All hail the Queen
All hail the Queen courtesy of the DNC

The first night of the Democratic National Convention was a rowdy one. Many of the biggest stars and heavy hitters from the party delivered prime time speeches, with Al Franken and Sarah Silverman in a duet, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker (and possible future presidential hopeful) ending with Michelle Obama, a keynote speech from Elizabeth Warren, and the final, most anticipated speech of the night from Bernie Sanders.

By the time Sanders got on the stage, you would be forgiven for thinking if half the audience had the vapours. Nearly every time the camera panned to the crowd, there were shots of people reacting a lot like this gal:

Or this one:

And this one:

Sanders delivered most of his stump speech and focused on income inequality with a special second half that leaned on his support for Hillary Clinton. It seemed be a direct call to the more stubborn faction of his supporters, the same ones who are still insisting they'll vote his name in or stupidly vote for a third party candidate like Jill Stein. (Listen to Dan: don't do it.)

Bernie: "By these measures, any objective observer will conclude that – based on her ideas and her leadership – Hillary Clinton must become the next president of the United States. The choice is not even close."

He went even harder into the paint:

"Hillary Clinton will nominate justices to the Supreme Court who are prepared to overturn Citizens United and end the movement toward oligarchy in this country. Her Supreme Court appointments will also defend a woman’s right to choose, workers’ rights, the rights of the LGBT community, the needs of minorities and immigrants and the government’s ability to protect the environment.

If you don’t believe this election is important, if you think you can sit it out, take a moment to think about the Supreme Court justices that Donald Trump would nominate and what that would mean to civil liberties, equal rights and the future of our country."

(Read the full speech here).

It's clear that Bernie doesn't have any desire to be a spoiler like Ralph Nader; it would ruin his legacy and taint the memories of his revolution.

But beyond his advocacy for Clinton, he and Obama, Warren, and other speakers throughout the night, spent less time talking about what was wrong and how terrible the country was, but how it could be fixed and what was already great about it.

As Elizabeth Warren said of Trump and the Republicans: "Other than that wall, did you hear any actual ideas? Let's face it, Donald Trump has no real plans." She added: "Trump thinks he can win votes by fanning the flames of fear and hatred."

After a week of fear and loathing at the RNC, of scaremongering and yelling by an oranged-hued man, the Dems, with their love and compassion were a welcome change, a salve for the abuse we all suffered through last week. (But especially Heidi and Sydney. Please send them cookies).

But even with Sanders and Warren, it was MIchelle Obama's speech that brought the house down.

If you could sum her speech up in a sentence, it was: "the children are our future."

Michelle Obama made the case for Clinton by using the future of America's children as the motivating factor. (Read the whole thing here.)

She said: "And I watch my daughters, two beautiful, intelligent, black young women, playing with their dogs on the White House lawn. And because of Hillary Clinton, my daughters and all our sons and daughters now take for granted that a woman can be president of the United States."

But my favorite lines of the night were more pointed and took digs at the darkness that Republicans want us to believe we are all living in.

She said: "How we explain that when someone is cruel, or acts like a bully, you don’t stoop to their level—no, our motto is, when they go low, we go high."

After last night, perhaps the Democrats will rise above the fray instead of taking the bait.