I must come out forthright and say I will be bitter about tonight regardless of the quality of the speeches. The DNC's decision to shift the venue from the stadium that could seat 70,000 to the convention center which seats about 22,000 has prevented me from attending the last night of the convention. I will still give my thoughts on the night but be aware I was not present for the speeches or events that took place.

The Democratic National Convention's final night brought out a lot of star power in the hope of generating a large audience for Obama. Celebrities like Eva Longoria and Scarlet Johansson spoke impressively on Obama's progress in the White House and the importance of keeping the American dream alive.

Emotions ran high when Beau Biden nominated his own father as the vice president and when he asked if anyone objected, a silence spread which was so absolute one could hear a pin drop. John Kerry spoke before Biden and attempted to discredit Mitt Romney as a candidate with some cheesy jokes and shots at his record. His best line was, "don't outsource the job of commander in chief," when talking about Romney's time at Bain Capital and outsourcing jobs overseas.

However, when Jill Biden took the stage the tone of the night quickly changed. She gave an incredibly heartfelt speech in which she spoke of Joe Biden's emotional struggles and tragedy at the loss of his family.

In my opinion Biden gave the best speech of the night. The vice president gave perhaps the most sincerely ardent speech of the whole convention. He stressed family values and the emotions that circulate among the Americans who are suffering in the country. In addition to his passionate feelings about family values, Biden was incredibly respectful of Mitt Romney. Biden asserted that Romney is not a bad guy, he just has poor policies. Now that may seem to be a small thing to most people, but Biden was so unwavering in allowing anything to besmirch Romney as a person, Joe just showed that he was a stand-up guy. Biden delivered his big line: "Bin Laden is dead and GM is alive." He spoke on Obama saving the auto industry from certain destruction. Biden looked on the verge of crying as he remembered, in his words, the fallen angels who have the served the country. Joe showed how much he cared for the American people, and he declared that Romney didn't understand the American people. He proclaimed America is not on the decline, and never bet against the American people.

Obama disappointed me. He is an incredible speaker, and watching him is always a treat. However, if I wanted to hear his acceptance speech for the nomination I would have hit rewind to four years ago. I wish Obama would have abandoned his "Hope" campaign and instead built upon his incredible accomplishments. Instead, he came out with "Hope 2.0, the presidential edition."

Obama missed a monumental opportunity to credit himself with the accomplishment of health care, and his bailout of the auto industry. In addition, the American people wanted to hear more about the economy, not how hard they have to work to accomplish the American dream and stay in the middle class. If Obama rants about optimism and the turnaround of the economy, no one will believe him. He needed to establish how much he has accomplished given the catastrophe Bush left him. He prevented the total collapse of Wall Street with bailouts and re-established the auto industry. I hope Obama gets re-elected because a Romney presidency is a frightening possibility, but the president will not win over any independent votes with the kind of speech he gave tonight.

-- Malcom Fox

Follow all of Malcom's convention reports: from his own blog.