CDP Candidate Performance

by Julia Rosen [courtesy of Working Californians blogs]

The whirlwind weekend is now over and its time to reflect back on the overall performance of the presidential contenders. Here is my performance assessment of the candidates at the CDP Convention.

Mike Gravel was the only candidate to speak on Friday and had the smallest crowd of any candidate. It was outside and more delegates were interested in the free food and chatting than listening to him out on the patio. He was not nearly as passionate as he was on Thursday's debate. This appearance did not do much for his campaign.

Hillary Clinton did what she needed to do. She humanized herself to a crowd who had demonized her over the years. Clinton was never going to wow the delegates like Obama, but she earned the respect of the delegates. Her speech was not tailored enough to a Californian audience. She did much better addressing Californian issues like the environment in her press availability, whereas she talked about 9/11 in her speech.

Barack Obama was on fire. He lived up to his reputation as a master orator, but his speech was devoid of a lot of substance. It sounded great and was inspirational, but let delegates wondering where he stood on the issues. He was the only candidate not to take reporter's questions after his speech.

Chris Dodd gave a good substantive speech, tailored to the audience. It was unlikely that he picked up a lot of traction, but delegates received it warmly. He did very well in the blogger interview, much more engaging than his speech.

Dennis Kucinich appealed to the left most elements in the crowd, but did not give a speech likely to change his low single digit support in the state.

John Edwards has come a lot way from four years ago, where he was booed over his Iraq war position. Of all of the leading candidates, he exceeded expectations, bringing both substance and inspiration. Of all of the candidates, Edwards probably picked up the largest number of supporters at the convention.

Bill Richardson connected to the crowd better than the rest of the second tier candidates, but spoke to a severely reduced audience. He performed the opposite of Dodd, doing better in the speech then in a small group setting.

When I get the videos up I will talk more about the policy substance in their speeches, rather than performance. It was an absolute delight to have all of the candidates speaking at the convention. This is a very strong field of candidates and that was on full display.