Former vice president Joe Biden, a 77-year-old grandfather of seven (five acknowledged, two unacknowledged), formally accepted his party's nomination and delivered the primetime address to the Democratic convention Thursday evening.
Biden's speech was assessed by professional journalists to be one of the highlights of an otherwise unimpressive lifetime career in politics, and had #Resistance leaders applauding in their living rooms and posting pictures of their cats on the internet. Though not as dark and divisive as former President Barack Obama's address on Wednesday, Biden's speech surpassed expectation on multiple counts: 1) He was alive, 2) He was awake, and 3) He hadn't lost the ability to read and say words out loud.
That is not to say Biden's speech wasn't teeming with darkness and division, two of the most dominant themes on display throughout the four-day convention. It was. He accused Donald Trump of having "cloaked America in darkness for far too long," promising to help the country "overcome this season of darkness," deeply alarming phrases cribbed from the speech notes of history's worst dictators who donned military uniforms and rallied the masses.
CNN, the media wing of the Democratic Party, immediately sought to spin the address as uplifting, publishing headlines such as, "Biden lays out brighter vision for America." CNN reporters and other professional journos had reacted similarly to Obama's deranged invective, calling it "the finest convention speech in modern history."
Biden mostly toed the Democratic line until delivering a controversial sign off—"God protect our troops"—that is sure to rile up the party's left-wing base. On the other hand, he opened his speech by reading a quote from Ella Baker, a socialist activist who rejected Martin Luther King's leadership style. All in all, Biden managed to read the words on his teleprompter and say them out loud with an acceptable degree of competence.
Minutes before Biden took the stage on Thursday, one of the most pressing questions leading up to the convention was answered. Hunter Biden, the former VP's renegade son who fathered two of the grandchildren his dad refuses to acknowledge, appeared in a short video to introduce his father. As long as Biden continues to lead in the polls, Hunter's prospects for finding employment are looking brighter by the day.