Wow. Bill Clinton’s speech last night was extraordinary.

Granted, I’m not sure it’s enough to heal the Clinton-Obama rift, or persuade any undecided Hillary supporters.

But on the level of oratory, it was remarkable.

What Clinton lacks in his ability to inspire, he more than makes up for in his ability to explain and, crucially, empathize. He just took the impersonal complexity of global economic system and repackaged it in personal terms, in a language and story anyone could understand.

For all his own rhetorical gifts, that’s a skill Obama has yet to master. In fact, it’s probably his most glaring weakness as a campaigner.

In that sense, Clinton’s speech was more magnanimous than it might appear. It was designed not to show Obama up, but to show him the way—to offer him a textbook example of how to explain and empathize at the same time.

Hopefully Obama was wise enough to take note. He won’t enter the White House unless he learns to do the same thing.