Kerry and Edwards: The Buddy Picture

"Now, Jack's got his priorities wired, doesn't he?" Kerry says to laughter.

He hits more laugh lines than usual. And -- a most un-Kerryeque phenomenon, he is laughing at his own jokes.

"We've got better vision," Kerry says, comparing his ticket to the Republicans'. "We've got better ideas, we've got real plans. We've got a better sense of what's happening to America." This sounds like standard stump speech pap until he curve-balls. "And we've got better hair," he says.

He'll say it again later at a rally in Dayton.

Kerry introduces Edwards, who leads with a fail-safe Jack vignette.

He'd just overheard Jack ask why there are so many American flags here. "I've got an answer for my son," Edwards says, and the audience awaits a punch line. "It's because when John Kerry is president of the United States, we're going to restore real American values."

The applause feels obligatory.

Edwards's voice is lower than usual. He is almost subdued.

There is music, cheering and rain that disperses about a third of the crowd by the time the speeches end. Confetti goes up and comes down, much of it into the ample heads of hair onstage.

In Dayton, Kerry will remove his suit coat (Edwards-like) and Edwards will keep his on (Kerry-like). Later the Kerry-Edwards Double-Date Tour will proceed to Florida on a plane that can only be called Hair Force One.