four-night eventhttps://t.co/vYbZNQ0joD
"I will draw on the best of us, not the worst. I will be an ally of the light, not the darkness. It's time for us, for we, the people, to come together. And make no mistake. United we can and will overcome this season of darkness in America. We'll choose hope over fear. Facts over fiction. Fairness over privilege."
It was forceful rhetoric stripped of appealing flourishes - poetry and prose hammered together.
Biden will be hoping his unvarnished pitch will peel away enough 2016 Trump voters to restore the blue wall in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
It was a world away from the optimistic notes of Biden's one-time boss President Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 2008.
This is a really smart piece by @saletan @Slate about how Democrats this week invoked themes around faith, family, patriotism, democracy and national unity to appeal to middle-of-the-road voters “without surrendering progressive ambitions.” https://t.co/2hOZUmp4J0
— EJ Dionne (@EJDionne) August 21, 2020
This was the metaphorical promise of a long trudge through winter to an unknown place.
"No generation ever knows what history will ask of it. All we can ever know is whether we'll be ready when that moment arrives. And now history has delivered us to one of the most difficult moments America has ever faced. Four historic crises. All at the same time."
It was also the speech of someone with nothing left to prove and one shot to do what he can.
Biden is 77 with decades in politics behind him. He has been marked with the grief of having lost his first wife and two children.
Biden leads Trump by 16 points among suburban voters in five battleground states: Poll https://t.co/wtiBYlbxtd
— Newsweek (@Newsweek) August 21, 2020
The convention's key argument was that he was the man for this moment: Biden was empathetic and experienced while Trump was not. The Democrat, but not the Republican, was prepared to put in the work battling the pandemic, the economic crisis, calls for racial justice and climate change.
The Democrats tried hard to suggest that the culture of a Biden administration would be one of hard work in rolled-up sleeves.
Trump's unconventional approach to the presidency has throughout the pandemic gifted Biden the space to virtually fill the expected role of a president in a crisis.
That's to provide leadership, direction, and reassurance; say the right things and look the part. Biden has presented himself as the socially-distanced president-in-waiting.
Biden is already forming a government. Here's what his Cabinet could look like. https://t.co/vOGyr2H3B0 via @politico
— Wajahat "Wears a Mask Because of a Pandemic" Ali (@WajahatAli) August 22, 2020
Biden's campaign has had a consistent theory of the case for his presidential bid.
Back in the primary season, the Biden strategy was that the contest was about Trump's character and performance, and that people wanted a return to normality, well before the onslaught of Covid-19.
Throughout the year there were younger and more exciting candidates, but the majority of Democrats decided Biden was the most electable.
At the convention former rival Andrew Yang came up with the interesting idea that "the magic of Joe Biden is that everything he does becomes the new reasonable. If he comes with an ambitious new plan to address climate change, all of a sudden everyone is going to follow his lead."
The convention showed the party relying mostly on an emotional connection rather than policy detail. Biden, former President Bill Clinton and senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders mentioned the economy. Was that enough?
Our 2020 Election Forecast: https://t.co/zaBwpFjn2y
— FiveThirtyEight (@FiveThirtyEight) August 21, 2020
Trump's main advantage has continued to be that people credited the President with the country's strong economic performance.
Polls show that is still a hard nut for Biden to crack. A CNN poll gave Trump an eight-point lead on who was better to handle the economy.
In March and April, the US lost more than 22 million jobs. Since then about nine million jobs have been recovered. Last week another million people applied for state unemployment help, NPR reports.
According to RealClearPolitics.com averages, in the last week of February about 55 per cent of voters believed the US was on the wrong track. That is 70 per cent now. Trump's job approval rating has fallen by 6.2 per cent over that time.
Biden "in an enviable yet challenging position," says @danbalz. Enviable because he leads in polls and has united his party. Challenging because "there are still questions about...his ability to make good on his pledge to unify a divided country." https://t.co/bC4HA21zJf
— Peter Baker (@peterbakernyt) August 21, 2020
This week the Republicans get to post their reply with their own national convention.
Trump has been trying to define Biden as a front for a socialist agenda pushed by Sanders and his allies. He will target the Democratic ticket over its spending plans, and fears the situation will worsen on taxes, immigration, and crime.
Deposing an incumbent is a rare event in US elections and is a challenge not to be underestimated.
.@GOPChairwoman responds to @CBSNewsPoll showing 57% of Republicans say the number of those dead from #COVID19 is acceptable at 175,000:
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) August 23, 2020
"I think that is a really unfair poll..Republicans do not want to see people suffering from this pandemic." pic.twitter.com/E43B4p9rck
The Electoral College elevates the influence of the white voters without university-level education in Rust Belt states who pushed Trump over the line in 2016.
Polls show Biden is doing better with higher-educated whites than Hillary Clinton in 2016 but is polling about the same with black voters and Hispanics - core Democratic groups.
Dave Wasserman of the Cook Political Report estimates that in the 10 closest battleground states in 2016, whites without a college degree made up 49 per cent of the electorate.
Joe Biden takes on Trump-era traumas in career-defining speech | Analysis https://t.co/368MD7z1nk pic.twitter.com/h3I3FUqL3r
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) August 21, 2020
A further 29 per cent were higher educated whites and 22 per cent were non-white. That compares to 42 per cent, 30 per cent and 28 per cent for the rest of the US.
Poll averages and prediction forecasts are more useful measures of the race than individual polls.
The question will be whether any of the poll data changes after the convention and the selection of Senator Kamala Harris as Biden's running mate.
The Democrats will hope the convention has stirred more enthusiasm among their voters to vote for Biden rather than mainly against Trump.
Aug 21, Biden margin in polls v Clinton actual margin in 2016 (2-party vote)
— G. Elliott Morris (@gelliottmorris) August 21, 2020
National: Biden +9 (Clinton +2)
IA: -2 (-10)
TX: -1 (-9)
OH: -1 (-9)
GA: 0 (-5)
NC: 2 (-4)
AZ: 3 (-4)
FL: 5 (-1)
PA: 6 (-1)
NV: 7 (3)
WI: 7 (-1)
MI: 7 (0)
MN: 9 (2)
NH: 9 (0)https://t.co/O6Lknvo6Kp
The pandemic and its economic fallout have taken a heavy toll in the US, but they make the election terrain uncertain with two and a half months to go. The US outbreak could be better or worse by late October.
There are already major questions over election turnout with Covid-19 at high levels and Trump's attempts to sow doubt about voting by mail.
Potentially, late-breaking positive news on jobs or a vaccine could help the President. Trump has made the search for an effective vaccine the centre of his coronavirus strategy.
Will the electorate see Biden as a credible and welcome alternative to Trump? Or does the sheer weight of multiple crises this year make the electorate sceptical that a change at the top will make any difference?
For the Democrats to win, enough voters will need to feel hope as well as anger in these difficult times.
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