Your correspondent just doesn’t wanna like Democratic wannaveep Tim Walz.

The way he carries on at rallies like a panting puppy.

The whole deals with alleged “stolen valor,” coaching role exaggeration, grandma-lockup and especially “Tampon Tim.”

His cuddling with imams and Chi-Coms, and coddling of ravaging rioters and precinct pyromaniacs.

Yet this cynical, seen-it-all, ink-stained wretch found his whole face stretched by an ear-to-ear and – wait for it – joyous grin watching the Land-of-a-Thousand-Laker exchange a heartfelt bear hug with his weeping scion. And then join in the traditional lifting of clasped hands with his entire just-too-perfect family to cap a triumphant tour de force of an acceptance speech Wednesday night.

Near his oration’s denouement, the Minny guv insisted that “when somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they plan on using it.” (More on that in a minute.)

Well, someone clearly coached up Coach Walz on how the conventional veep convention playbook is drawn up – ‘cause he ran it to a T. And thereby took the big W for the night.

Even over bigger names like still-Slick Willie Clinton, surprisingly substance-free Josh Shapiro, wet-behind-the-ears Wes Moore, pompous Mayor Pete (notably not introduced as Transportation Secretary) and even the Otherworldly Oprah.

How, you might ask?

He defined himself – brilliantly. Rule one in politics: Define yourself before the other side does. Here, Coach Walz shined: introducing himself off-the-bat as the humbly grateful, patriotic, aw-shucks, farm boy, shirt-off-his-back kinda family man you might not always see eye-to-eye with but would love to have as your neighbor, hunting buddy, hubby, dad, teacher, coach and yes, maybe even vice president.

Up till his down-home homily, this commentator thought the line of the convention was feisty Michelle O’s zesty zinger that “the job (Donald Trump)’s currently seeking might just be one of those ‘Black jobs.’”

Trumped, to coin a phrase, by Walz’s firm but folksy defense of “personal choices” on abortion and fertility treatments, governed by his version of the “Golden Rule: mind your own damn business.”

And topped off by a winsome if misleading characterization of his record as an accidental legislator and state chief executive who is pro-Second Amendment – and the best shot in Congress – but prioritizes his and other children’s safety, cut taxes, fought crime (guffaw!), made housing affordable, cut drug costs and fed schoolkids.

He continued to define his opponents – bitingly. The second rule of politics: Define your opponents before they do (or more successfully than they do). 

In addition to another dig at J.D. Vance’s Ivy League credentials, Coach W dredged up his one-word taunt that had already knocked his opposite number on his heels: “weird.”

Along with the Democrats’ favorite, annoyingly effective bogeyman – the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. Which Walz, as noted, proceeded once again to hang around the GOP ticket’s neck as its “playbook,” despite Trumpian denials.

And promptly mischaracterized as a plan to:

• “Jack up costs on the middle class” (pot calling the kettle black, mayhap?
• “Repeal the Affordable Care Act” and “gut Social Security and Medicare” (no such proposals in the document) and 
• “Ban abortion nationwide” (The Donald, in fact, has drawn ire,and fire, from within his own party for insisting such determinations now be made at the state level).

But hey! If your blueprint is a 900-page black box with an ominous name that sounds like it comes out of a dystopian Ray Bradbury novel … 

and you’ve failed Politics 101 and 102 by neglecting to define it in terms accessible to the public and allowing your opponents to fill in the blanks …  

and your own former budget director is on latter-day Candid Camera claiming to be coordinating with the campaign, who’s going to fact-check? 

Not the Big Propaganda Media (as Tulsi Gabbard dubs it). And certainly not your viewing audience.

He teed up the head of the ticket — “bigly.” Coach W convincingly made a case for Kamala Harris as a “tough … experienced … and ready” former prosecutor and senator and current No. 2 who has “fought on the side of the American people” against “predators and fraudsters,” “transnational gangs,” and “powerful corporate interests” with “energy, passion, and” … there’s that word again… “joy.”

He also spoke to a current criticism of the presidential nominee … and set up her likely acceptance speech themes … by promising to tell the American people “exactly (emphasis added) what she’d do as president before we ask for their votes.”

And then engaged in the manner of exercise Winston Churchill once described as “terminological inexactitude” – albeit not ineffectively. By vaguely claiming Ms. Harris will cut middle-class taxes, make housing affordable, “take on Big Pharma” and “fight for the freedom to live the life you want to lead,” presumably meaning to wallow in gender confusion and abort babies.

And he fired up the crowd — boisterously. Job one for the veep nominee is to serve up a heapin’ helpin’ of red meat for the assembled delegates, whose raucous response in turn rouses an infectious sense of poll-bumping passion among the viewing public.

An assignment which saw the unfortunate Mr. Vance fall flat on his face as his equally flat delivery steadily drained the energy out of his audience. (Appropriately, the good senator appeared immediately after Walz’s happy warrior act on Fox News looking and sounding as if he had been sucking on a sour pickle.)

But just the right job for a coach accustomed, in his words, to giving “pep talks.” And boy, did he ever unleash one, pumping up the faithful with an ascending exhortation to “get in the trenches and do the blocking and tackling. One inch at a time, one yard at a time, one phone call at a time, one door knock at a time, one $5 donation at a time.” And to “leave it all on the field.”

All of which led usually laid-back former senator and Fox News analyst Harold Ford to gush, “I like this guy.”

And your still-grinning correspondent grudgingly to admit that for one night at least, his speechwriter side did, too.

Bob Maistros, a regular contributor to Issues & Insights, is a messaging and communications strategist, crisis specialist, and former political speechwriter. He can be reached at bob@rpmexecutive.com.