“So far, it’s been inspiring and predictable.” That’s an assessment of the DNC from Stephen Gale, the newly elected chair of the Sonoma County Democratic Party.

When I talked to Gale, a Santa Rosa resident, today, he said, “Nothing really happened on the first day that I didn’t expect. The appearance of Kennedy was exceptional,” but Democrats had been told that was a possibility all along.

And, “Michelle Obama did as much to introduce herself to voters as to introduce Obama,” he said. “I was very pleased with how well that presentation went.”

The big moment will come tonight when Hillary Clinton takes the stage and seeks to unify the party.

Gale has put in writing some of his other thoughts about the convention, particularly about Ted Kennedy’s appearance. We’ve decided to post them on line. If you would like to read them, click here. Here’s an excerpt:

“Ted Kennedy has been the patriarch of a generation of Democrats for as long as I can remember, being only 11 when John Kennedy visited Dallas for the last time. Five years later, such a short time after I heard him calm an anguished crowd when Martin Luther King was murdered, there was no consoling those whom Robert Kennedy touched and who sought to touch him. Although I would experience grief at the loss of friends who did not return from Vietnam and others who stepped out of line too soon, there is a cold stillness, even today, as I remember the assassination of the second Kennedy. The generous words Ted Kennedy spoke in eulogy were soothing and still hang on my office wall.”

– Paul Gullixson