There was a moment after Barack Obama spoke but before Michelle and the children had made it on stage when the crowd roared and the fireworks shot into the sky, but the candidate stood alone. It was clear that the Mile High crowd was exactly that, caught up in the emotion of the moment, but Obama seemed oddly apart from it all, and at least to this TV viewer, there was a sense of disconnection. I admit to being a fan of Obama's more rhetorical and eloquent style, yet I also believe he needed to be more "workman-like" as his campaign described the speech. And I agree with Jon and John and Frank that Obama hit many of the notes the uncommitted (and particularly white, working class voters) needed to hear. But the speech was uneven in delivery, too long, and suffered from the curse of comprehesiveness, which at times made Obama seem almost more defensive than feisty and may have even allowed some viewers to drift off between the best lines. I do not think the Mount Olympus stage did him any favors either--the acoustics of a hall setting would have given TV viewers more of the texture of his voice and emotion--as well as that of his connection to the crowd. But I seem to be alone in my opinion among my colleagues, and I certainly hope I am wrong.