Analysis: 27 Days to Go, and Barack Obama Just Needs to Stay on His A-Game to Win Big
October 8, 2008
Michael Cottman, BlackAmericaWeb.com
Barack Obama returns to the campaign trail Wednesday surging in the polls, airing new television ads promoting his message, and widening his lead in five battleground states 27 days before Election Day.
Keith Murphy, the host and producer of The Urban Journal on XM Satellite Radio, who has followed politics for years, said while Obama is ahead in the polls, his campaign needs to “stay on their A-game” because John McCain’s campaign will resort to nasty attacks on Obama’s character.
“Despite his pledge of a new politics, Obama is in the fourth quarter of a full-contact sport, and in coming days, the McCain campaign is going to clear its bench,” Murphy told BlackAmericaWeb.com Tuesday.
Obama’s Lack of Leadership
October 8, 2008
For years now, I have been waiting for the esteemed Senator from Illinois to begin to take the lead on issues of poverty in America. According to the US Census Bureau, Sen. Obama represents a state that has the fifth largest group of people in poverty in America. Illinois is home to two of America’s highest concentrations of poverty; the East St. Louis and Cook County areas. And with Senator Obama’s background of community activism in one of those poverty stricken areas, one would be lead to believe that Sen. Obama had the mandate to become a champion for issues facing the poor people in America.
But, since 2004, America has not experienced Senator Obama’s use of his political capital when it comes to issues of poverty. In the last democratic primary, John Edwards was seen as the champion on issues of poverty. Where was John Edward’s mandate? As Senator of North Carolina, he served a state with three of the most prosperous metropolitan areas in the United States. And on critical issues that the poor face such as health care and living wage, Senators Clinton and Kennedy, respectively, were the leaders on those issues. And what about the issue of government assistance or housing? On all of these issues Sen. Obama becomes more of a follower than a leader.
Now I ask you, what other senator does such a disservice to the needs of their constituents. The leading senator on military issues, Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia, has one of the largest military complexes in his state. The leading senator on coal mining, Sen. Byrd of West Virginia, represents one of the largest coal producing states in America. The leading senator on providing heating assistance for the upcoming winter is Sen. Collins of Maine, whose constituents will face the brunt of inflated heating oil prices. And the list goes on and on.
As Tavis Smiley said, this is not about going negative on Sen. Obama. This is about holding the Senator accountable for his actions. For years now, Sen. Obama has not been called out for his record on the poor or the black community because of his past work on Chicago’s Southside and American racism. However, Senator Obama’s senatorial record has not been emblematic of his past activism in the Chicagoland community. And if American voters ever needed a champion on issues of poverty and economics, is there no better time than now.
- Kush Jenkins
How Obama quietly targets blacks
October 7, 2008
Ben Smith, Politico
- As Barack Obama trekked through the Philadelphia suburbs, Northern Virginia, and Greensboro, N.C., in recent days, his campaign was ramping up a massive parallel effort in big cities like Detroit, Cleveland, and Miami.
In the largely black precincts of those metropolises, radio broadcasts blast constant reminders to vote for Obama, field organizers swarm, and megastars including Jay-Z, Russell Simmons, and LeBron James have led massive rallies, working to reach not just the substantial portion of the black community who regularly come out to vote, but the younger people and others who have never before cast a ballot.
Though the rallies are publicized, much of the advertising directed at black voters isn’t. Get-out-the-vote ads on radio and television aren’t released to the media, and the number of new voters Obama has registered is a closely-held secret. He is, however, leaving no stone unturned when it comes to registering African-American voters. The campaign has, for example, a major initiative aimed at turning barbershops and beauty parlors into voter registration offices. This week, Kimora Lee Simmons’ E! Network reality show, Life in the Fab Lane, carried a campaign ad at the bottom of the screen reminding citizens to register to vote.
McCain, Obama gear up for second debate
October 7, 2008
With the record-setting vp debate now history, it’s back to the top of the ticket on Tuesday night.
John McCain and Barack Obama square off in a town-hall-style debate moderated by NBC’s Tom Brokaw at Belmont University in Nashville. It’s the second of three debates between the candidates, with the last one scheduled for October 15 at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.
Experts say that while Thursday’s Sarah Palin-Joe Biden vice presidential battle was interesting television, it will probably be long forgotten by the time the voters make their way to the polls.
“It’s back to the top two candidates,” CNN political analyst Gloria Borger said. “In the end, that’s who people are going to be voting for.”
The format of Tuesday’s debate will stand in stark contrast to the other three. Brokaw may be the moderator, but he won’t be asking any questions. Instead, he’ll be handing the microphone to a group of ordinary people — undecided voters all — who will ask questions that might not be what the mainstream media has been asking.
“It’s not the high drama of the YouTube debates. I don’t think we’ll see any snowmen asking questions (as in the 2004 YouTube debates sponsored with CNN),” said Dotty Lynch, a former CBS News analyst and a faculty member at American University in Washington. “But they are typically pretty interesting. Viewers at home can put themselves into the shoes of the questioners more than they can reporters.”
Each question gets a two-minute response from the candidates, followed by one minute of discussion. In the first presidential debate, moderator Jim Lehrer gave two minutes of responses each followed by five minutes of sometimes painfully awkward discussion.
It’s also one of the first times in a long time — perhaps since the retail politics of Iowa and New Hampshire 10 months ago — that the presidential candidates will have extended interaction with real people. McCain is known to be relaxed and comfortable with the town-hall style format. Obama, not so much, perhaps.
“The town hall debate is McCain’s best debate format,” said Paul Levinson, a professor at Fordham University in New York. “Obama . . . clearly is a much better speaker to a huge crowd or an interviewer (than he is at a debate).”
The town-hall format has its risks. In 1992, a reflexive action by then-President George H.W. Bush to look at his watch, caught by a camera, played into conventional wisdom that he was out of touch with average Americans.
“Non-verbal communication is king in the debate, even though a lot of people don’t realize that,” Levinson said. “It’s not so much what they say, it’s what they look like when they’re talking and, even more important, when their opponent is talking.”
It’s also about confidence, said Leonard Steinhorn, a public communications professor at American University.
“These are uncertain times and people are looking for somebody who is going to be the steady hand at the tiller. That’s how people will be looking,” Steinhorn said. “They don’t just listen to what they have to say, they’ll listen to how they say it. They look at the command, their mannerisms and their temperament.”
What there probably won’t be will be a lot of bitter back and forth between the candidates, experts say.
“Whatever anger that exists between the candidates, they are probably going to do their best to sublimate it and speak directly to the American people,” Steinhorn said. “I think it would be a huge mistake for one candidate to let it fly.”
Said CNN’s Borger: “Will they be negative directly to each other? Will they be combative? It’s going to be interesting to watch how they engage.”
It’s likely that ratings will be higher than the 52.4 million viewers who tuned in for the September 26 opening presidential debate that was held on a Friday night. But it’s also likely that it won’t come close to the 69.9 million who tuned in for Biden-Palin.
One TV executive well acquainted with ratings said he wasn’t going to make a prediction.
“You don’t know whether the tune-in was for Palin or because of increasing interest in the campaign. We don’t know enough,” CNN U.S. president Jonathan Klein said. “I have learned not to make any predictions about this campaign whatsoever.”
Paul J. Gough, Reuters
“Obama Youth — Junior Fraternity Regiment” video - what’s your take?
October 6, 2008
A Youtube video of middle school students at a Kansas City charter school is making the rounds on the internet. The video shows the students speaking of what Obama has inspired them to become in a stepping routine. The teacher who organized the video has been suspended. What’s your take on the video - is this being blown out of proportion or do you feel that their routine is inappropriate?
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