"This is really just a supremely entertaining infomercial," Peter Savodnik reports from Chicago for the Free Press. Perhaps, but does it sell the product?

And what exactly is the product?

We got a look at the Buy Now And You Also Get This Bonus! product last night in Tim Walz' speech. Walz, however, has a track record as governor in Minnesota, so that product can be analyzed -- even while Walz avoids the press too. They want to sell him as America's Dad, your Not At All Nosy Neighbor who once set up a snitch line so people could inform on their neighbors' movements during the COVID-19 pandemic. He's also the pugilistic political fighter that let Minneapolis burn for five days before finally allowing the National Guard to restore order in June 2020. 

Plus, I guess he's from a lousy school ...?

And that means ... what, exactly? Democrats who have turned the Ivy League into their epicenter of woke elitism suddenly want to paint a man who went to Yale Law on a GI bill as an elitist. That seems a bit dissonant coming after speeches from two former presidents that went to Harvard (and one to Columbia as well), not to mention speeches from two former First Ladies that went Ivy League schools. Mrs. Obama went to Harvard and Princeton, while Hillary Clinton went to Wellesley and -- wait for it -- Yale Law!

And no one at the 2016 convention seemed bothered by Yale when nominating Hillary.

At least Hillary had a track record in the Senate and State Department at that time, though, and had campaigned hard against Bernie Sanders on some issues for a legitimate nomination. Tonight, Kamala Harris will take the stage, a woman who never got a single primary or caucus vote for this nomination and who remained in relative obscurity as VP for the last three years. Will she lay out her agenda for governing, offer her policy priorities, or even talk specifically about the outcomes of the Biden-Harris administration?

Of course not. Harris plans to "tell her personal story," according to ABC News. And then she'll attack Donald Trump:

The fourth and final day of the Democratic National Convention is leading up to a dramatic finale: Kamala Harris giving her acceptance speech and getting to tell her personal story -- in her own words -- to an audience of millions.

She's expected talk about a middle-class upbringing with a working mother. She will continue to stress the themes we've heard from speakers throughout the convention: optimism and patriotism -- the "politics of joy" -- drawing a contrast, her campaign says, with the "dark" vision of Donald Trump.

In other words, it's a Nancy Pelosi infomercial -- you can't see the product until you buy it!

That sticks in Savodnik's craw:

It’s unclear what these people are peddling.

Certainly not Harris’s proposal to cap the cost of groceries. The only speaker at the convention who has bothered to talk that up has been Bernie Sanders. Everyone else drones on about Harris being a dog lover and a fighter and, most importantly, Momala.

While (rightly) pummeling the GOP–Donald Trump cult of personality, Democrats have mythologized Harris and turned her into an alternate-Harris who would have been unrecognizable to Harris herself just a few weeks ago: tough, caring, super-smart, results-oriented. Hillary Clinton 2.0.

But no one has ventured to say what this alternate-Harris would do in office. Or, more broadly, what her party wants to accomplish over the next four years. There is no program.

To be fair, conventions themselves really are mainly nothing more than infomercials. They are very expensive, very long, and for the most part inconsequential advertising pitches rather than substantive forums for policy and priorities. In some, one can glean those from the speaker list and their placement relative to prime time and the day order. Generally, though, every convention is about "vibes" rather than substance.

The difference, however, is that the nominee has either had to campaign on substance to get to the stage tonight, or has an incumbency to defend. Kamala Harris has not had to do the former, and she's trying to avoid the latter. Had Democrats required Joe Biden's replacement to win an open convention, the nominee would have had to at least address policy and priorities in a one-month compressed quasi-primary, which would have then carried some substantive weight into the acceptance speech. 

Instead, the relentlessly substance-free Kamala -- er, Momala -- will vibe for an hour on the stage tonight. The media will eat it up, as will Democrats' true believers, but the net effect will last as long as cotton candy. It will evaporate nearly as quickly as it's spun, and when the sugar high runs its course, Democrats will still have bought a pig in a poke ... and risk turning the campaign into a slaughterhouse when voters demand substance and answers, especially in two scheduled debates with Trump. 

In fact, the sugar high may come crashing down in Phoenix in mere hours, if Robert Kennedy decides to throw a spanner in the works, as expected. That's what happens when you run not a convention about nothing, but a candidate about nothing. Except power.