So it’s now official, and 80,000 packed into the Denver Broncos’ football stadium in Denver on Thursday were there to see it: Barack Obama is now indisputably the Democratic candidate for the 2008 presidential election campaign, and the first bi-racial man in American history to win the nomination of a major party. The unlikely campaign that began 19 months ago in the freezing winter of Springfield, Illinois had reached and passed its penultimate hurdle.

Senator Obama himself, revelling in the biggest political extravaganza the US has ever seen, seized the opportunity on prime-time, coast-to-coast television to switch gears in campaign strategy – and the nation witnessed non-confrontational Obama morph into combative Obama.

“If John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament and judgment to serve as the next commander-in-chief, that’s a debate I’m ready to have,” he roared with the characteristically brilliant, soaring oratory that has stirred so much enthusiasm across the world. “I’ve got news for you, John McCain. We all put our country first… John McCain likes to say that he’ll follow bin Laden to the gates of hell, but he won’t even go to the cave where he lives.”

McCain, meanwhile, also took advantage of the evening to spring a surprise, one-upmanship campaign ad on the nation’s television screens. Oozing supposed sincerity, McCain looked straight into the camera and congratulated his opponent: “Senator Obama, this is truly a good day for America,” he said. “Too often, the achievements of our opponents go unnoticed.” Minutes later, viewers saw an Obama campaign ad featuring a negative personal attack on McCain – all with the overall effect that Mr Nice Guy seemed to have transformed into an attack dog during the course of the evening, while the veteran old toughie McCain had changed into the warm and fuzzy of the two candidates.
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