In a media coup reminiscent of the way Kerry somehow managed to successfully lower expectations before his debates with the greatest Presidential word mangler of all-time, by some miracle the expectations for Obama's acceptance speech at Invesco Field have been lowered. Check out these headlines:
I have my own headline: "On Eve Of Obama Speech, Concern Trolling Reaches Record Levels." In this case, however, I actually don't mind the concern trolling. The big payoff a candidate can receive in terms of media commentary is to engage in a seemingly risky move, but then beating expectations. Without the very real media perception of risk for tonight's speech, it would be virtually impossible for Obama to beat expectations. Now, thanks to the heavy dose of concern trolling, he shouldn't have much difficulty defeating expectations.
My confidence in the last sentence comes from my inability to understand exactly why the stadium setting is any riskier than the convention setting. Obama has spoken before huge crowds before--even bigger than this one--and nothing has happened. Further, given that most of the people in the audience will be people who traveled to Denver in order to promote Democrats, it will be an extremely pro-Obama crowd. Yet further, as I explained yesterday, McCain's "celebrity" attacks on Obama aren't actually working, as Obama's favorables have risen throughout the summer. No matter what conventional wisdom says, McCain has risen by improving his own image, not by damaging Obama's.
So really, I don't see any big risk tonight, even though I am glad that journalists and pundits do. The best position to be in is when the media sets low expectations for you. At that point, you are pretty much guaranteed to rise to the occasion.
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