« K-Lo's Take | Main | Prescient » Obama's Speech27 Jan 2008 01:32 am Here it is on video: I would link to Hillary Clinton's concession speech but she, um, didn't deliver one. That combined with the Calvinball effort to get us to all go pay attention to Florida is pretty classless. She's still got a clear lead in the clear bulk of the February 5 states so that sort of funny business seems uncalled for. Comments (66)
Well we all know how reliable the polls are this year... Great speech, exciting win. Should be a pretty insane 10 days till the 5th 
It's a good time for bye week in the NFL. Politics will probably be issue #1 for a lot of people who aren't normally that engaged and it's going to help Obama's performance in South Carolina and brilliant speech get a wider audience. Obama should wear a soft boot on his ankle tomorrow and spend the day with Michelle.
I would link to Obama's awesome concession speech from Nevada, but....?
The classical tradition of oratory largely disappeared from mainstream American politics sometime around the middle of the 20th century, to be replaced by an anodyne fudge of technocratese and advertising-speak. It survived only in the African-American tradition of public discourse, and is most readily visible in the pulpits of African-American churches. Barack Obama did not grow up amidst this tradition, but he seems to have completely imbibed it, internalized it, and has now converted it into a fine instrument for expressing his distinctive vision of politics. We find it bracing and novel, but it is really something quite old, this style of speaking which pays heed to the canons of classical rhetoric, which goes all the way back to ancient Greece and Rome.
That combined with the Calvinball effort to get us to all go pay attention to Florida is pretty classless. Wait a second. Didn't you just agree with JMM's theory that the Clinton camp was trying "to muscle the party and the other candidates into seating the Michigan and Florida delegate slates." So you've dropped that theory and are now proposing a new one? Is this your final answer?
what a great calvinball reference.
Matt, you seem to be implying that Hillary's got this pretty locked up, with her lead in the February 5 states. Do you really think those leads are fixed? If so, then all this punditry is obsolete and we should just get behind our nominee... I surely hope not. Ten days may be just long enough...
Damn, now that was a speech. Great advance work putting a predominantly white audience in the background. Speaks louder than words that he's not running as "the black candidate".
Yes, she did give a concession speech. I watched a small part of it before it was cut off. But go ahead and believe whatever you're told, since that seems to be working.
So Edwards didn't concede/congratulate the winner in Iowa. Obama slinked out of Nevada without making a speech, and Clinton slips out and gives a stump speech in Tennessee tonight. Apparently these people really don't take well to losing.
Calvinball made me laugh out loud.
She didn't give a concession speech. That was just her normal stump speech with a little mention of South Carolina at the beginning. I don't care so much about that as the talk about Florida and Bill's talk about Jesse Jackson.
Really, nobody should be giving a "concession speech" after a single state's primary. Especially considering that the Dem primaries aren't winner take all, it's silly for a candidate to act like they "lost" after a primary in which they earned a significant number of delegates, but someone else gained slightly more. It's like a tennis player walking up to the net to congratulate his opponent for winning the first set.
"It's like a tennis player walking up to the net to congratulate his opponent for winning the first set." More like a football team losing a game during the regular season.
More like a football team losing a game during the regular season. It's nothing like that! In football, you don't give a shit if you lose by five or fifty. (Well, I mean, you probably do, but as far as the standings go, you don't.) If the standings were determined simply by accumulated points over the course of a season, then it would be more analogous. So really my tennis example isn't great either. It's more like a baseball game where one team scores two runs in the top of the third inning, and the other team answers back with three in the bottom half. The point is, as we saw in the Obama campaign's assertions about who really 'won' Nevada, the whole idea of winning a state isn't really applicable, unless it's winner take all. The only truly meaningful unit of currency here is the delegate; opportunities to pick up delegates are presented in a state by state manner, but there's no value in 'winning' a particular state over and above the value of winning however many delegates you got (there is, of course, a PR value in 'winning' a state, but only because the media basically ignores every point I've just made). It would be perfectly possible for someone to win the nomination without 'winning' a single state. Concession speeches are for when a candidate loses an election - when one person takes office (or is named the nominee), and the other person goes home. Otherwise, does each state deserve a concession speech? On Super Tuesday, should the candidate who won the majority of delegates still give a separate concession speech for every state he or she didn't win? OK, I've officially spent way too much time and brain power on an exceedingly trivial point.
The point is, as we saw in the Obama campaign's assertions about who really 'won' Nevada, the whole idea of winning a state isn't really applicable, unless it's winner take all. This a false comparison. In Nevada, the popular vote was not measured and Obama won more delegates. In South Carolina, Obama won the popular vote by 27-28% (doubling Clinton's vote) and won the most delegates by a significant margin. I don't have a problem with Clinton not giving a concession speech if she doesn't want to, but it's pretty clear that the outcome in South Carolina is indisputable.
The point is, as we saw in the Obama campaign's assertions about who really 'won' Nevada, the whole idea of winning a state isn't really applicable, unless it's winner take all. The only truly meaningful unit of currency here is the delegate... Right. Winning congressional districts matter. In Nevada, Clinton won big in Las Vegas and Obama won elsewhere, so he got more delegates. In South Carolina, though... well, look for yourself: There's nothing debatable here.
Hey, speaking of classy, at least Hillary's not crying election fraud...
I cannot think of any precedent for a candidate to deliver a flowery concession speech based upon losing one state. A call to the winner or a sentence tacked onto your regular speech is the norm. But I see Big Media Matt has mastered the art of sneering at the Clintons, everyone's favorite spectator sport.
I'm just happy that my primary vote will actually matter this year. What's the current CW on the state split on 2/5 - I am going with 13/8/1.
Thinking Gravel will be able to eke out a win in Alaska?
Dude if I wanted knne-jerk Hillary bashing I could just as easily go over to La Sullivan's blog... give us a break
Does Michelle being on stage strike anybody else as a subtle reminder that Bill and Hillary are campaigning in different states right now?
I think Barack - it is a new JFK! Great speech!
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Classless? God, stop being so damn sensitive. Fuck, Obama didn't even congratulate her in Nevada and you're blasting Clinton for not having proper etiquette. They should just say congratulations and move on. I don't think she should've gone into her stump speech, but I'm not all shaken by it. Jesus.
I haven't ever really gotten on the Obama bandwagon, what with all the vagueness and homophobic associations and SSI reform talk. But goddamn if he isn't a great orator. I am a hard-core cynic and he almost makes me believe that he can change how the federal government works. Almost. I mean, lets be realistic, if he gets elected he'll just be another pol making strategic moves. But listen to the last 2 minutes of that speech and I almost have hope. And hope really is a powerful thing.
"It's a good time for bye week in the NFL. Politics will probably be issue #1 for a lot of people who aren't normally that engaged and it's going to help Obama's performance in South Carolina and brilliant speech get a wider audience." I wonder what effect this will have on voting. I know I plan on being drunk during the Super Bowl. Considering that one of the teams is technically a New York team while the other is in a state where the governor endorsed Obama (I'm guessing NJ is trending Clinton, but I haven't seen the numbers), who knows what effect drunken hangovers might have on people? I do have to agree with Jason C.'s point about concession speeches after a primary. It kind of makes sense after Iowa because it is first and you want to remind your supporters that you're still in it, but giving one after losing, say, New Mexico or Alaska doesn't seem to make much sense.
The Calvinball analogy is perfect.
Just saw the speech. Wow. Hopefully this will help flip the Latino vote.
Matt, Ted's moving off the fence to endorse Obama, Halperin seems to strongly imply: http://thepage.time.com/2008/01/27/teddy-is-ready/
There are fair criticisms of Obama. For example, he does have a relatively thin resume. He could have been a more aggressive leader in the Senate in opposing the current administration (although the same can be said of Clinton). He's not a great debater. He's untested against a viable Republican candidate (not that Rick Lazio is the second coming of Ronald Reagan). But the idea that he's not liberal enough is just silly. In terms of the "homophobic associations," Obama went into a black church on MLK day and championed gay equality, connecting it to the larger civil rights struggle. I don't recall (although I could be wrong) Clinton making a similar statement in a major speech (and her husband did sign DOMA). With respect to Soc Security, far as I can tell Obama used the word "crisis" once. That was definitely a mistake, but there is zero other evidence that he would be weak on Soc Security. Besides, the paranoia over privatization is totally unwarranted. It's not happenening because a substantial majority opposes it. Dems need to stop cowering like they're the minority party on this issue. Yes, Edwards has been the more aggressively liberal candidate, and he deserves credit for pushing the other two to the left. I appreciate why Dems would support him. But for the life of me I can't imagine why anyone would prefer Clinton over Obama. Clearly many do, so I will admit to a failure of imagination here.
Go Obama! And shut the hell up Bill.
------- (1) He was accepted into Columbia and Harvard because of affirmative action (not academic merit) (2) His black nationalist church in Chicago has called for the execution of all white people. Need I say more? I'm not even going to mention his proclivity for raping white women.
Liz Matheson: Wow, you're a piece of shit.
Drosz, she just posted the SAME stupid crap at Ross Douthat's about 1 min ago. She did the same last night at Ezra's. It's cut and paste trolling. Dull, stupid, vicious, and unimaginative.
If I was a doctrinaire pro-war Republican, I'd be feeling pretty good right now. Yes, Obama's speech quite excellent. But 24 percent of the white vote, not so much. And I wonder how the speech would play if the background audience was selected to accurately represent the voters responsible for the S.C. victory. I assume Liz Matheson is trying to be sarcastic. If not, she's putting out a very crude and dishonest version of what the Republicans will be able to do deftly and accurately in the fall.
Drosz, she just posted the SAME stupid crap at Ross Douthat's about 1 min ago. She did the same last night at Ezra's. It's cut and paste trolling. Dull, stupid, vicious, and unimaginative. And Ambinder, Yglesias, too.
torgo, Heh, figures. scott, "deftly and accurately"...? Accurately? Really? Maybe you meant the tactic not the charge? But if this is the type of shenanigans they've got...cakewalk.
Scott, dude, this is SC we are talking about. 24% of the white vote for a black candidate is massive. Remember, this is a state with a strong Confederate background, to put it politely, and where they still fly the Confederate flag.
What is "classless" about trying to get us to pay attention to a state? If she's merely trying to get us to focus on the state to blunt his momentum, there's wrong with that. That's politics. Trying to get the delegates to count at the convention violating the agreement they all had? Now that's not good.
"sashaqz"---dude---this is the SC *Democratic Party primary* we're talking about. What sort of "white folks" have stayed in SC's Democratic Party while nearly all of the others switched to the Republicans? When was the last time that SC went for a Democratic Presidential candidate? Maybe fifty years ago or something?
well, i hate to piss on the parade, but i really did not find his speech remarkable at all. the applause lines and applause got very old. there was no substance to his speech. my reaction was the same after every line he spoke: no shit, sherlock. sorry, but i'm forty and i thought the speech, though delivered well, was all pretty obvious stuff without any specific mention of how he was going to affect change. if he thinks "republicans will cross over" to support democratic policies, where has he been for the last seven years? but before the obama fluffers pile on, please be advised i will vote for him if he's the nominee although i hope he isn't.
Drosz, What I meant by "accurately" is that the charges will focus on Obama's genuine vulnerabilities, rather than made up ones. Not BS about raping white women or affimative action (Obama's obviously a super qualified politician, who more than proved himself at Harvard Law) But the black nationalist church he still belongs is a bit over the top for a national electorate. His name is Barack Hussein Obama, Liz didn't make that up. Someone named Scott made these points in the following article. http://www.amconmag.com/2008/2008_01_28/article.html written before the SC result, but still valid.
scott, okay, I thought that's what you meant, so I didn't want to be too harsh. I knew his middle name beforehand. I also know that's a weak argument. The church thing, heard that before too, never heard anything like what was spewed by Lizbot, though. That was a stupid argument, the name thing is a stupid argument. Now if his name was Hitler H. McHitlerface...
Everyone is missing the key points of the Clinton campaign: -Barack Hussein Obama is a Negro. A Muslim, Reagan-loving Negro. -Other Negros voted for him. That was unfair because Lyndon Johnson gave them the vote. -25% of white Democrats in South Carolina are race traitors. Ignore them.
I'm with RKU. Obama's win is being way overspun; if it wasn't for SC's odd demographics, there's no big win. So how meaningful is it. How meaningful for Democrats is anything that happens in SC, actually?
I think the Lizbot deserves 'her' IP address displayed for all interested, because that smacks of paid trolling. The tactics from the Clinton camp have been plain weird. One thing about a concession speech is that it's 5-10 minutes of free media where you have the liberty to shape and control the message. Offering up half a sentence in a stump speech, and letting the cable producers cut away from you after three minutes, makes you look second-tier. That, combined with Wolfson's shameless 'on to Florida, where Obama has abandoned the voters' also made the Clinton camp look like it was treating the sanctioned primary like an exhibition game and treating the exhibition primary like a playoff. As I said elsethread, Obama looks to be shaping an argument that repudiating the Bush era also means drawing a line under the Clinton era. I don't necessarily agree with that on substance, but I think it's something for the Clinton campaign to be worried about, because the subtext -- 'Bush became possible because of the Clinton years' -- is a good retort to the experience question.
What's funny about Lizbot's statements is that Obama's dad was in the PhD program at Harvard, so Obama himself might have got in the Republican way (i.e. legacy admission). At any rate, he graduated magna cum laude and was president of the Harvard Law Review. If the best the conservatives got against Obama is that he's a black-nationalist Muslim rapist who benefited from affirmative action, they are toast. And the business-world equivalent of his resume would be Jeff Bezos in 1998 or Bill Gates in 1986.
How meaningful for Democrats is anything that happens in SC, actually? Ah, there's your Clinton-sanctioned spin point. How meaningful is it that Obama got more votes than McCain and Huckabee combined, that Clinton got about as many as McCain in a distant second place, and that the total votes cast in the Democratic primary wasn't too far off the total gained by Kerry in the 2004 general election? That doesn't turn SC into a battleground state, but this after-the-fact sniffiness at a primary that motivated twice as many Democrats to the polls doesn't wash.
"With respect to Soc Security, far as I can tell Obama used the word "crisis" once. That was definitely a mistake, but there is zero other evidence that he would be weak on Soc Security." Google 'Osama Advisor Jeffrey Liebman'. Among others you get this result Obama's Economic Advisors Some might disagree with the author's summation of Liebman as "another Harvard economist and former Clinton adviser who favors privatizing social security". To be fair you would have to actually read the nine-page 2004 Liebman-MacGuineas-Samwick Non Partisan Social Security Reform Plan (aka LMS) for yourself. When you freely choose to take your economic advice whose signature proposal is a very worker unfriendly Social Security privatization plan you are very, very far from "zero other evidence". When you add in the fact that Obama's only expressed policy idea on Social Security was a cap increase which actually does nothing for Social Security solvency under the current financing setup but is a key component of LMS you begin to get something more than an inference that Obama is weak on Social Security. It is otherwise hard to see to see why Liebman was added to the team to start with. To the degree you can judge a candidate by the team he has assembled economic progressives have much to be alarmed about. Goulsbee, Liebman, Cutler. By all evidence these would be the three guys shaping Obama Administration economic policy. I don't have any problem contemplating an Obama Presidency, but people are projecting things onto him that are not clear at all. LMS: A 5.25% worker financed 'fix' to a 1.95% 'problem' that does not actually fix the problem but does have the effect of gutting Social Security. A plan co-written with a former staffer to McCain and a former top Bush economist, a plan whose lead author is sitting at the table when Obama talks economics policy. Obama has every right to pick his own Economics team. He has picked a team of at best centrists. Goulsbee, Liebman, Cutler. People who think that Krugman was activated by some bias against Obama or secret backing of Hillary need to understand that he grasped the implications of these three names right away. For those of us who want to address income inequality Goulsbee is absolutely the wrong guy. For those of us who want to preserve Social Security Liebman is precisely the wrong man, and for those of us who want the most logical path to universal coverage Cutler is not the guy for the job. Vote for whoever you want, just understand what it is you are voting for.
I don't mean to imply that economic progressives need to jump on the Hillary Wagon. After all both Liebman and Cutler worked in the Clinton Administration, Obama and Hillary are fundamentally drawing from the same pool, anyone who believes either is going to be the second coming of FDR is due for a rude shock. I'll take either simply on the grounds they are not likely to actively move us backwards, but progress on the economic progressive agenda is going to have to come from Congress.
AlanC9-- Yeah, it's not like real demographics, like in Iowa or N.H. Y'know, where regular people live. Not those people who aren't representative of normal Americans. I think you know what I'm talking about... did the affirmative action hires leave the room yet? Can we talk freely now? Please comment again, and don't forget to mention Jesse Jackson.
Bruce: We can agree that Obama's actual voting record is to the left Clinton and Edwards, right? And in terms of Obama's support for Soc Security, I give you his 2005 speech at the National Press Club aggressively opposing privatization. (Link in my name.) I tend to think the best way to judge a candidate is look at what he has done, said and what he proposes to do. I'm not sure you can say that the guys you mentioned will be "shaping Obama's economic policy." I don't think that, historically speaking, academic advisors actually shape policy. But I'm open to being persuaded otherwise. As far as the LMS plan goes, on its face it was a somewhat academic "experiment" to see what compromise plan the three authors could come up with and it was published at a time when the White House and Congress were both controlled by Republicans. Unless one is a little paranoid, I don't think you can look at it as a more credible measure of what Obama would do on Social Security than Obama's own record. It seems to me that some liberals really don't like the unity rhetoric, are suspicious, and are looking for reasons to question Obama's liberal bona fides. But his record is what it is.
The Clintons would never have won anywhere without the black vote and now they're pissing all over the African-American community. Classy. It is also ironic that Bill depended on Jackson not running in 1992 to get black support during the primaries. "Google 'Osama Advisor Jeffrey Liebman'." I'll let this comment from Bruce Webb stand on its own. The idea that the candidate who voted for the war, refuses to refute the idea of preventive war and failed massively and embarrassingly on health care (even refusing to back S-CHIP in the White House until Ted Kennedy stood up to her on it) is somehow a candidate of substance. Just because she can't give a good, moving speech doesn't mean she is smarter. She couldn't even pass the bar the first time she took it. She got schooled by Bush on Iraq and the Republicans on health care. For Clinton, substance means complaining about flag burning and Grand Theft Auto while talking about nuking Pakistan. Classy.
...well, i hate to piss on the parade, but i really did not find his speech remarkable at all. the applause lines and applause got very old. Me neither. I thought he seemed a bit lethargic. My guess is they were hoping -- and perhaps had internal polling to this effect -- that Edwards would take second, thereby really giving Hillary a bloody nose. But Edwards' campaign effectively ended last night, making this a two person race, and Obama knows that can't be good news.
Whoops. The link re: the 2005 speech didn't work. Here's a URL:
Reality Man: Actually, I think Bruce Webb's little "Obama = Osama" slip tends to prove my exact point... Unless he's an extraordinarily determined hoaxer, Webb doesn't seem like the main demographic or ideological target of a "rough" Republican campaign against Obama in November. Yet if he can make such a simple slip, what does it say about the potential for America's overall electorate, which in large measure is totally ignorant and easily swayed. I think I saw a poll recently that even today, 41% of Americans *still* believe that Saddam was proven to be behind the 9/11 Attacks... Yep, just imagine the nature of a 1944 Presidential campaign between Democrat FDR and Republican Adolf Hissler...
Trying to sell your candidate on the "Americans are too racist card" doesn't exactly speak well of you and just makes you look like a smaller person for it.
Actually, I think "America is too racist for a black president" is a big part of Hillary's constituency (in addition to "She has a vagina" and "He's a scary black man").
Show us Obama's in Nevada and we will show you hers.
...well, i hate to piss on the parade, but i really did not find his speech remarkable at all. the applause lines and applause got very old. Me neither. I thought he seemed a bit lethargic. My guess is they were hoping -- and perhaps had internal polling to this effect -- that Edwards would take second, thereby really giving Hillary a bloody nose. But Edwards' campaign effectively ended last night, making this a two person race, and Obama knows that can't be good news. C'mon everyone gets it , we are inspired, now what are you going to do for the roads Mr. Obama? Look, last year Oprah was peddling the Secret, "if you believe" good things will happen to you. Now we have, if you are inspired, the world will change, transform and transcend. No clue what kind of healthcare you will get, no clue if FEMA will work better, no clue about the mortgage crisis, no clue how we will fix trade agreements, but you will be inspired. You will not think about those irrelevant culture wars cause you are transcended and transformed. So eat transformation, inspiration and transcendancy and let the Chicago political machine come and get some of those privatized contracts from those piggy Texans. Yeah, why should the Texans get to steal only? The Chicago mob wants a chunk. Now you just sit on your inspiration cushion and transcend.
"She's still got a clear lead in the clear bulk of the February 5 states so that sort of funny business seems uncalled for." Well she does in the random public polls we've seen, but obviously the Clinton campaign has much more polling on Feb. 5th than we have access to. Seems to me the polls must not look very good considering some of their recent actions...
"Now you just sit on your inspiration cushion and transcend." Sorry, stellaa, I've got to take it with me to Minnesota next weekend to get out the vote for Obama.
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Heads in the Sand
I would link to Hillary Clinton's concession speech but she, um, didn't deliver one.
"Hillary Clinton made her concession speech from Nashville, Tennessee."
Posted by Dan the Man | January 27, 2008 1:39 AM