DNC Night 2: Hillary Clinton has high bar to jump

News Correspondent Richard Lui

Many analysts say Senator Hillary Clinton has jumped and made it over a very tall high-bar after the second night of the Democratic National Convention. She had three major objectives to achieve in 25 minutes.

Sen. Hillary Clinton, with daughter Chelsea, receives a standing ovation from the Democratic delegates.

First, she had to thank delegates representing the 18 million votes she received during the long primary battle with Barack Obama. Committed Clinton delegates wanted to feel they were appreciated and not taken for granted moving in the nomination of Barack Obama.

Clinton also had to unify the party. There have been reports of a Clinton-Obama rift behind the scenes. Did Obama vet Clinton as a VP possibility? Did the Obama camp feel the Clintons were not giving their genuine support for Obama's nomination? Whether those were answered yes or no, poll numbers did seem to indicate unification was needed. An august 24 CNN/Opinion Research poll showed more than one in four Clinton supporters planned on voting for McCain.

Clinton's speech had a third objective, and that was to attack Senator McCain by comparing him to President Bush. Some analysts have said day one of the convention failed in that regard; that the speakers did not go for the GOP jugular strongly enough.

As insurmountable as these three objectives seemed to some analysts, they praised the results, giving Clinton an overall thumbs up. A group of CNN analysts gave Clinton high marks on their scorecard, the same grades they gave Michelle Obama on her speech the night before. They agreed her speech would end speculation that she had not fully embraced Obama as the Democratic candidate, noting that Clinton mentioned Obama by name a dozen times, twice as much as she mentioned the Democratic Party itself.

But mentioning him by name may not mean Clinton “felt it” according to one body language expert. Dan hill, author of "Face Time" which looks at the facial coding in the 2008 election, says her face didn't show emotion when she mentioned his name. He highlighted the "crocodile smile" she had each time she mentioned his name. The one point Clinton was passionate about, Hill says, was when she discussed women's right to vote. She brought up Seneca Hills and the women's march to the convention in 1848. Hill says that was the most intense part of the speech, when her eyes went wide and her eyebrows went low, showing anger and commitment. See full analysis of Clinton's body language during her speech.

One indication that Clinton's speech (emotional analysis and pundit grades included) was not enough to bring all camps together was this: as the lights went down on the convention after her speech some Democrats, namely those who would still prefer to have Clinton has their president, had heard enough and went home for good, not planning to stick around for when Obama accepts the nomination.

November is now some two months away. We'll have to wait until then to find out if that high-bar was indeed an easy clearing or just too tall for the Democrats this year.