Elizabeth Warren DNC 2012 Speech: All the Things She Got Right as a Speaker

Elizabeth Warren took the stage Wednesday at the Democratic National Convention with a difficult task. She had to speak before the much anticipated and greatly admired former President Bill Clinton. Few would have chosen a slot so destined for the get-out-of-the-way sentiment, yet Warren did herself and her party proud. As she works to defeat an incumbent Republican to regain the deceased Ted Kennedy's Senate seat in Massachusetts, her DNC speech sounded middle class, sounded tough, and sounded determined.

She said, "I never thought I'd run for Senate" and she sounded authentic. She said "I'm here to talk about hard working people" and she sounded endearingly common. She discussed those "who grew up on the ragged edge of the middle class" and she sounded inspiring. She talked about "a middle class chipped, squeezed, and hammered" and bound herself to everyone feeling the pain of today's economy. When she said "their fight is my fight" she was what every politician tries so hard to be but few accomplish: populist.

She discussed "a system that is rigged." She referred to Teddy Roosevelt as a progressive, something sure to draw the ire of all those Republicans grasping at the straws of their long abandoned social justice roots. When Warren said she would fight against the "I got mine Republicans" she tapped the very pulse of what the Democratic Party seethes against. All of this was merely prologue as she uttered one of the night's best quotes saying, "corporations are not people!" The applause was long and deafening. Take that Mitt Romney.

As she closed she invoked the spiritual, quoting Matthew chapter 25 verse 40, which admonishes us to care for one another as a sacred duty. In the end she asked "are you ready to answer the call? Whereupon she answered herself saying "I'm ready!"

Although she trails Scott Brown by a few percentage points, I wouldn't vote against Elizabeth Warren or President Obama. Tonight it was hard to imagine anything but victory.