Early returns on Kerry speech say nominee delivered message

Referring to the open of John F. Kerry's speech in which he saluted and declared "I'm reporting for duty," NBC anchor Tom Brokaw said that "on this occasion, he fulfilled his duty, delivering a strong speech."

Asked by CBS anchor Dan Rather for his reaction, chief Washington correspondent Bob Schieffer said "Dan, this is the best speech I have ever heard John Kerry make."

Those instant post-mortems on Kerry's speech last night are just the first fragmentary returns, with polls, punditry, and public opinion certain to render a fuller verdict soon. But any quickly congealing conventional wisdom by the media can set the campaign tone for the days ahead. And as veteran presidential adviser David Gergen said on MSNBC last evening, "The next 24 hours are the hours that count."

At a convention in which Al Sharpton's fiery speech seemed to be the only ad lib from a carefully constructed script, there was genuine suspense and uncertainty on the final day. The question on the lips of practically every pundit, anchor, and reporter before Kerry addressed the nation was whether he would finally connect with voters and define himself in the biggest speech of his political life.

On CNN's "Inside Politics," yesterday, senior political analyst William Schneider described a festering problem with Kerry's candidacy. "Voters don't really know him," he explained. The cover stories on this week's Time magazine ("What Makes John Kerry Tick") and Newsweek ("In Search of John Kerry") reinforce the notion of a nation fundamentally unfamiliar with a man described as "an oddly elusive character" and "enigmatic."

The campaign seemed aware of that, having Kerry's Vietnam War boatmates on stage and former senator Max Cleland introduce the Massachusetts senator. Kerry also devoted the first part of his speech to his childhood and how his parents helped shape his values.

Yesterday, in the hours leading up to that crucial address -- in hotel rooms scattered around Boston -- skirmishing spinmasters were busy waging a battle of soundbites and expectations. The idea was not only to influence the coverage of the Kerry speech itself, but to push their message into the daylong diet of convention news and media chatter before the candidate even took to the podium.

In the early morning, dozens of journalists gathered at the Colonnade Hotel for a Christian Science Monitor breakfast featuring Kerry advisor Bob Shrum and speechwriter Terry Edmonds, who laid out their visions for the speech and stressed the mantra of leadership.

"I think he'll do a very good job of telling who he is, what his values are and where he wants to lead the country" said Shrum.

"We want people to get to know him as a human being," and to understand "the fact that he is ready and able to lead the country in a time of great challenge," stressed Edmonds.

Shortly after that, during a briefing for reporters at the Sheraton, Kerry campaign spokeswoman Debra DeShong stayed firmly on the day's message. "We think voters are going to see that John Kerry can lead this nation," she asserted. " And he's going to look presidential."

But across town at the Omni Parker House, in an event that looked and sounded more like a political rally than a press conference, the Republicans rolled out some heavy hitters.

Former Massachusetts governor William Weld, Senator John Cornyn of Texas, and most notably, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani joined forces to paint their own portrait of Kerry.

"This has been a convention in which everything and anything has been discussed but the record of these two men," said Giuliani, standing against a camera-ready backdrop of five American flags. He then described the nominee as "more liberal than Teddy Kennedy, more liberal than Hillary Clinton."

This high-powered counterattack attracted a large crowd of cameras and microphones.

And not long after it ended, Weld and Giuliani started showing up on the cable news networks, energetically wedging their anti-Kerry message into the important news cycles leading up to the Democratic candidate's career-defining speech.

Mark Jurkowitz can be reached at jurkowitz@globe.com