ANALYSIS: Slick, solid and easily digested but will Democrats' low energy live-stream convention help Joe Biden beat Donald Trump?
 

Perhaps, writes Andrew Buncombe, the party needs to emulate professional soccer and use canned applause

Four years ago, on the opening night of the Democratic national convention, Bernie Sanders delivered a soaring piece of rhetoric in which he urged his supporters to vote for the candidate who had defeated him.

The audience packed into Wells Fargo Centre in Philadelphia leapt to their feet, emotions running high, as the senator declared: "We have begun a political revolution to transform America and that revolution -- our revolution -- continues."

Yet this time it sounded flat, muted. And it was not just Bernie Sanders. Michelle Obama, Monday evening's keynote speaker, who we were told would deliver the most rousing address of her life, felt equally low-key.

Of course, it was not their fault. Forced by the coronavirus pandemic to deliver live-streamed speeches from the safety of their homes to Americans sitting in theirs, rather than in a noisy arena, the addresses lacked the input of live applause and emotion.
 

They were slick, solid and easily digested, but they lacked the back of and forth of speaking to a live audience, the interactions and smiles and shouts and screams. In short, they lacked an actual convention.
 

Read More