Despite other commitments and a desire to avoid, live, the overwrought grievance-mongering and arrogant condescension of certain speakers, speech transcripts provided details of the recent Democratic National Convention, the puzzling themes and clear omissions of which raised many questions:

1)  How could Democrats spend three days talking about spending even more tax money on special interests and new programs without once mentioning the $16 trillion national debt, or the $6 trillion added to it in less than four years?

2)  With the economy suffering and the world in turmoil, why did Democrats devote the second night of their convention to some of the least appealing domestic interest groups in their base: Big Labor, abortion advocates and militant feminists?

3) The Democrats have held the White House for four years, and controlled both houses of Congress for the first two. If, as speaker Bob King, president of the United Auto Workers, would have it, Democrats are the last, best hope of "workers," why are so many Americans un- and underemployed?

4)  In her speech to the DNC, Massachusetts senatorial candidate Elizabeth Warren described Bill Clinton as "an amazing man, who had the good sense to marry one of the coolest women on the planet." If Clinton is such a star, why, four years ago, was he unable to persuade his own party to nominate for president "one of the coolest women on the planet?"

5)  Ms. Warren said, "The game is rigged. The system is rigged against you." Is the American system rigged in ways it is not in other parts of the world? What parts are those? Or does Ms. Warren mean that it is rigged against the 10 percent of Americans who pay 70 percent of all federal taxes?

6)  Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, a political action committee, spoke in favor of "reproductive rights" for women. "Reproductive rights," is a euphemism for abortion, an anti-reproductive procedure. Do these people have any sense of irony at all? Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion mill in America. Without commenting on PP's practices, is it common for political action committees to speak at party conventions? Would there be a media outcry if an officer of a friendly PAC were allowed to speak at a Republican convention?

7)  Among second night speakers was Sandra Fluke, an unmarried, thirty-something recent graduate of Georgetown University Law School, who thinks the Catholic institution should pay for her birth control. Is it just me, or do others think it a little creepy that Fluke is considered important enough to speak in prime time at the DNC? Is a two-block walk to an off-campus pharmacy and seven dollars a month for her pills too much to ask of a woman who can afford to attend one of the most expensive schools in America?

8)  After reviewing Richards' and Fluke's remarks, one wonders, are American women powerless? Really? Compared to where else? Saudi Arabia? Afghanistan?

9) When Bill Clinton made the (questionable) claim that, in recent decades, more jobs were created under Democratic presidents than under Republican ones, why did he fail to mention the more than three million fewer Americans who are working today than were working when President Obama took office?

10) Does Barack Obama have anything more to tell Americans that we haven't heard many times before? In his DNC speech, Obama faced the problem of explaining how the next four years would be different without sounding like a failure in his first four. Did anyone hear Obama suggest any changes to current policy? Other than whimsical recollections of earlier Democratic administrations, another hazy vision of "Hope" and some poorly-defined goals Obama should have easily accomplished in his first term, did the president lay out a second-term agenda?  What was it? More of the same? Will voters buy the status quo?

11) Democrats spoke quite a bit about Mitt Romney's success, none of it flattering, but never explained: How can anyone in a private equity firm make a fortune only by selling off "unprofitable businesses" and "shipping jobs overseas"? Where did the money come from to invest in "unprofitable businesses," and why, if a business is and will remain unprofitable, was money invested there in the first place? Equity advisers who make such investments aren't "vulture capitalists," they're even dumber than the people who level such silly charges.

12) After watching interviews of Democratic delegates, un-credentialed attendees and listening to talking heads on some of the cable news channels, one wonders, if a Republican uses it, is there a word left in the English language which isn't racist?

Inquiring minds want to know.