Michelle Obama Takes Center Stage; Democrats Spotlight Rising Star; Obama Speaks To Supporters In Virginia; Democrats Tackle Tough Topics; Democrats Release Party Platform; Democratic Strategy for Winning in November; Hill Harper Supports Obama; What is Middle Class?
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: Democrats get ready to make their opening arguments in their case for re-electing president Barack Obama. I'm Suzanne Malveaux live from the site of the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. Just a week ago, we heard Ann Romney's speech on the personal side of her husband. Well, tonight, it is Michelle Obama's time and her turn. She's not going to have to work as hard to convince people that President Obama is likable. Check it out. In a recent "Washington Post" poll, 61 percent of registered voters said the president seems more friendly and likable compared to 27 percent for Romney. So, what does Michelle Obama need to say tonight to get Democrats revved up, convince voters that her husband should get another four years in office? Well, we're going to talk about -- a little bit about it. We're going to bring in our Republican consultant, CNN Contributor, Alex Castellanos, and Democrat Van Joes who's also president and co-founder of Rebuild the Dream, an initiative to restore good jobs and economic opportunity. Good to see you guys, both, in person. I love this. CNN grill. Likability. You know, Alex, you're always talking about, I don't have to have a beer with a guy, you know, the economy's really important. But people do want to be able to feel like the person in office gets it, they trust him, they know him well. Did he do -- and did an Romney do a good enough job last week not to have that be an issue this week?</s>ALEX CASTELLANOS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I used to work with Mitt Romney. And I always told him that if she ever primaried him, I'd vote for her. She's just a Rock Star, and she is a window -- like many wives and husbands are for their mates, she's a window into who he is. We saw more of him through her eyes sometimes than we do through our own. Michelle Obama has a similar job tonight. You know, the president is such a bright mind, but sometimes we get the sense that he's a little distant from him, that he's better with ideas than people. And she connects him. They've got two lovely daughters. Tell us their story. It's their future as well as everyone else's that Barack Obama is supposed to be doing something about.</s>MALVEAUX: Van, I want you to check this out. This is four years ago. This is when Michelle was really just trying to get the country to know her and her husband a little bit better. And here's how she set it up when she talked to me.</s>MICHELLE OBAMA, FIRST LADY: Our table was smaller. It was in a little bitty apartment, but, you know, we had consistent traditions and rituals and routines in our family that he embraced. The fact that we all got together on thanksgiving, you know, the fact that our Christmases were big with lots of family and cousins. I think that was something coming from a smaller family that he missed although his traditions were pretty solid. It was just with a small group of people. So, I think he -- you know, he has said that, you know, what he would want for his own children would be the kind of traditions and stability that was more reminiscent of how I grew up.</s>MALVEAUX: Van, do you think that's as relevant today as it was four years ago? Because people are looking at their own lives. They appreciate who they are as a first family, but they're looking at their own lives and their own economic situation.</s>VAN JONES, PRESIDENT AND CO-FOUNDER, REBUILD A DREAM: : Well, first of all, it's hard not to get choked up listening to her. It's -- what a turnaround. Four years ago, she was considered this scary one. Now, she's -- like, everybody loves her and he needs to be warmed up a little bit. But, you know, I think what she can shine a light on is how hard he's working and how hard he's trying. There's this myth out there he's just going around playing golf, that he doesn't care. Their whole thing is Obama isn't working. This man is working. I think as a wife and as a mother to talk about that is just to shed a window on the light. The other thing, of course, he's working -- he's not getting that much help from the other side. The Republican party sometimes is like a Lucy holding the football. Every time Charlie tries to kick it, they move the ball. And so, --</s>MALVEAUX: So, Alex, are you going to let him get away with that?</s>JONES: -- I'm just saying, and so the impact of trying to rescue a country without a good partner on the other side, but continuing to go to work every day, I think people understand what that's like to go to work every day, but try to do a good job even if the other people who are supposed to be helping you aren't really helping you.</s>MALVEAUX: And I want us to listen to Ann Romney too, because she also described very much what it was like for her and Mitt Romney in the first days that they were dating and they became a couple. Let's listen real quick.</s>ANN ROMNEY: We got married and moved into a basement apartment. We walked to class together, shared the housekeeping, ate a lot of pasta and tuna fish. Our desk was a door propped up on sawhorses. Our dining room table was a fold-down ironing board in the kitchen. But those were the best days.</s>MALVEAUX: All right, Alex. So, I have to tell you, I mean, this kind of reminds me of the talks that we used to get from our parents. You know, I walked to school uphill both ways, you know? I mean, like they're trying to outdo each other here. Why is that appealing to people? Why are they both trying to seem like, oh, you know, I really had it rougher than you did?</s>CASTELLANOS: Well, I think, Suzanne, you hit it to start with. Policy is great. We want these candidates to tell us where they're going to take us. Just as important is can we trust them to take us there? Do they understand our shared American experience? Are they -- do they have our values? So, it is as important who they are as where they're going. And that's what, I think, family can do for you. I'm going to be interested tonight to see if these two great parents, Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, talk a little bit about education. They've chosen great schools for their kids. I wonder if they're going to extend that opportunity -- equal opportunity to go to a good school to every American.</s>JONES: Well, I mean, and for me, again, I think that you're in a situation where Michelle Obama's one of the most beloved people. She's becoming more of a beloved person. But she's also a fighter. And I think she's going to get out there and want to defend her husband. I think ordinary people are just now starting to tune back in. I think those of us who are political junkies, we watch every, you know, thing that's been going on the last several months. I think people are going to say, hey, the first lady is on television, what does she have to say? And I think she's going to remind people of why we like this family so much and why we want this family to be there because I do think they share our values. Now, they really had a struggle that I think most people can relate to and we've got a president who didn't get a chance to pay off his student loans until a couple years ago. People can relate to that.</s>CASTELLANOS: That's the story people didn't know about Mitt Romney that, yes, he comes from a very successful family but he had to sort over. And what he's made, he's earned. And, by the way, is Obama's Patty speaking tonight? Or is that private?</s>MALVEAUX: Oh.</s>JONES: You got one in there. I love it.</s>MALVEAUX: Final question here. This is a big deal. Obviously, the middle class and who defines themselves as middle class? We hear all kinds of -- I mean, almost outlandish when you think about it, the range from $25,000 all the way up to President Obama who says $250,000. You guys are considered are the middle -- you know, considered the middle class. Does it matter how people just feel as opposed to what they're making? But how they feel how they're doing?</s>JONES: Well, the middle class is a value set in America. I mean, it's -- unless you -- unless you have two jets or you're homeless, you feel like you're the middle class in America. It's part of our identity. The problem we have right now, you saw Democrats struggling, is America better off or America worse off today? The problem that we have right now, you saw Democrats struggling, it was, like, well, is America better off or is America worse off today? The problem we have right now is we now have two Americas. We're beginning to see the sort of split where some are better off and some are worse off. The people who are feeling worse off want to stay in the middle class. They desperately want to stay in the middle class. Romney, unfortunately, his only plan to keep them in the middle class is to cut his own taxes. Obama actually has the plan to keep them in the middle class and rebuild the middle class. I think Michelle can speak to that tonight as well -- the first lady can.</s>CASTELLANOS: I'm shocked -- I'm shocked to find that we may have different views on this. Middle class -- you know, this is a country of equal opportunity and we all believe that's what defines us as Americans. And when you say you're middle class, that's says, look, I'm no better or worse than anyone else, and I just deserve the same shot. That's really what people are saying. I think Romney's challenge, as well as Obama's challenge, is to tell us what's going to be different the next four years. What are we going to do that's going to change things? I think Obama, frankly, the administration, is exhausted. The poverty of ideas has hit them now. There is nothing new they can say, ,so far. Education may be one place, but what's going to be -- Romney hasn't done it either, by the way. Mitt Romney has to get up there and say, I'm going to turn what's been going on in Washington under Republicans and Democrats upside down. End all the crazy spending, get that money out of Washington, get it into your -- in your economy, not Washington's. We've been growing the wrong economy. But somebody has got to come out of this as change.</s>MALVEAUX: All right. Alex, Van, good to see you both. We'll be watching. All right. It is a big night for the Democrats. Even bigger night for the man who's going to give the keynote address tonight. We're talking about Julian Castro. And if you don't know him, you soon will. He's one of the rising stars of the Democratic party. Our Ed Lavandera got the chance to meet him before the big night.</s>JULIAN CASTRO, MAYOR, SAN ANTONIO: Hey, everybody, I'm Julian Castro.</s>ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): First thing you need to know, it's pronounced hoo-lee-ahn Castro. The J is silent, not Julian. But even if you get the Spanish wrong, don't worry, San Antonio's Latino mayor has never mastered Espanol either.</s>CASTRO: I understand Spanish better than I speak it. I grew up in my household with my mother and grandmother mostly speaking English. So, I understand it, but speaking it back is the challenge.</s>LAVANDERA: Julian Castro's grandmother immigrated to San Antonio from Mexico and worked as a community activist in San Antonio's Chicano movements. From those humble beginnings, Julian Castro and twin brother went on to Stanford University and Harvard Law School. Now, he's a rising star in the Democratic party tapped to give the keynote speech at the Democratic convention, the same speech an unknown Barack Obama gave at the convention in 2004.</s>LAVANDERA (on camera): You get talked about as someone who could be the first Hispanic governor of Texas, even -- some people even suggesting the first Hispanic president of the United States. Do you like that kind of talk? Can you handle that kind of pressure?</s>CASTRO: No, I'd be lying if I said that's not flattering. Of course it's flattering to anybody, but the biggest mistake that I could make or anybody could make in this situation is to believe the press. To believe the hype.</s>LAVANDERA (voice-over): Castro was elected mayor in 2009, and then re-elected with 82 percent of the vote. Now, he's 37, the youngest mayor of a top 50 city in the United States. He's also used to the baby face jokes. (on camera): I think one of the funnier things that has happened to you, when you first met President Obama, he jokingly asked if you were the intern.</s>CASTRO: That's right, yes.</s>LAVANDERA: You being asked to do this speech, is that kind of making up for that jab?</s>CASTRO: I don't know. I don't know. But I accept -- you know, I always got the age jokes at different points in my career.</s>LAVANDERA: Is it still happening?</s>CASTRO: Every now and then. You know, but I'm starting to get the gray hair that I need from my three-year-old daughter and from politics.</s>LAVANDERA (voice-over): This is the biggest speech of Castro's career. Latinos enjoyed prominent speaking roles at the Republican convention, and Castro must convince Latinos to stick with President Obama and turn out in big numbers. (on camera): But there are a lot of Latino leaders out there who say that President Obama has not been a friend of the Latino community.</s>CASTRO: Under any score, immigration, education, health care, on any number of issues, he has been a very effective advocate for the community -- for the Latino community.</s>LAVANDERA (voice-over): He's in the midst of pushing for a small sales tax hike to fund pre-kindergarten programs for low-income children back in San Antonio. Castro enjoys a squeaky clean political image except for that 2005 San Antonio river walk parade scandal. Castro was a city councilman and couldn't make it to the parade in time. So, his twin brother jumped on the city council float instead. Castro's political opponents said the brothers were trying to fool the massive crowd. Castro laughs it off now. (on camera): How can we be sure that you're going to be the Castro brother giving the speech tonight?</s>CASTRO: Well, he says he's a lot better looking than I am. So, there you go. And the wedding ring is another good (</s>INAUDIBLE.) LAVANDERA (voice-over): Actually, his brother, Joaquin Castro, will introduce his twin at the convention. You'll see the Castro brothers standing side by side. Ed Lavandera, CNN, San Antonio, Texas.</s>MALVEAUX: Democrats bringing out the heavy hitters this week. The lineup of the speakers includes the first lady, former presidents and rising stars in Democratic party. First lady Michelle Obama speaking tonight. So does San Antonio mayor Julian Castro. Tomorrow night, former president Bill Clinton takes the stage and Thursday vice president Biden, he's going to accept his nomination ahead of President Obama's acceptance speech. Hear what's -- here's what we're working on for this hour. President Obama speaking to voters in Virginia on his last stop before heading to his party's convention. Heat could be a deadly problem today for storm victims living without air-conditioning, that's in Louisiana and Mississippi. Of course, we keep hearing about the middle class and the election but who exactly is the middle class, and how much do you need to make to actually be in it?