'We can and will overcome this season of darkness': Biden promises to unite America
Last night Joe Biden made the most important speech of his long political life to an empty hall, but to tens of millions of Americans watching at home and online.
It was a sales pitch that was vast in its ambition.
He would heal America. He would lead it out of the darkness. He would tackle the pandemic and its economic fallout.
Above all, he would address America's original sin - the stain of racism.
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The atmosphere was bizarre for a speech of this magnitude. There were no crowds, no cheers, no balloons.
But perhaps this was what America needed at this time. No gimmicks. Just a chance for voters to assess the man who hopes that in 74 days he will be the President-elect.
Whether voters will give him that prize remains to be seen. Many progressives do not trust him.
Biden is the Senator who voted for the Iraq War.
He shepherded the Crime Bill into law, a measure that put thousands of young black men behind bars for petty offences.
And he chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee when it humiliated a black victim of sexual harassment, Anita Hill.
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But Biden has emerged from those clouds because he is empathetic and because the party has a single priority - not the pursuit of purity, but the eviction of Trump from the White House.
Last night, for Biden it was mission accomplished.
The Democratic Party is united. Biden is reaching out to moderate Republicans and to those exhausted by the political trench warfare.
His running mate Kamala Harris is appealing to America's minorities. Barack Obama is warning that President Trump threatens the country's very democracy.
Next week, the Republican Party holds its convention. Trump must somehow persuade Americans that Biden is a danger and a hostage to the far-left. That he has no ideas and is too senile for the job.
Joe Biden's speech last night has made that task far, far harder.
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