All eyes on Bill Clinton at Democratic convention

All eyes at the Democratic convention will be on Bill Clinton, late on Wednesday, as the former president and one-time darling of the party seeks to put aside months of hard feelings to back Barack Obama.

Delegates will also create a piece of history, by going through a formal roll-call to enshrine the Illinois senator, 47, as the party’s White House candidate, making him the first ever black presidential nominee. Obama’s vice presidential nominee Joseph Biden meanwhile is set to deliver his keynote speech, likely to hammer the convention’s Wednesday theme of national security, and to highlight his tragedy-scarred life story.

Act two of the Clinton melodrama at the convention will come a day after Obama’s former primary rival Hillary Clinton stirred a rapturous reception and ordered her army of millions of supporters to back the party ticket.

Bill Clinton has been waging a ill-tempered feud with the Obama campaign for months, and has yet to offer a full-throated endorsement of the new party standard bearer. Clinton, who accused the Obama camp of playing the “race card” on him, seems to have taken his wife’s loss hard, and appears to believe his legacy as the only Democrat to win two terms since World War II is getting insufficient respect.

Reports quoting unnamed Clinton aides have said the former president will not attend Obama’s acceptance speech, due to be delivered before more than 70,000 supporters in an open-air football stadium here on Thursday night.

The former first lady’s speech was an emotional final act to a presidential campaign, which took audacious aim at history, but fell just short. “Whether you voted for me, or voted for Barack, the time is now to unite as a single party with a single purpose,” said Clinton, who got a euphoric welcome for her prime-time speech on Tuesday at the Democratic National Convention.

“We are on the same team, and none of us can sit on the sidelines,” she said, vowing to work to elect the man who thwarted her presidential dreams, and who will make his own history by becoming the first black presidential nominee.

Clinton also laid into the Republicans, and their candidate John McCain. “No way, no how, no McCain,” she said. Republicans however noted that the New York senator, however, did not say Obama was ready to serve as commander-in-chief and sought a political, rather than personal connection with the new party champion. The roll-call vote of the states in the hall is a time-honoured feature of the convention, which in days gone by was often fraught with tension but is now merely a ceremonial affair.

Intense negotiations between Clinton and Obama camps took place to ensure that the former first lady gets her due, and has her 18 million primary votes honoured, while stressing an image of unity.

But Republicans made a fresh attempt on Wednesday to pick at the scars of the divisive primary campaign, arguing that Clinton’s endorsement of Obama was hardly comprehensive. “She never really answered the key question, is he prepared to be President which is the issue she put out there rather dramatically during the primaries,” said former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani on Fox News.