Some Conservatives Praise Joe Biden’s DNC Speech; ‘The Bar Was Pretty Low’

Some conservatives praised former Vice President Joe Biden’s speech accepting the nomination of the Democratic Party to run for president — though they also noted that “the bar was pretty low.”

“Biden crushed expectations,” noted Fox News contributor Guy Benson. Daily Wire editor emeritus Ben Shapiro agreed, adding: “The bar was being alive.”

Biden crushed expectations.

— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) August 21, 2020

The bar was being alive. Joe Biden clearly surpassed it. So that means he had a good night.

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) August 21, 2020

On cnn @jaketapper right now is right. GOP set expectations really low for Biden. He exceeded those expectations. Can we please get past the “will he debate” bs now?

— Erick Erickson (@EWErickson) August 21, 2020

The Blaze agreed: “The par was pretty low.”

C-SPAN reported that Biden’s speech, at 24.5 minutes, was the shortest acceptance speech at a Democratic convention since 1984.

.@JoeBiden's acceptance speech is shortest at a #DemConvention since '84.

Longest: @BillClinton in 1996. pic.twitter.com/XiIzfqMsAN

— CSPAN (@cspan) August 21, 2020

Fox News hosts praised Biden’s speech effusively. Chris Wallace, for example:

Wallace said, “I thought it was an enormously effective speech.”

He continued, “Remember, Donald Trump has been talking for months about Joe Biden as mentally shot, a captive of the left. And yes, Biden was reading from the teleprompter and a prepared speech, but I thought that he blew a hole, a big hole in the characterization.”

He added, “It seems to me that after tonight, Donald Trump is going to have to run against a candidate, not a caricature. The Democrats have had a good convention. Now it’s the Republicans’ turn.”

That puzzled critics who noted that Biden had repeated one of the most notorious lies in recent American political history, the Charlottesville “fine people hoax.” Fox did not fact-check the hoax.

Others commented that while Biden had not made a convincing case for his candidacy, he came across as a good “dad,” as Democrats made the case that the former vice president was more capable;e of “empathy than the incumbent president:

I won't vote for Joe Biden. But I'll admit that following this convention, and watching tonight particularly, has made me want to be a better dad.

— Tim Carney (@TPCarney) August 21, 2020

Republicans will begin their own convention, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Monday.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). His new book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.