The Best and Worst Speeches of the DNC's Third Night

Over the last decade, no one has been better at making us laugh at Joe Biden than the Onion. "Shirtless Biden Washes Trans Am in Driveway," read a headline on May 5, 2009—just a few months after he and President Barack Obama were sworn in to their respective offices. And last night, as the vice president spoke to the Democratic National Convention, the long-running satirical newspaper absolutely unloaded an avalanche of Biden headlines, each more hilariously dead-on than the last: "Biden Busted in DNC Parking Lot Selling Bootleg 'I'm With Her' T-Shirts," "Biden Chokes Up While Describing Hardworking Americans Who Can Only Afford Shitty Ditch Weed."

Far from portraying him as a scumbag or parking-lot weed dealer, the joke is that Biden is a "cool dad" type—a suited-up, Secret Service–detailed alternate-universe version of one of the subjects on True Life Presents: My Dad Is a Bro. And he's not alone, for a fair number of the speeches on night three of the DNC were either peppered with dad jokes, or engineered to trigger dad jokes about dad jokes. (Insert your own "domination of the patriarchy continues" remark here—it's warranted!)

Amid chants of "Joe," Biden used his 18 minutes of time to speak rousingly about the middle class, telling the audience at points to quiet down in a way not unlike a father telling his kids in the backseat to stop messing around; after ruminating on Donald Trump's "You're fired!" catchphrase with the amazement of someone who just ripped from a bong, he exhaled, "That's a bunch of malarkey!" like your pops yelling at the TV after someone in the outfield missed catching a fly ball.

In the opening minutes of President Obama's beautifully delivered, pitch-perfect speech, he pridefully referred to his daughters as "two amazing young women who just fill me with pride," before cracking wise on Sasha and Malia, observing how eight years of governing our increasingly rancorous nation has weathered his own physical appearance.

Notable Rock Dad Lenny Kravitz performed "Let Love Rule" backed by a choir and without risking, uh, overexposure, and shortly after a speech delivered by the vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine, the FADER and Buzzfeed ran nearly identical Kaine-as-ultimate-dad-joke articles, owing to his folksy, just-fine delivery and his silly Donald Trump impression.

Incidental or not, fatherhood may have been a hot topic during the DNC's third night—but the constant, unending torrent of gun violence in America was a far more potent topic addressed throughout. Film director and Empire creator Lee Daniels gave an impassioned, touchingly shambling speech, urging the government to tackle gun control in a meaningful way. Legendary actress Angela Bassett's appearance with survivors of the 2015 Charleston church shooting was absolutely heartrending, as well as a reminder of the total uselessness that "thoughts and prayers" have accomplished in pushing our country toward a meaningful solution to ending gun violence. And Arizona House representative and victim of gun violence Gabby Giffords's speech provided a moment of equal emotional potency: "Speaking is difficult for me, but come January, I want to say these two words: 'Madam President.'"

After last week's largely agenda-less parade of xenophobia and paranoia, it has been a startling and comforting change to hear actual policy being discussed on a convention stage. The DNC's overall approach in attacking Trump may have been largely unfocused this week, but the issue-focused orations have been specific and effective—especially Sigourney Weaver's speech focusing on climate change, an issue that hasn't been touched on by either side of the political aisle in this election.

"What we're really talking about is people," she said before a powerful doc played. "People whose lives are affected by climate change in America, right now." As is the case with many of the social issues that the US faces during this election cycle, the sentiment might amount to not much else beyond "too little, too late"—but, especially after peeling back the corpse flower-esque layers of cynicism required to get through this year, it's at least a start.

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