In a highly-edited account of his 41-year marriage to Hillary Clinton earlier this week, the 42nd president of the United States called his wife the “best darn change-maker” he’d ever met.

It was a clear attempt to switch sides in that old political tussle between change and continuity; Donald Trump is currently perceived as the “change candidate”, and the former First Lady realises the electoral advantage in that perception.

Yet in accepting the Democratic nomination in Philadelphia on Thursday night, Clinton was attempting to ride two horses at once – and not always successfully.

Read more: Hillary Clinton: 'I'm a steady hand in a dangerous world'

For one horse, having shed Senator Bernie Sanders on day one of the convention, insists on galloping to the left, while the other is attempting to pick up Republicans appalled at their Grand Old Party’s sudden bolt to the right. 

And while the continuity bit was straightforward enough – Hillary aligning herself with the “man from Hope” (her husband) and the “man of Hope” (Barack Obama) – the change part was trickier given her four-decade political career and the “Clinton” surname.

This was the sort of “continuity” despised by some of Bernie’s still-brooding supporters, many donning fluorescent jackets to make clear their unhappiness.

Read more: Hillary Clinton: 'I'm a steady hand in a dangerous world'

Yet at points it was a very Sanders-like speech, with talk of a “progressive” platform, pledges on workers’ rights and pops at Wall Street.

The fluorescent blobs, however, clearly weren’t convinced, only reluctantly bursting into life when Clinton thanked their man, adding: “I’ve heard you. Your cause is our cause.” But then she spoilt it all by talking of the Founding Fathers’ “compromising”, not the sort of language the faithful wanted to hear.


Clinton also quoted the United States’ motto, e pluribus unum, “out of many, we are one”, something not only directed at a divided party but a deeply divided country.

In attacking Donald Trump, she channelled both Republicans (from “Morning in America” to “Midnight in America”) and Democrats (“the only thing we have to fear is fear itself”), and indeed cleverly turned most of his best-known lines against him. “Americans don’t say: ‘I alone can fix it’,” she declared at one point. “We say: ‘We’ll fix it together.” 

Then Clinton focused on her personal continuity: eight years a First Lady, another eight a New York Senator and four as Secretary of State, job titles that only told of “what” she’d done rather than “why”.

She thereafter sought to give more of herself – there was lots about her mother and childhood bullies – transforming her perceived weaknesses into strengths. It was true she “sweat the details of policy”, but then why shouldn’t that be the case with someone who aspired to high office? “It’s a big deal,” said Hillary, “and it should be a big deal to your president.” 

Read more: Hillary Clinton: 'I'm a steady hand in a dangerous world'

Again and again Clinton emphasised that she’d be a president not only for Democrats but Republicans and Independents too, but occasionally there was tension a message that simultaneously pitched left and right.

She said voters were right to be “frustrated, even furious” about inequality, but also defended the US military as a “national treasure”, prompting chants of “no more war!” from the Californian delegation.  

There were also several portions of motherhood and apple pie from a candidate who claimed to revel in policy detail. More “good” jobs!

Higher wages! Making things! Often it resembled the SNP at their Panglossian worst, and while Clinton contrasted Trump’s “empty promises” with her party’s offer of a “bold agenda to improve the lives of people across our country”, detail came there none.

To be fair there was some policy meat on the rhetorical bone. A constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United (crucial caveat: “if necessary”) and a promise to work with Bernie Sanders on making “college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all”.

But there was no big idea that threatened to compete with Trump’s simplistic but effective cry of “Make America Great Again”, rather there were lots of standard Democratic tropes dressed up as a radical break with centrist orthodoxy. 

Nor did Clinton reveal herself to be any more compelling a public speaker, wading through cheers rather than surfing them, throwing away some good lines through poor delivery.

At points the crowd got bored and chanted her name instead, in response to which Hillary looked uncomfortable and later, when pyrotechnics signalled the end of her speech, almost cartoon-like in her surprise.

But then this convention didn’t require a modern Gettysburg Address, it just needed Clinton to appear solid, as embodying both continuity and a degree of change.

For her greatest virtue is not being Donald Trump, and her party will be hoping she retains control of both horses until at least early November.