Black Voters Like Obama
Yahoo! News - USA
The Nation — The big news in today’s Washington Post/ABC poll is that black voters like Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record). He now leads …

Barack Obama and The Experience Factor
Scripps News - Washington,DC,USA
By MARTIN SCHRAM. "The Experience Factor." The words resonate wherever pols and pundits congregate, sipping and opining at watering holes along the campaign …

Oprah Winfrey embraces Barack Obama: Can she drive votes?
ZDNet.com blogs - USA
… to be competitive during this process, I’ve decided to make the maximum allowable primary donation to Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama. …

Barack Obama gets key Indian American backing
Indian Muslims - San Diego,CA,USA
New York, Feb 26 (IANS) The 2008 US presidential election nominee, Democrat Barack Obama, has received some key support from the Indian American community. …

Rice: Obama’s Run Shows Black Progress
Washington Post - Washington,DC,USA
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice finds Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama appealing and says it won’t be much longer before …

An Open Letter to Barack Obama
American Chronicle - Beverly Hills,CA,USA
I’m 26 years old and I never voted for anyone in an election for anything until this past November. I don’t think politicians can be trusted. …

Barack Obama’s audacity of hope
Manila Times - Manila,Philippines
ON Barack Obama’s first day as a senator, occupying a tiny transition office right next to a janitor’s closet in the basement of the Dirksen office building …

Barack Obama is not just addressing the American people. He is addressing the world gone cynical over corrupt, incompetent and morally degenerate leaders. He tells the world that a different future is possible. He tells us that there is power in conviction. And that beneath all the differences of race and region, faith and station, the world comprises one people. He tells us that there is power in hope. Obama, unadulterated and still uncorrupted, has the makings of a great American president. Our people need such leaders; not actors, boxers or brain-impaired justice secretaries, but leaders who have the capacity to instill the hope and reality of real change.

Nothing makes as satisfying a pop as the conventional wisdom being punctured. Take Barack Obama. The mainstream press loves the idea that Obama is wildly popular across America — everywhere, that is, except the households of African-American voters.

Why? Difficult to say, but here are a few scattered guesses. It allows quickly generated news shows to present truisms about race as sage wisdom (”one thing is certain: Obama cannot take black voters for granted”); it allows them to stage a generational spat, established black activists against the fresh face; to question Obama’s authenticity; and finally to “balance” their coverage, by pointing out in the mid-section of such stories that Hillary Clinton currently seems to enjoy more support in the African American community (”And she’s a white candidate. That’s irony for you. Back to you in Situation Room, Wolf.”)

But what a difference two weeks makes.

Following Obama’s announcement on February 10, attitudes have apparently shifted dramatically. Here’s the key nugget from the Post poll, under the heading “Blacks Shift to Obama, Poll Finds”:

In December and January Post-ABC News polls, Clinton led Obama among African Americans by 60 percent to 20 percent. In the new poll, Obama held a narrow advantage among blacks, 44 percent to 33 percent. The shift came despite four in five blacks having a favorable impression of the New York senator.

Interesting. And you don’t have to do much math to figure out what these figures project over the next six months. You guessed it: an intensification of the Clinton campaign’s “Deploy Bubba” strategy.

Good God, how I love this race. And it’s only February 2007.

Late Update, March 1, 8:26 am:

Hold the phone! Apparently the MSM isn’t going to let go of the “Blacks Suspicious of Obama” meme that easily. CNN puts these seemingly dramatic new numbers in a more comfortable light. Speaking of the Post poll, Candy Crowley writes:

That change represents a stunning 24-point swing, but does it mean the black community has embraced the Illinois Democrat as its candidate?

“Obama does have a plurality of black voters right now. He doesn’t have a majority yet,” CNN Polling Director Keating Holland said. “That means a majority of blacks still aren’t sure about him.”

Ah, now it all comes into focus. It isn’t enough to register a 24-point swing in the African-American vote; not enough to lead a woman with near-100% name recognition in that crucial Democratic demographic. No, only a majority of the black vote will count as significant.

And of course, when Obama’s support in the African-American community tops 50%, as it almost certainly will, analysts will pivot and point out that nearly half of black voters prefer a candidate other than Obama.

And so on.

If Obama eventually tallies 75% support in the African American community, and Hillary Clinton 25%, more than a few voices in the media will continue to figure this as a measure of Hillary’s solid strength among black Americans.

And they will be right. Both Clintons enjoy broad-based support in that demographic, and for good reason.

But that’s beside the point: the point is that the media seems extremely reluctant to give up the idea that the average black American views Obama with suspicion. They like dividing him, in their coverage, from “real” African-Americans.

And that’s not only a bit creepy, it’s a lot silly.

According to Steve Benen’s Carpetbagger Report…

Following this week’s dust-up over David Geffen’s comments about Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama is reportedly trying to lower the temperature a bit. He told an audience in Houston last night that the nation will remain at a standstill “if we continue to engage in small and divisive politics and tit-for-tat.” Obama also told the NYT that he wasn’t aware of the competing press statements as they were flying, and he told his staff that he doesn’t want his team “to be a party to these kinds of distractions because I want to make sure that we’re spending time talking about issues.”

In handling things this way, he seems to appreciate the discomfort many felt about the initial response to the Clinton/Geffen story. And is staying true to this part of his announcement speech…

That is why this campaign can’t only be about me. It must be about us - it must be about what we can do together. This campaign must be the occasion, the vehicle, of your hopes, and your dreams. It will take your time, your energy, and your advice - to push us forward when we’re doing right, and to let us know when we’re not.

Bravo Barack, bravo!

And now the Link Party…

Barack Obama Rally Heads To Larger Venue
CBS 42 - Austin,TX,USA
(CBS 42) AUSTIN Presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama will be in Austin Friday afternoon for a rally. And apparently so many people want to see and hear …

Oprah Winfrey Backs Barack Obama
Post Chronicle - USA
Media titan Oprah Winfrey is throwing her considerable weight behind Barack Obama’s bid to become America’s first black president after dismissing public …

Why Obama will surprise national political pundits
Chicago Sun-Times - Chicago,IL,USA
First, just because a prominent African-American leader endorses Hillary Clinton, that doesn’t mean Barack Obama’s campaign has suffered a mortal wound. …

In Illinois, at least, large numbers of black voters tend to take their time making up their minds. In political parlance, they ‘’break late.'’

Ten months before the March 2004 U.S. Senate primary (about where we are now before the Iowa caucuses), Obama’s own polls showed him winning just 34 percent of the black vote. About a month before the primary, African-American voters began ‘’breaking'’ in large numbers to his candidacy. As they began focusing on the campaign, black voters saw he was viable, liked his message and a significant percentage finally realized he was African American. He ended up winning just about all their votes.

This same pattern has been repeated time and time again during the past 25 years here. Harold Washington didn’t start off his campaign with the majority of black support against a white female with a huge war chest and the powers of patronage and incumbency, but he certainly ended that way.

Proposal by Obama on Public Financing Appears to Gain
New York Times - New York,NY,USA
The opinion is a response to an inquiry by Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination. It is an indication of how …

Barack Obama Draws Large Crowds In Urban Areas
CBS 5 - San Francisco,CA,USA
(AP) WASHINGTON Leah Hanes had never been much into politics until she ended up at a Barack Obama rally this week in Los Angeles, wearing a campaign T-shirt …

I’d like to invite any Obama supporters who stumble across this post to join a few related BarackObama.com groups that just might be able to provide Obama HQ with the helpful feedback that Barack asked for in his announcement speech.

Obama Rapid Response (82 members so far!)
Help monitor misinformation and negative political spin about Barack Obama. And organize efforts to respectfully contact media outlets to correct the record.
Group home page
Blog home page

Citizen Strategy ThinkTank (65 members so far!)
Help Barack Obama craft the messages and strategy that will make him the 44th President of the United States.
Group home page
Blog home page

Website Feedback (58 members so far!)
Help the Web Team continue to evolve this "work in progress" by providing feedback on all aspects of your Web visitor experience.
Group home page
Blog home page

And if you’re in Vermont…

Vermonters for Obama (44 members so far!)
Started in December 2006 and based in Burlington.
Group home page
Blog home page

Robert Greenwald documents the Obama atrocities on Fox News…

And now today’s featured links…

Senators Barack Obama, Claire McCaskill to Introduce Legislation …
All American Patriots (press release) - Taeby,NA,Sweden
Tuesday, February 20, 2007, WASHINGTON, DC – US Senators Barack Obama (D-IL), a member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, and Claire McCaskill …

Obama with Democrats in Des Moines
Radio Iowa - Des Moines,IA,USA
Over 2000 Iowa Democrats assembled in downtown Des Moines last night to see and hear Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. ..

Barack Obama Drawing Large Crowds
Washington Post - Washington,DC,USA
WASHINGTON — Barack Obama’s campaign says 9000 people showed up for his Los Angeles rally, but it’s hard to know for sure. The crowd sprawled around the …

Interest appears high in Barack Obama’s Austin landing
Austin American-Statesman (subscription) - Austin,TX,USA
Barack Obama, D-Illinois, to arrive before his slated 2 pm Friday speech on Auditorium Shores. Obama plans to bring his nascent presidential campaign to …

Ex-Senate leader Daschle endorses Obama
Boston Globe - Boston,MA,USA
Barack Obama won the endorsement Wednesday of former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who said the White House hopeful "personifies the future of …

Minnesota Congressman Ellison Endorses Barack Obama for President
FOX News - USA
Barack Obama, D-Ill., reaches for supporters during a campaign rally in Los Angeles. MINNEAPOLIS — Minnesota US Rep. Keith Ellison says he supports Illinois …

Barack Obama’s Hollywood Debut
Chicago Tribune - Chicago,IL,USA
At the Beverly Hilton, site of the Golden Globe Awards, the stars of the entertainment world came out for a $2300-per-ticket campaign fundraiser with the …

Obama to headline voting rights march commemoration in Selma
The Decatur Daily - Decatur,AL,USA
WASHINGTON — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama will deliver the keynote address next month at the annual Bridge Crossing Jubilee that …

Obama represents a new generation
Philadelphia Inquirer - Philadelphia,PA,USA
Barack Obama (D. Ill.)? His economist father (black) was born in Kenya, giving Obama a connection to Africa more direct than most African Americans have. …

Barack Obama puts UK politicians to shame for Web 2.0 skillz
Mobile Digest - London,England,UK
Check the new website for Democrat candidate Barack Obama, for example, which lets users create their own profiles, hook up to plan local events, …

Obama got start in civil rights practice
Boston Globe - Boston,MA,USA
This photo provided by Harvard University Law School shows Barack Obama as a student at the school in Cambridge, Mass., Feb. 6, 1990. …

Obama’s new breed of baby boomer
Boston Globe - Boston,MA,USA
Senator Barack Obama, shown in Las Vegas on Sunday, grew up in the aftermath of the huge cultural storm of the 1960s….

The Hot Ticket in Hollywood: An Evening With Obama
New York Times - New York,NY,USA
Barack Obama was greeted during a rally on Sunday in Las Vegas. Mr. Obama will be the guest of honor at a celebrity-studded benefit tonight. …

Authentic Obama
Washington Post - Washington,DC,USA
ORANGEBURG, SC — Is Barack Obama "authentically" black? Come on, be real. Is the pope Catholic? Obama made his first campaign trip to this early-primary …

US presidential hopeful Obama targets hedge funds with tax haven bill
HedgeWeek - London,UK
Senator Barack Obama, who has launched a campaign to become the first black US president, has thrown his backing behind a bill that would require hedge …

Political Web sites get personal
PopMatters - Chicago,IL,USA
WASHINGTON—Barack Obama’s newly revamped Web site looks a lot like MySpace and Facebook, and that is no accident. As a presidential candidate offering …

Gigabyte grass roots grow for Obama campaign
Kansas City Star - MO,USA
Barack Obama, an Illinois Democrat, announced that he was forming a presidential exploratory committee, Farouk Olu Aregbe logged on to Facebook.com. …

Obama: US Ready for Black President
ABC News - USA
Barack Obama, D-Ill., makes a campaign visit to Claflin University with a town-hall style meeting Saturday, Feb. 17, 2007, at the Tullis arena in Orangeburg …

Barack Obama: not your typical Chicago politician
Monterey County Herald - Monterey,CA,USA
CHICAGO - Watching Barack Obama launch his presidential campaign, you’d never know he’s from Chicago. He staged the dramatic kickoff downstate in …

The first-term Democratic senator didn’t come up through the rough ranks of Chicago politics. He got his start as a neighborhood organizer who fought City Hall. He was just a bystander to the 1983-87 reign of the city’s only African-American mayor, Harold Washington. He made his first unsuccessful run for Congress against an established black congressman, Bobby Rush. And he ran for the U.S. Senate against an Irish-American Democrat with deep roots in Chicago’s political machine and broad support from the party establishment.

"He’s an enigma," said Denny Jacobs, a former Democratic state senator from East Moline who served with Obama in the state Legislature.

"He’s not the mayor’s guy. He’s not the aldermen’s guy. He’s not the county board chairman’s guy. He’s nobody’s guy. Usually you’re somebody’s guy. In Chicago, that’s a way of life."

It’s not that Obama is at odds with Chicago politics. He’s endorsed Daley for re-election, for example.

But being free of debts to Chicago’s political establishments - black or white - gives him more freedom to seek the White House without being implicated in City Hall patronage investigations or having close ties to a controversial figure such as Jackson.

"He’s trying to show he’s not just a Chicago politician. He’s a politician for all the people," said state Sen. Terry Link, a Democrat from Will County, north of Chicago.

When it comes to politics, I’m ordinarily a very strategically minded person, unlikely to get swept up in things, usually weighing the odds and always keeping an eye on the prize: putting people in office who share my beliefs, rather than people I happen to find charming or likeable.

But this early 2008 Presidential primary season has been more cyclone than cycle so far, and I’ve gotten hurried along with it.

When a Draft Barack Obama movement started to percolate in Burlington, back around mid-December, I thought it was interesting.

Just that: interesting.

No more, no less.

Of course, I’d seen Obama when he came to the University of Vermont to campaign for Peter Welch in 2006, and he was very impressive, no doubt. Extremely impressive.

Still, there was no way I was going to buy a ticket before all the horses had been put through their paces. And then something weird happened: I went to the first Obama meet-up in Burlington.

More than anything else, I went to write about the group, and what struck me immediately was how many showed up: thirty people, give or take. And that was to talk about a candidate who wasn’t even in the race, on a very cold night in December a year before the first primary.

One couple even brought their four kids, all in their PJs, and the kids crashed around the place and produced the excellent sort of mayhem that kids produce near or just past their bedtimes. Since the café specialized in European foods, we all ate spanikopita and baklava, and drank incredibly strong coffee.

And the thirty people turned out to be thirty really wonderful people: thoughtful, committed, passionate. Every other person mentioned Obama’s attempt to move the discourse away from the divisive, and back toward the democratic.

I left that meet-up feeling as though I’d found something I’d been missing for a long while, the sort of common purpose and support that people say they find in their churches, and their twelve-step groups.

It didn’t bear logical examination; nothing that anyone had said made Obama seem a more logical winner in 2008.

But I came away attributing the warmth of the experience partially to Obama himself, because like Dean in 2004, he seemed to be the catalyst for something otherwise unobtainable.

This past Saturday, when Obama announced his candidacy from a platform set up in sight of the Old Capitol Building in Illinois, I watched it with the same group, now called Vermonters for Obama. There were more than forty members now, and Anita, who runs the café, had thrown the speech up onto a white bed sheet tacked to the back wall.

As luck would have it, it was my birthday, and so my mother was in town, and my mother-in-law, and we were all there, with the kids, sitting on love seats thrown together into rows. Obama talked about the promise of the new generation, and I felt deep in the midst of something, maybe inextricably in the midst of something, something powerful.

Maybe it had less to do with Obama than it did with plain human contact; maybe Obama will flame out before his campaign ever truly gets up and running.

The only thing certain at this point is that 2008 will not be a year ruled by logic. It will be made of slipperier stuff: virtual candidates, anonymous attacks, and, if we’re lucky, the thin, distant gleam of hope.

[This piece aired originally on Vermont Public Radio. The MP3 is available here.]

Virginia Governor to Endorse Obama
ABC News - USA
Timothy M. Kaine will endorse Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, perhaps as early as the weekend, two officials said Wednesday. …

Version 2.0 of the Barack Obama Web site ready for prime time
Chicago Tribune - Chicago,IL,USA
When I checked in on the campaign Web sites of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama a few weeks back, it was before the latter had announced he was in it …

Aussie does a favor for Obama
Seattle Post Intelligencer - Seattle,WA,USA
No doubt to most Americans, Australian Prime Minister John Howard’s well-publicized weekend attack on Barack Obama seems mystifying. …

Barack Obama’s On-Point Message Man
Washington Post - Washington,DC,USA
On Saturday in the Lincolnesque setting of Springfield, Ill., when Barack Obama delivered his full-throated appeal to the ideals of a new generation, …

Welcome to Obama’s family
Providence Journal - Providence,RI,USA
His sister, who married Obama in 1992, is in the middle of that campaign, but Robinson knows she was a great success story before she ever met Barack Obama. …

Obama rocks Granite State: And viva NH primary
Boston Herald - Boston,MA,USA
But when I turned up in New Hampshire over the weekend to cover the Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama events, I walked right in. No ID. No credentials. …

Obama’s poker face comes into play
Telegraph.co.uk - London,England,UK
When he was a young state politician in Illinois, Barack Obama played his cards right. "He had the stone face," said Senator Terry Links, who hosted weekly …

I doubt you’d believe it if I didn’t have the transcript, but on Friday, February 9th, the day before Obama announced, Chris Matthews acted as if the madrassa hoax might actually be true.

What does this say about Matthews? Well, I’m not actually sure. A desire to perpetuate something he knew to be false? Or simply an almost complete ignorance about the facts.

I’ll let you try to figure that out for yourself from the relevant portion of his conversation with Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times and Jim Warren of the Chicago Tribune…

MATTHEWS:  OK, Jim, the same question.  How does she get—how does he get up to where she is, Hillary? 

WARREN:  Well, I don‘t think first and foremost it‘s a matter of money.  I think one can spend a little bit too much time in Washington and be convinced that this is all about money and high-priced consultants. 

First of all, he is going to have to exploit the celebrity status.  There are going to be a lot of folks in Iowa and New Hampshire for starters who are going to be coming out for curiosity‘s sake.  He has to absolutely knock it out of the park then and there.  He has got to make sure starting tomorrow that there are no huge gaffes.  He‘s got to make sure that he‘s not on the defensive when he‘s dealing with us. 

Already one seasoned example of the sort of thing that is going to hit him and I think that could conceivably stymie him, even the B.S. story about the, you know, the Muslim school in Indonesia.  As well as that I think was rebutted, the fact is I think it‘s done a little short-term damage.  And I have run into folks who have bought into that total, absolute B.S. 

MATTHEWS:  I know.  I have, too.  And the question is—people who care a lot about Israel, for example, are very worried about somebody who may have had hard militant training in Islam.  And people worry about our security.  Is there anything to that story that anybody really believes, Jim? 

WARREN:  No.  First of all, I don‘t think it‘s, you know, substantive and fair at all…

MATTHEWS:  That he went to a madrassah school when he was in Indonesia?  There‘s no substance to that yet.  Nobody‘s been able to harden that up.  It‘s just a push by somebody with a point of view? 

WARREN:  Well, remember, the thrust of the story…

SWEET:  On the contrary, every report that came out is that it wasn‘t true.

MATTHEWS:  Yes.  Jim?

WARREN:  … and in that sort of stuff, particularly in the world that we now live and the blogosphere, is going to be coming out.  And he‘s got to realize there‘s some lessons to be learned from the Kerry campaign and you better to be far more aggressive in making the counterattack.  We still don‘t know, based on the Illinois experience, how good is he going to be at that.

(my emphasis and minor transcript corrections)

Matthews seems barely aware of the complete debunking of the madrassa hoax. And doesn’t seem to notice or care that Warren says that it’s "B.S." At least Lynn Sweet states what any person in the business of political reporting should have already known.

It’s going to be a long campaign season.

She writes…

Picking up the rhetorical shank bone, and accepting Obama’s substance anorexia as a given, Russert asked, “Is there now a second phase of the coverage of Barack Obama where reporters and voters will start demanding from him real specifics on the real challenges confronting our country and world?”

It makes me wonder: don’t these guys own a computer? If they took the time to surf the websites of any of the candidates, they’d see that the presidential campaign is already awash in real specifics on all kinds of real challenges. Indeed, they should go to barackobama.com right now and click on ‘Issues.” They’ll see something called “Plan to End the War in Iraq,” which is… a plan to end the war in Iraq. But maybe the war isn’t a real enough challenge for Russert.

They could also check out the page on “Creating a Healthcare System that Works” and read a bunch of real specifics about “Harnessing the Power of Genetic Medicine,” “Fostering Healthy Communities,” and “Fighting AIDS Worldwide.” Though, to be fair, Obama has been willfully vague on what the co-pay is for a dental cleaning, and exactly what allergy drugs would be in the formulary of his prescription drug plan.

In fact, just two days into Obama’s official campaign — a full year and nine months before the election — we know quite a bit about where Obama stands. But there is a much larger point here than the quantity of meat on Barack’s policy bones. It’s that when it comes to presidential politics, specifics on the issues are not really the issue. Campaigns for the White House — especially this one — are about leadership. Specifics are nice, but they’re meaningless without the leadership skills needed to turn the policies into reality. And leadership is a much, much harder thing to come by than position papers.

Obama made this point himself earlier this month at the DNC meeting: “There are those who don’t believe in talking about hope. They say, well, we want specifics, we want details, we want white papers we want plans. We’ve had a lot of plans, Democrats. What we’ve had is a shortage of hope.”

This is one of Obama’s most appealing attributes: his willingness to address perceived liabilities head on (apply directly to forehead), and to turn potential negatives into attributes.

Think I don’t have enough experience? Then go ahead and elect Dick Cheney — he’s got a lengthy resume. Think I need more meat on my policy bones? Then gnaw on the endless, and endlessly detailed, policy laundry lists that, absent true leadership, have gone down to defeat together with the uninspiring Democrats holding them — again and again and again.

People aren’t hungry for policy meat. They are starving for prime-cut leadership.

Well said, Arianna.