Barack Obama for President

Obama's A List

2007-04-19T09:23:00.000-07:00

Sweet column: Obama's donor courtship

While Chicago was, naturally, fertile fund-raising turf for Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama, his top state for first quarter cash was California, and his donor list is sprinkled with big names from the entertainment industry.

Besides stars who wrote checks to Obama, the Illinois senator also heav-ily relied on a relatively small group of big donors to help him raise $25.8 million in just three months, according to Federal Election Commission reports filed Sunday.

• From the entertainment world, here's a sampling of Obama's big names: actors Eddie Murphy, Barbra Steisand, Tom Hanks, Angela Bassett, Zach Braff, Morgan Freeman, Jennifer Aniston, Ben Stiller; producer/director James Brooks; music producer Steve McKeever (a graduate of St. Ignatius High School); musician Branford Marsalis, and songwriter Carole Bayer Sager. And, as much reported, the Dreamwork moguls David Geffen, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Steven Spielberg, who hosted a Beverly Hills bash for Obama in February.

Obama also received donations from at least eight executives from Island Def Jam executives, whose artists include the rapper Ludacris, whose song lyrics have been criticized for promoting sex, drugs and violence. Ludacris, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, appeared with Obama at a rally in Atlanta last month. The rapper met with Obama in Chicago last November to talk about AIDS awareness.

I am mentioning this because, in the wake of the Don Imus controversy in which the shock jock smeared the Rutgers basketball team with racial and sexual slurs, Obama in South Carolina last Friday said at a rally, in response to a question, that some rappers are "degrading their sisters. That doesn't inspire me."

To note: Big names don't equal mega-donations. Federal rules limit an individual donation to a maximum of $2,300 per election. A person can donate $2,300 for the presidential primary and $2,300 for the general election -- money that can be used only if the candidate becomes the nominee. Most of the celebs in the list above gave at least $2,300.

• ZIP codes in Chicago accounted for $3,654,265 of Obama's total, with his hometown his best city. His top Chicago ZIP codes are 60614 and 60611, which includes wealthy neighborhoods in the city and downtown; many givers list their business address for federal records and not where they live. Of Obama's top five ZIP codes, four were from Chicago and the fifth was from Manhattan, 10021.

• Obama is making an enormous effort to stroke big donors who can use their influential networks to "bundle" checks for him. According to an analysis by the Campaign Finance Institute of Obama's $25.8 million, 46 percent of it was raised by donors who gave at least $2,300. Some 68 percent of Obama's total was raised by people who gave at least $1,000.

How did Obama do so well in New York? For starters, he has a full-time professional fund-raiser, Jenny Yeager, who raised money for his Senate war chests, based in New York.

Exactly how the deal is done is well-explained in the current issue of New York Magazine, where Obama is featured on the cover. Writer John Heilemann provides a detailed look at how ardently Obama wooed Manhattan donors, including the "courtship" of investment banker and top-tier donor, Robert Wolf, who he first met last December. Then Obama called him to chat and "the next week, they had dinner in Washington, just the two of them," Heilemann wrote.

Get Barack Obama's Speeches for Free

2007-04-11T09:39:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES, April 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Today Publishing 180 announced that it is offering a free e-book edition of their just released softbound book, the "Best Speeches of Barack Obama."

The free e-book includes all 500-plus pages from the just released $29.99 print edition. No email address or registration is required for the download. It is available at http://www.freeobamabook.com/.

The book, the "Best Speeches of Barack Obama," groups 77 of Barack Obama's most notable speeches into 16 categories including Iraq, education, healthcare, the environment, foreign policy & defense and his plans for the economy.

In addition to the speeches, the book contains Obama's floor statements and podcasts, including transcripts of the podcasts he called in from his cell phone while visiting the Middle East and Iraq.

About the free e-book offer, Publishing 180's president, Jaclyn Easton, explains, "To most people it doesn't make sense to give away a version of something you're selling, but in this case we believe it's the best way to boost sales."

Easton explains that since the paper edition is sold only online, people don't have the benefit of being able to look at it thoroughly in a bookstore. By offering a free e-book version that is identical to the bound book, people can look at it page-by-page and have that experience. "It's 522 pages. If the insides appeal to them they are going to want the print edition in addition to the e-book," says Easton.

But there's more to the free e-book than bumping sales. "This is a great tool for educators because these speeches are part of America's history," says Easton. "We encourage teachers, professors and other educators to download the book and share it with their students."

Easton also notes a benefit for business professionals: "We believe that by studying Obama's speeches, executives can learn why and how he's such an effective communicator and leader, and, in turn, become one, too."

To soften the cost of distributing the 500-plus-page free e-book, ObamaQuotes.com is sponsoring the download in exchange for a handful of ads.

The free e-book offer is guaranteed through June 30, 2007 at http://www.freeobamabook.com/. No email address or registration required. It is an instant download with one click.

The $29.99 softcover edition is available at http://www.obamaspeechbook.com/.

Newsweek: Is the Clinton Juggernaut Sending Supporters in Obama's Arms?

2007-04-08T11:29:00.000-07:00

The End of Inevitability

By Richard Wolffe

Newsweek

April 16, 2007 issue - There's a turncoat inside Hillary Clinton's money machine. Over the past several years, Leonore Blitz has helped raise about $250,000 for Clinton's Senate races, and she signed up early to help the new presidential campaign. But in recent weeks the Manhattan marketing consultant has secretly attended finance meetings and fund-raisers for Clinton's archrival, Barack Obama. Under intense pressure from the Clinton team to pick sides, Blitz—who bundled more than $1 million for John Kerry in 2004—felt deeply conflicted. Clinton operatives have warned donors not to contribute to other campaigns, and put a price on disloyalty: early supporters will be valued and latecomers scorned. But now Blitz is coming out of the shadows, ready to test the rules. "I have been a lifelong advocate of women and minorities' participating and running for political office," she told NEWSWEEK last week. "Therefore, I'm supporting both Clinton and Obama."

Continued

International Herald Tribune: Obama Gains Admirers

2007-04-08T11:16:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama, Low Key, Gains Admirers

COLO, Iowa: Senator Barack Obama is not big on what he calls red-meat applause lines when he campaigns in small communities like this one, just northeast of Des Moines. He does not tell many jokes. He talks in even, measured tones, and at times is so low-key that he lulls his audiences into long, if respectful, silences.

Obama likes to recount the chapters of his unusual life: growing up in Hawaii, living overseas, community organizing in Chicago, working in the Illinois Legislature, though not his years as a U.S. senator.

He talks - often in broad, general strokes - about an Obama White House that would provide health care to all, attack global warming, improve education, fix Social Security and end the war in Iraq.

His campaign events end almost as an afterthought, surprising voters used to the big finishes typically served up by the presidential candidates seeking their support. "Thank you very much, everybody; have a nice day," Obama said pleasantly in Dakota City, Iowa, one afternoon, with a leisurely wave of a hand. He headed over to a table where copies of his books, brought by audience members, had been neatly laid out, awaiting the slash of his left-handed autograph.

For most Democrats, Obama is the Illinois senator who riveted the 2004 Democratic National Convention with a keynote speech that marked him as one of the most powerful speakers his party had produced in 50 years

But as Obama methodically worked his way across swaths of rural northern Iowa - his towering figure and skin color making him stand out at diners and veterans' homes, at high schools and community colleges - it was clear that he is not presenting himself, stylistically at least, the way he did in July 2004 when he gripped Democrats at the Fleet Center in Boston.

He is cerebral and easygoing, often talking over any applause that might rise up from his audience, and perhaps consciously trying to present a political style that contrasts with the more-charged presence of John Edwards, the former trial lawyer and senator from North Carolina, and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

He rarely mentions President George W. Bush, as he disparages the partisan quarrels of Washington, and is, at most, elliptically critical of Edwards and Clinton when he notes that he had opposed the war in Iraq from the start; the two others voted to authorize the war in 2002.

His audiences are rapt, if sometimes a tad restless; long periods can go by when there is not a rustle in the crowd. Yet Iowa is not the Fleet Center, and this appeal - "letting people see how I think," as Obama put it in an interview - could clearly go a long way in drawing the support of Iowans who are turning out in huge numbers to see him in the state where the presidential voting process will start.

"He's low-key; he speaks like a professor," said Jim Sayer, 51, a farmer from Humboldt. "Maybe I expected more emotion. But the lower key impresses me: He seems to be at the level that we are."

Mary Margaret Gran, a middle-school teacher who met him when he spoke to 25 Iowans eating breakfast at a tiny diner in Colo on Friday morning, summed up her view the moment Obama had moved on to the next table.

"Rock star?" Gran said, offering the description herself. "That's the national moniker. But dazzle is not what he is about at all. He's peaceful."

Obama, wearing sunglasses as he sat in the back of a car that was taking him to a charter plane and then on to his home in Chicago for the Easter weekend, nodded when told what Sayer and Gran had said about him.

"I use a different style if I'm speaking to a big crowd; I can gin up folks pretty well," he said. "But when I'm in these town hall settings, my job is not to throw them a lot of red meat. I want to give them a sense of my thought process."

If Obama enters the room to the sounds of "Think" by Aretha Franklin and the roar of people coming to their feet, clapping and jostling for photographs, it is only moments before the atmosphere turns from campaign rally to college seminar, when he talks, for example, about the need for a "common sense, nonideological, practical-minded, generous agenda for change in this country."

This evolution, or more precisely this attention to Obama's credentials as a campaigner in communities like this, comes in a week in which he has, with the report that he had nearly matched Clinton by raising $25 million in the first quarter of presidential fund-raising, left no doubt that he had the resources, and presumably the popular support, to potentially deny her the nomination.

Continued

Sioux City Journal: Barack Obama Will Announce Housing Program for Veterans

2007-04-08T11:11:00.000-07:00

Obama's Housing Plan for Veterans

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa (AP) -- Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama on Friday said he would unveil a housing program for veterans aimed at keeping them off the streets when their service is completed.

The Illinois senator told The Associated Press he would introduce legislation Monday that he calls Homes for Heroes. The plan would establish grant and voucher programs to encourage development of affordable housing targeted for veterans.

"Veterans are far more likely to be homeless than non-veterans and part of it is because we're not providing services to them as they transition out of the service," Obama said in an interview before a campaign rally. "Part of it is because there is just not enough affordable housing."

The Department of Veterans Affairs estimates as many as 200,000 are living on the streets or in shelters and perhaps twice as many are homeless at some in the course of a year.

Obama, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, concluded a three-day trip to Iowa by touring the Iowa Veterans Home and focusing on veterans issues.

He has walked a fine line on the issue, mixing his opposition to the war in Iraq with support for the troops.

"During the course of this war, one of the things I think we did learn from Vietnam was that whether you are for or against a war, everyone has to honor and respect the service and sacrifice of the troops," Obama said.

Obama said the government spends billions to prosecute the war but has consistently shortchanged programs for veterans, who should be a top priority.

"We haven't always done that in our federal budget," said Obama. "During the course of this war the VA has consistently low-balled their requests for funding."

In addition to problems like substance abuse, Obama said the lack of affordable housing has been a consistent problem for veterans. He said his legislation would address that shortfall.

"What we've done is we've increased voucher programs, we're encouraging grants and loans for non-profits to build affordable housing for veterans," said Obama.

Obama said he chose to visit the Iowa Veterans Home because of its solid reputation. The center is essentially a state-financed retirement home for veterans.

"The fact that you have an outstanding veterans home that's state run here, I think that has to be the model for how the federal VA system is run, as well as how states around the country ought to be operating," said Obama. "We wanted to highlight what a good-quality veterans home looks like to make sure that's the standard by which the VA system is operated."

In his three days in Iowa, Obama has often focused on veterans. At each of his stops he's held meetings -- usually in private -- with small groups of veterans, and he packed more than 250 people into a VFW Hall in tiny Dakota City on Thursday.

"It's to say thank you for their service," Obama said. "I reminded them that my grandfather served in World War II."

Speaking at a noisy campaign rally at a community college, Obama said his latest trip to Iowa demonstrates his grassroots campaign plan.

"This is my 20th county I have visited in Iowa since I announced," said Obama. "At this pace, by the end of the year I will have gotten to every county."

Obama said his status coming from neighboring Illinois gives him an edge in Iowa, where precinct caucuses launch the presidential nominating process.

"I feel like I'm home," said Obama. "Illinois is basically Iowa and then we have Chicago."

Barack Obama Raked in $25 million, Stays Competitive with Hillary Clinton

2007-04-04T11:14:00.000-07:00

DAVENPORT, Iowa - Democrat Barack Obama raked in $25 million for his presidential bid in the first three months of 2007, placing him on a par with front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton and dashing her image as the party's inevitable nominee.

The donations came from an eye-popping 100,000 donors, the campaign said in a statement Wednesday.

The figures were the latest evidence that Obama, a political newcomer who has served just two years in the Senate, has emerged as the most powerful new force in presidential politics this year.

It also reinforced his status as a significant threat to Clinton, who'd hoped her own $26 million first quarter fundraising total would begin to squeeze her rivals out of contention.

The campaign reported that the figure included at least $23.5 million that he can spend on the highly competitive primary race. The Clinton campaign has yet to disclose how much they can use for the primary verses money that is designated for the general election.

While Clinton has honed a vast national fundraising network through two Senate campaigns and her husband's eight years as president, Obama launched his bid for the White House with a relatively small donor base concentrated largely in Illinois, his home state. But his early opposition to the Iraq war and voter excitement over his quest to be the first black president quickly fueled a powerful fundraising machine.

Since he formally declared his presidential campaign in February, Obama has been traveling the country with a focus on urban areas where he could build his momentum and bring in new donors. He attracted big-money Hollywood and Wall St. executives along with families who came out to his stops in places like Oklahoma that sometimes are neglected by other candidates.

More than half the donors contributed via the Internet for a total of $6.9 million, the campaign said.

"This overwhelming response, in only a few short weeks, shows the hunger for a different kind of politics in this country and a belief at the grassroots level that Barack Obama can bring out the best in America to solve our problems," said Obama finance chairwoman Penny Pritzker.

Donors are limited by law to contributions of $2,300 for the primary election, but Clinton, Obama and some other candidates also have been raising money for the general election. That allows them to take another $2,300 from each donor, but the money has to be returned if they don't win the nomination.

Clinton's campaign often solicited the $4,600 donations, while Obama's campaign focused on recruiting small dollar donors. In the coming months, he can return to those donors and ask those who haven't maxed out to give more.

Unlike Clinton, Obama says he doesn't take money from the lobbyists or political action committees that are frequent contributors on other campaigns.

Clinton campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle said, "We are thrilled with our historic fundraising success and congratulate Senator Obama and the entire Democratic field on their fundraising, which demonstrates the overwhelming desire for change in our country."

Obama was visiting Iowa Wednesday, holding an evening rally at a community college in Mason City.

Among the other Democratic candidates, aides to former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards said his $14 million in new contributions included $1 million for the general election.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said he had raised $6 million and had more than $5 million cash on hand.

Aides to Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd said he raised more than $4 million and transferred nearly $5 million from his Senate campaign, for a total of $9 million in receipts and $7.5 million cash on hand. Delaware Sen. Joe Biden lagged behind, with his staff reporting that he had total receipts of nearly $4 million, nearly half of which was transferred from his Senate campaign account.

Edwards, speaking to Davenport, Iowa, television station KWQC, complained that the pressure to raise huge sums was distorting the political process.

"We should actually be publicly financing these campaigns," Edwards said. "We shouldn't be doing these money contests. They're not healthy, they're not good for democracy. Public financing is the answer.

"While we still have this system, you have to compete the best way you can. What's clear is I think we're going to have at least three candidates on the Democratic side who have plenty of money to run a very serious campaign."

Among the Republican candidates, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney was the top money-raiser with $23 million, another eye-catching sum that place him in the same league with Clinton and Obama and left his GOP rivals in the dust.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani raised $15 million for the quarter, while Arizona Sen. John McCain posted $12.5 million. Giuliani leads the GOP field in national popularity polls, followed by McCain.

Barack Obama Fundraiding

2007-04-03T12:45:00.000-07:00

New York Times: Obama Built Donor Newtork from Roots Up

CHICAGO — When Barack Obama announced to friends over brunch in 2002 that he planned to run for the United States Senate, one of their first questions was how he could possibly raise the necessary millions.

After all, two and a half years after he had taken quite a “spanking,” as he put it, in his bid to unseat an incumbent congressman, he was still struggling to pay off a $20,000 debt, eking out donations of $1,000 here, $2,000 there.

Improbably, Mr. Obama, running as something of an outsider, wound up raising $15 million and winning that 2004 Senate race. Now that he is running for president, his fund-raising prowess has helped make him the chief rival to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

[Aides said Monday that he had collected more than $20 million in donations in the first three months of the campaign, enough to ratchet up the anxiety in the Clinton camp, which announced it had raised $26 million. Mr. Obama’s campaign has yet to release precise information on its total donations or contributors.]

A look at his 2004 Senate race shows how he laid the foundation for his current fund-raising drive. Even as he cultivated an image as an unconventional candidate devoted to the people, not the establishment, he systematically built a sophisticated, and in many ways quite conventional, money machine.

Interviews and campaign finance reports show Mr. Obama drew crucial early support from Chicago’s thriving black professional class, using it as a springboard to other rainmakers within the broader party establishment. Soon he was drawing money — and, just as valuable, buzz — among wealthy Chicago families like the Crowns and the Pritzkers, as well as friends from Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago, where Mr. Obama taught constitutional law and his wife worked in community relations. As his popularity surged after his rousing speech at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004, big fund-raisers on Wall Street and in Hollywood hopped aboard, and grass-roots contributions began pouring in as well.

Mr. Obama has written that at the beginning he felt uncomfortable asking for money, but he developed a skill at cultivating donors, often with the same disarming directness he uses on the campaign trail.

“I met him on the first hole,” Steven S. Rogers, a former business owner who teaches at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, recalled recently about a golf game in 2001. “By the sixth hole, he said, ‘Steve, I want to run for the Senate.’ And by the ninth hole, he said he needed help to clear up some debts.”

Mr. Obama’s breakthrough in the 2004 Senate race was also made possible by a new wrinkle in the election laws. Faced with a self-financed opponent in the Democratic primary, Blair Hull, who pumped more than $28 million of his own money into the race, Mr. Obama was able to accept up to $12,000 from each donor, or six times the limit at that time.

As a result, nearly half of the more than $5 million that Mr. Obama raised in the primary came from just 300 donors. In a stroke of luck, he had just enough money to pay for a television advertising blitz in the final weeks as Mr. Hull’s campaign crumbled amid accusations that he had abused a former wife.

Some longtime Obama donors said they were glad to be able to exploit the financing loophole to help him.

James S. Crown, a senior member of the Crown family, said that despite the “formidable competition” in the Senate primary, he was so impressed after meeting Mr. Obama for breakfast in early 2003 that he quickly lent his support.

“I was just taken with his sensibility, his intelligence, his values and how he conducted himself during that campaign,” said Mr. Crown, who is Mr. Obama’s chief presidential fund-raiser in Illinois.

Mr. Obama appears to have such a firm hold on so many of Chicago’s big donors that Mrs. Clinton, who grew up in a Chicago suburb, did not even have a fund-raiser here during the crucial first quarter of this year. At the same time, Mr. Obama’s campaign says its grass-roots support is expanding rapidly, in part through $25-a-ticket fund-raisers designed for a new generation of donors.

Mr. Obama declined to be interviewed for this article. But in his book “The Audacity of Hope,” he sounded prescient about the dangers of the money chase, noting that he could not assume it “didn’t alter me in some ways.” At the simplest level, he wrote, it “eliminated any sense of shame” about asking for donations.

But, he added, he also worries that spending so much time courting wealthy donors has caused him to spend “more and more time above the fray,” away from the concerns of ordinary voters.

Mr. Obama, who grew up mostly in Hawaii, began making political contacts in Chicago as a community organizer in the 1980s. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1991, he returned to Chicago and led a drive that registered more than 100,000 voters for the 1992 elections.

Some Hillary Supporters Going for Barack Obama

2007-04-02T11:21:00.000-07:00

Never mind that it was a sunny spring afternoon. The shades were down, the better to see Sen. Barack Obama on a computer in the corner.

He was answering questions in Iowa, and, for about an hour, a dozen people in Carmen Ashhurst's living room in Eastchester watched him live on a webcast.

America needs universal health care and better school reform, he said, more high-speed Internet access and a repeal of the Bush administration's tax cuts.

Those are all topics Hillary Clinton talks about and has been talking about for years. Some of the people watching had supported her in the past. But now they wanted to hear what the senator from Illinois had to say.

This was much too small a group to draw conclusions from, just as it is too early in the presidential race to predict much of anything. But here are some observations about Ashhurst's house party, which took place Saturday, part of Obama's community kickoff across the country.

It cut across race and gender and age, and what seemed to interest people most was Obama's promise to replace bitter partisanship with something new.

Andrew Watiker is 19 and a student at Oberlin College and Obama's opposition to the war is important to him. But he addresses it only after you ask him about it. What he mentions first is his belief that Obama may be the man to break through deadlock in Washington.

"I think, too, that there is a feeling that he'll represent change that maybe Hillary wouldn't represent," Watiker said. He could work more easily with Republicans than Clinton.

"Barack Obama would be able to help make that change possible, make things happen," he said.

When Obama talks about transforming the country, many Americans are skeptical. Lots of politicians vow to reform Washington and bring a new spirit to the country. It's a perennial political pledge. And if Obama has drawn comparisons to the Kennedys, he is also facing the predictable backlash.

That didn't seem to matter to Ashhurst's guests.

To 41-year-old Dawn Kirnon, an oncologist, Obama appears sincere, someone who doesn't try to please everyone all of the time. Other politicians say what they think people want to hear, she said.

"It absolutely drew me in," Kirnon said. "It has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he's a black politician, because there have been other black politicians."

And, said this black woman who lives in White Plains, they didn't draw her to politics.

As for Clinton? Kirnon is not convinced that she would be able to govern well even if she were to win. Too many old political enemies would be waiting for her.

To 34-year-old Natalie Gross, Obama seems honest and hopeful to a degree that she has not seen in other politicians.

"I feel like I want to vote for him, but I need to figure out exactly why," said Gross, who works at Sarah Lawrence College as director of racial and ethnic diversity and campus engagement.

If that makes sense, she added. And it does if you're talking about Obama's charisma, that much-written-about and hard-to-pin-down quality.

Barack Obama Campaigning in Georgia

2007-04-01T00:09:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Campaign Video

2007-03-31T23:56:00.000-07:00

China Post: Barack Says Bush Doesn't Respect the Constitution

2007-03-31T23:49:00.000-07:00

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday accused President George W. Bush of failing to respect the Constitution amid the uproar over the firing of eight top federal prosecutors.

The Illinois senator also took a swipe at embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Obama has joined several other Democrats in calling for Gonzales to resign.

"I was a constitutional law professor, which means unlike the current president I actually respect the Constitution," Obama told an audience at a campaign fundraiser. "I believe in an attorney general who is actually the people's lawyer, not the president's lawyer."

Obama's remarks drew one of the most enthusiastic responses in a speech often interrupted by applause.

Gonzales acknowledged Friday there is confusion about his role in firing the eight U.S. attorneys last fall. His former chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, told Congress Thursday that prosecutors put on a list to be fired got there in part because they were not deemed "loyal Bushies."

Responding to Obama's comments, Dan Ronayne, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, said, "Senator Obama needs to understand that at this level, words matter and he will be scrutinized."

Ronayne pointed that Obama was only a senior lecturer and not a full professor. The University of Chicago lists him as a senior lecturer on leave.

During his stop in Florida, Obama held a brief meeting with Democratic lawmakers and then spoke for about three minutes to more than 100 college students who held an impromptu rally outside an IMAX theater where he he

Barack Obama in Iowa: War Hindering Domestic Agenda

2007-03-31T23:45:00.000-07:00

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Saturday it will be difficult to make progress on important domestic issues until the Iraq war has ended.

The Illinois senator cited health care, education and other concerns and said most Democratic candidates have similar goals, with differences only in the details.

"None of these things we are going to be able to do effectively until we bring this war in Iraq to a close," Obama told about 2,000 people in a town hall-style meeting.

The appearance marked the beginning of a two-day trip to heavily Republican western Iowa. Obama drew the loudest applause when he emphasized his opposition to the war.

Most polls have shown Obama and New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton atop the Democratic party's 2008 field, and the campaigns have squabbled at a distance over the war.

Clinton's allies say Obama has voted for spending bills to finance the war, and that can be equated to support. Obama rejected that charge.

"Even if I'm against the war, we need to make sure the troops have the armor they need," Obama said.

Obama said he would have voted against the initial $87 billion to pay for the war because it included $20 billion in reconstruction money that was certain to be wasted because of the chaos in Iraq.

"This is a recipe for disaster," said Obama. "How do you send $20 billion to a government that isn't a government?"

Clinton voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq in 2002 but has said she would not have done so if she had known then what she knows now. Obama, who was not in Congress in 2002, said he opposed the war from the beginning.

"We've got a war that should never have been authorized and should never have been waged," Obama said. "It's a war that's left us less safe and damaged our standing in the world and it's a war we need to end."

Obama said he is pushing legislation for a gradual troop withdrawal.

"There is no military solution to the problems in Iraq," he said. "There are political problems between the warring factions there."

On immigration, Obama said he favors a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already in the United States, though he would require them to pay a penalty and "get to the back of the line."

"After all, they have broken the law," he said.

Though Obama is in his first term in the Senate, he rejected suggestions that he needs more experience before running for president.

"I've only been in Washington for a few years, but I've been there long enough to know that Washington needs to change," Obama said.

Obama's next appearance, in Onawa, was streamed on the campaign's Web site. Aides said the event was seen at 5,000 house parties in all 50 states, including gatherings in all 99 Iowa counties.

Obama's wife, Michelle, watched from a house party in Des Moines. On her first solo campaign trip on behalf of her husband, she only briefly discussed politics with a crowd of largely black supporters who had gathered for the rally in the home of Willie Glanton, Iowa's first black legislator.

During a 15-minute speech, she focused on her upbringing in a working-class family on Chicago's south side and her subsequent marriage to Barack Obama.

She said voters should elect him as their next president for his integrity, his guts and the fact that "this brother is smart."

"Politics turns away good people. If you got sense, don't do this," Michelle Obama said. "But I'm not just here as the wife of a candidate, but I'm here as woman, a mother, a professional, a citizen desperate for something to change."

Link

Barack Obama Campaigning in Austin, Texas

2007-03-27T09:24:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama at SEIU Healthcare Forum

2007-03-27T09:22:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Speaking to Nevada Democratic Party and SEIU

2007-03-27T09:18:00.000-07:00

Hawaii in Barack's Early Life

2007-03-27T09:01:00.000-07:00

Hawaii plays role in Obama narrative

Search for self began far away from Illinois

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
N. Y. TIMES NEWS SERVICE

Published Monday, March 26, 2007

HONOLULU - To his high school classmates, Barack Obama was a pleasant if undistinguished student, the guy who seemed happiest on the basketball court, the first to dive into the pumpkin carving at Halloween, the one whose oratorical prowess was largely limited to out-debating classmates over the relative qualities of point guards.

But Obama's family here in Hawaii saw a more complex young man, a person whose racial confusion and feelings of alienation were matched with equal parts ambition, disquietude and lofty notions about where his internal struggles might lead.

"There was always a joke between my mom and Barack that he would be the first black president," his half sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, said in an interview over tea. "So there were intimations of all this early on. He has always been restless. There was always somewhere else he needed to go."

It was his early search for a cultural identity on the island of Oahu, populated with people of diverse origins but relatively few blacks, that presaged his current political persona, Soetoro-Ng suggested.

"He couldn't sit back and wait for the answers to come to him," said Soetoro-Ng, who is the daughter of Obama's mother from another marriage and who remains close to him. "He had to pursue those answers actively. People from very far-away places collide here, and cultures collide, and there is a blending and negotiation that is constant."

She continued, "I think Hawaii gave him a sense that a lot of different voices and textures can sort of live together, however imperfectly, and he would walk in many worlds and feel a level of comfort."

The political narrative of Obama was written about 4,500 miles and a cultural universe away from here, largely in Illinois. But the seeds of his racial consciousness, its attendant alienation and political curiosity appear to have been planted in Hawaii.

There was, by the description of his classmates, coaches and teachers, their Barry, the one who still looks remarkably like the picture in his yearbook, smiling under his Afro, or posing somewhat stiffly with other children under a sign "Mixed Races of America."

That Barry had a confident gait, a cheerful smile and a B average.

"He had the same exact mannerisms then as he does now," said Eric Kusunoki, Obama's homeroom teacher at the Punahou School. "When he walked up to give that speech at the Democratic convention, we recognized him right away by the way he walked. He was well liked by everybody, a very charismatic guy."

And there was the other Barry, the child of a white American mother, Ann Dunham, who died in 1995, and a Kenyan father, also named Barack, who left when Obama was young and who is also dead. That Barry, described in Obama's book, "Dreams From My Father," was the one whose young classmate once asked him if his "father ate people," who endured whispered racial epithets, whose sense of being a misfit haunted him into high school, where at times, he says, he hid behind a haze of marijuana smoke and unhappiness.

"He struggled here with the idea that people were pushing an identity on him, what it meant to be a black man," said Soetoro-Ng, whose own father was Indonesian.

"He was trying to balance that with a desire he already had then to name himself," she said. "There were not a lot of people here who were engaged in that process. Their identities were more solidly assumed. Having a community that embraced you without question was something that most people had. But he had lived in Indonesia, had a father who was absent but whose presence loomed large and a mother who had lived in 13 places."

As a result, she said, Obama, while "not a brooding young man - he played sports and formed close friendships and wasn't overly serious" - often "wrapped himself in his own solitude."

While Obama has several half siblings from his father's other marriages, Soetoro-Ng, 39, his half sister by his mother, is the only one he spent significant time with as a child.

He spoke at her wedding, and he sees her each Christmas when he comes to Hawaii.

As a child, living at times with his mother and at other times with his maternal grandparents, Obama straddled the worlds of a cloistered private school and a comforting if knotty existence among family members, accompanied by a cast of marginalized older men and poets attached to his grandfather and largely unknown to his largely privileged classmates.

Obama, whose parents met at the University of Hawaii, was born here on Aug. 4, 1961.

In 1967, he moved with his mother to live with her second husband in Indonesia. When he was 10, the family returned to Oahu, where he lived until graduating from high school.

Obama's grandparents enrolled him in the Punahou School, founded in 1841 by Congregational missionaries. It is among the largest private schools in the country. Punahou, with its rolling green lawns, imposing lava rock buildings and chapel in the center of a lily pond, was not an insignificant choice.

While power is asserted and social relativity established in Los Angeles by the car you drive, and in New York by the college you attended, in Honolulu, those things often hinge on where you went to high school.

But Obama's relationship to the school was more nuanced than that of other alumni, according to his book. He started out disoriented, unaccustomed to skateboards, wearing his sandals from Jakarta, ill at ease at his classmates' homes with swimming pools and large rooms. "I made few friends," he wrote.

When he discovered basketball, his lot improved. Punahou "has always been a school of cliques," said Dan Hale, who played basketball with Obama.

By the accounts of Hale and other teammates - who won a championship his senior year of high school - and his coach, Obama was a tireless player.

"He was on a very, very strong team," said his coach, Chris McLachlin. "Had he been on any other team in the league, he would have been a starter. But he practiced hard, and his work ethic might have been above everyone else's. He practiced at the 10 a.m. juice break; he practiced at the lunch break at noon; and he was the last one to leave each day."

The curriculum at Punahou - where library clocks give the time in some developing nations - centered on multiculturalism.

"He seems to have the skills that a lot of people in our class had, which is to pull diverse people together," said Bernice Glenn Bowers, another classmate.

But Obama continued to feel assailed by insensitive comments and by classmates and a coach, who used an epithet when they referred to black opponents. Obama also felt trapped between the black experiences of the characters in his library books and his life as one of the few blacks in the school.

"I kept finding the same anguish, the same doubt, a self contempt that neither irony not intellect seemed able to deflect," he wrote.

He took refuge among older black men whom he challenged to games of basketball, a figure identified in his book as Frank, a poet and incessant crank, and college parties populated with blacks.

Those revelations surprised many former classmates. "I kind of feel bad," said Alan Lam, a teammate. "I didn't know."

Few saw Obama as a standout academically, or intellectually.

"He was clearly bright," said a classmate, Debbie Ching, "but there are people in our class that are nuclear physicists."

He was not particularly political, nor was he the first one to speak up at assemblies or in class, several people said.

But he did have writing skills, composing poetry for the school's literary magazine. One poem, "An Old Man," lamented, "He pulls out forgotten dignity from under his flaking coat, and walks a straight line along the crooked world."

In the complicated racial dynamic of Hawaii, many students were, perhaps, too preoccupied with their own identities to worry about how Obama was puzzling out his own.

"I had my own issues to worry about," said Hale, who is white - or ha'ole (pronounced howley) - the Hawaiian term for white outsider. "Being a ha'ole from Punahou, now that was the worst," he recalled.

Obama Campaigning in Florida

2007-03-27T08:33:00.000-07:00

Obama Feeding off Fans in Florida

By ADAM C. SMITH
St. Petersburg Times

WEST PALM BEACH - Broward County builder and Army Reserve Lt. Col. Julian Garvin paid $100, because he wanted to see "the candidate of the future, who can communicate across all lines."

Delray Beach retiree and Democratic Club leader Sam Lender came to see the "fresh face" candidate who had the foresight to oppose the Iraq war early on.

Mary Hubbs, a Republican and assisted living facility owner from Pompano Beach, is so fed up with GOP leadership she wanted to personally size up the new Democratic star who seems so appealing.

"I have never been more excited and more passionate about a presidential campaign and a presidential candidate than I am about Sen. Barack Obama," shouted U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton. He dubbed Obama a John Kennedy for a new generation.

The Temptations' "Get Ready," blared from speakers before Obama took to the stage.

He called on the more than 600 people at the Kravis Center to fight cynicism and embrace a new kind of politics.

"This campaign cannot just be about me. I am confident in my capacity to lead this country, but I can't do it alone," the Illinois senator told the cheering crowd Sunday.

"When ordinary people stand up, they can do extraordinary things. That's always been our history. So I want you guys to stand up with me."

The reception was among five fundraisers Obama held throughout South Florida on Sunday, most of them far pricier than the $100 per person West Palm Beach reception.

Many Democrats in the half-filled Kravis Center ballroom were undecided voters eager to check out the newest Democratic sensation who's threatening to knock off front-runner Hillary Clinton.

"It is so refreshing to have an African-American candidate bring out this many people," said an ebullient Palm Beach County Commissioner Addie Greene, waiting for Obama to sign his bestselling book, The Audacity of Hope, which she brought to the event.

The 45-year-old, first-term senator is being billed as a new kind of candidate to transcend partisan, slash-and-burn politics.

But the broad platform he laid out Sunday sounded little different from any other Democrat: improve schools, increase teacher pay, restore America's international standing, push energy independence and universal health care by the end of his first term.

Campaigning among Florida Democrats, he threw in a call to "count every vote" and embraced paper trails for voting machines.

"He's got the charisma, the intelligence and has everything going for him, but I want to hear how he's going to do all that," nurse Shelley Nathan said after the speech. "I want to hear his plans. Those were all sound bites."

Obama, who opposed authorizing force in Iraq and calls for all combat troops to be withdrawn by March 2008, said the country's domestic agenda is largely dependent on what happens in Iraq.

"We can't initiate all these creative ideas to solve our domestic problems if we don't bring war in Iraq to a close. We can't spend $100 billion every year and still fund early childhood education, still provide for universal health care," he said.

Sunday was Obama's first Florida campaign swing since announcing for president, but he'll be back often in the coming days and weeks. Private fundraisers are scheduled for Friday in Tallahassee and Jacksonville.

On April 15, Obama will be in Tampa for a high-dollar fundraiser at the home of Jean Lykes and Charlie Burr and a $25-per-head reception at the Cuban Club in Ybor City.

Chicago Tribune: Family Portrait on Life of Barack Obama

2007-03-27T08:25:00.000-07:00

Family Portraits

Strong personalities shaped a future senator, Barack Obama

By Tim Jones, Tribune national correspondent.

Tribune correspondents Kirsten Scharnberg and Laurie Goering contributed to this report
Published March 27, 2007

MERCER ISLAND, Wash. -- Chip Wall can't help but zero in on the little stuff whenever he watches Sen. Barack Obama on TV.

The turn of the smile, the sharp wit, the comfortable self-assuredness, all of which he saw up close, a half-century ago.

It's his old pal Stanley.

For Wall and a few dozen others, Obama on the campaign trail often brings to mind Stanley Ann Dunham, Obama's mother and a strong-willed, unconventional member of the Mercer Island High School graduating class of 1960.

"She was not a standard-issue girl of her times. ... She wasn't part of the matched-sweater-set crowd," said Wall, a classmate and retired philosophy teacher who used to make after-school runs to Seattle with Dunham to sit and talk -- for hours and hours -- in coffee shops.

"She touted herself as an atheist, and it was something she'd read about and could argue," said Maxine Box, who was Dunham's best friend in high school. "She was always challenging and arguing and comparing. She was already thinking about things that the rest of us hadn't."

The education of Obama the would-be politician didn't begin, of course, until after his birth in 1961, in Honolulu. But the parental traits that would mold him -- a contrarian worldview, an initial rejection of organized religion, a questioning nature -- were already taking shape years earlier in the nomadic and sometimes tempestuous Dunham family, where the only child was a curious and precocious daughter of a father who wanted a boy so badly that he named her Stanley -- after himself.

In his best-selling book, "Dreams From My Father" and in campaign speeches, Obama frequently describes the story of his mother, who died of cancer in 1995, as a tale of the Heartland. She's the white woman from the flatlands of Kansas and the only daughter of parents who grew up in the "dab-smack, landlocked center of the country," in towns "too small to warrant boldface on a roadmap."

Implicit in that portrayal is this message: If you have any lingering questions or doubts about the Hawaiian-born presidential candidate with a funny name, just remember that Mom hails from America's good earth. That's the log cabin story, or his version of Bill Clinton's "Man from Hope."

That presentation, though, glosses over Stanley Ann Dunham's formative years, spent not on the Great Plains but more than 1,800 miles away on a small island in the Pacific Northwest.

Obama visited the Seattle area last October, and in a speech to a Democratic Party rally at Bellevue Community College, he mentioned that his mother attended Mercer Island High School before moving on to Hawaii. In "Dreams," Obama wrote that the family moved to Seattle "long enough for my mother to finish high school."

Obama plans city health-care forum

2007-03-27T08:14:00.000-07:00

PORTSMOUTH - Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has publicly stated his intent to establish a universal health-care system by the end of his first term.

On Tuesday, April 3, Obama will hold a forum to get input from the public on the problems they are having with the current system of health care in this country and what they would like to see in a new system. That forum titled "A Community Meeting on Health Care with Sen. Barack Obama," will be held at 2:30 p.m., at Seacoast Media Group's new headquarters, 111 New Hampshire Ave., at the Pease International Tradeport.

"As I confirm my ideas on health care with the experts, I also want to go into communities and talk to families dealing with health care issues, doctors, nurses and other providers," Obama said in a telephone interview Monday. "I think Portsmouth is wonderfully representative of the communities of this nation."

The Illinois senator said he has found in the course of his career both in the U.S. Senate and in his state's Legislature, that by listening to the American people he can create more effective policies and be a better legislator.

"I believe that sense stems from my background as a community organizer," Obama said.

After graduating from Columbia University in 1983, Obama put law school and corporate life on hold and moved to Chicago, where he became a community organizer with a church-based group seeking to improve living conditions in poor neighborhoods plagued with crime and high unemployment.

The group had some success, but Obama said the experience made him realize that in order to truly improve the lives of people in that and other communities, it would take not just a change at the local level, but a change in laws and in the country's political system.

That led him to run for the Illinois Legislature, where he served for eight years, and subsequently for U.S. Senate. Obama was elected to that body in 2004.

He said the information he gleans from the April 3 forum in Portsmouth will be used to help craft a comprehensive health-care policy that will be presented to the nation in the course of his campaign and then, hopefully, enacted once he becomes president.

"I'm hoping for a good turnout," Obama said.

The Obama campaign approached Seacoast Media Group to serve as host for this forum. No representatives from that group will take part in the forum other than as observers and reporters. SMG publishes the Portsmouth Herald, the Exeter News-Letter, the Hampton Union and the Rockingham News in New Hampshire and the York Weekly and York County Coast Star in southern Maine, and operates Seacoastonline.com., SeacoastConnects.com and TheNewHampshirePrimary.com. In addition, Seacoast Media Group has extended an invitation to all other major presidential candidates to use its facilities at Pease for similar events.

To Get Tickets

Seating will be limited for the Tuesday, April 3, "Community Meeting on Health Care with Barack Obama," scheduled to take place at 2:30 p.m., at Seacoast Media Group's new corporate headquarters at 111 New Hampshire Ave., Pease International Tradeport. Anyone interested in attending may contact Seacoast Media Group Executive Editor Howard Altschiller at 570-2202 starting today between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. Tickets will be allocated on first-come, first-served basis.

Link

Obama Raising Money in Georgia

2007-03-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama made his first campaign visit to Georgia since announcing his run for the nomination, attending a private fundraiser in Atlanta.

About 600 people turned out for the event yesterday evening at the downtown Hyatt Regency, paying between $500 and $2300 dollars apiece to see and hear the Illinois senator. Obama didn't speak to the press on the quick visit to the Peach State. He is expected back for a public rally in April.

Reporters and photographers were kept out of the event, but there were plenty of photographs taken by people with cell phonecameras as Obama worked the room.

He collected cash in Georgia just a few days before fundraising totals are due that will show how the candidates stand.

Organizers predicted the event would break the 500-thousand dollar Democratic fundraising record in Atlanta set by John Kerry in 2004. Contributors shelled out 23-hundred dollars for a VIP reception. A larger crowd attended the 500-dollar per-person rally.

Obama in Iowa Next Sunday

2007-03-27T08:06:00.000-07:00

Obama Visit

As the days get closer to next year's Iowa caucus, A democratic front-runner is making his way to Siouxland.

On the heels of the second Iowa visit from his top opposition, Morningside College in Sioux City is setting the stage for U.S Senator Barack Obama's visit to Siouxland. The Illinois Democrat is scheduled to talk with folks at Morningside's Allee Gymnasium on Sunday, April 1.

His speech is set to start at 3 p.m.

Chicago Tribune: Digs Up Facts About Barack's Religious Upbringing

2007-03-24T11:51:00.000-07:00

History of schooling distorted

By Kim Barker
Tribune foreign correspondent
Published March 25, 2007

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- When Barack Obama was a boy here, he studied for three years at a religious school and prayed four times a day.

It was a Roman Catholic school. There, Obama was registered as student No. 203. "Yes, he prayed, because all the students here had to pray in the Catholic way--`in the name of the Father, [Son] and the Holy Spirit,'

" recalled Obama's 1st-grade teacher, Israella Pareira Darmawan.

Attention on U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's childhood in Indonesia has so far focused on whether he was a Muslim and whether one of his schools was a fundamentalist Islamic madrassa.

Although his campaign has denied that Obama was a practicing Muslim, the "Islam" issue is not likely to go away soon for the presidential candidate. Some Americans link the religion with terrorism and see Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, as being an alien place, a world away from the White House.

But initial reports have distorted the reality of the four years Obama spent in Indonesia, from 1967 to 1971. In fact, Obama's religious upbringing in Indonesia depended more on the conventions of the schools he attended than on any decision by him, his mother or his stepfather. When he was at a Catholic school for three years, he prayed as a Catholic.

When he was at a public school for a year, he learned about Islam.

Obama's stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, was much more of a free spirit than a devout Muslim, according to former friends and neighbors. And the school described as an Islamic madrassa in media reports actually was a public school, so progressive that teachers wore miniskirts and all students were encouraged to celebrate Christmas.

Interviews with dozens of former classmates, teachers, neighbors and friends show that Obama was not a regular practicing Muslim when he was in Indonesia, despite being listed as a Muslim on the registration form for the Catholic school, Strada Asisia, where he attended 1st through 3rd grades.

At the time, the school most likely registered children based on the religion of their fathers, said Darmawan, Obama's former teacher. Because Soetoro was a Muslim, Obama was listed as a Muslim, she said.

The enrollment form from the Catholic school, which has been cited as evidence that Obama was a Muslim in Indonesia, also was rife with errors. It listed Obama as an Indonesian, listed his previous school incorrectly and failed to list his mother, Ann, at all.

Mosque visits rare

Obama and his mother moved from Honolulu to Jakarta to join Soetoro in 1967, when Obama was 6. Here, Obama became "Barry Soetoro."

In their first neighborhood, Obama occasionally followed his stepfather to the mosque for Friday prayers, a few neighbors said. But Soetoro usually was too busy working, first for the Indonesian army and later for a Western oil company.

"Sometimes Lolo went to the mosque to pray, but he rarely socialized with people," said Fermina Katarina Sinaga, Obama's 3rd-grade teacher at the Catholic school, who lived near the family. "Rarely, Barry went to the mosque with Lolo."

Zulfan Adi, a former neighborhood playmate of Obama's who has been cited in news reports as saying Obama regularly attended Friday prayers with Soetoro, told the Tribune he was not certain about that when pressed about his recollections. He only knew Obama for a few months, during 1970, when his family moved to the neighborhood.

Soetoro, who died in 1987, was hardly the image of a pious Muslim, friends and family members say.

His nephew, Sonny Trisulo, 49, said Soetoro always liked women and alcohol. One of his health problems was a failing liver. "He loved drinking, was a smart and warm person, the naughtiest one in the family," Trisulo recalled.

In his autobiography, Obama said Soetoro followed the same kind of Islam as many Indonesians, "a brand of Islam that could make room for the remnants of more ancient animist and Hindu faiths," the kind of Islam that meant a man could absorb the powers of the animals he ate, such as tigers and snakes.

Interfaith studies

In late 1970, Obama's family moved to another neighborhood, and Obama enrolled in Public Elementary School Menteng No. 1, the school depicted by several news outlets as an Islamic madrassa, or boarding school. The school, founded in 1934 as a Dutch school, once catered only to Dutch children and a few elite Indonesians. In 1962 the Dutch handed the school over to the Indonesian government. At the time, the predominantly Muslim public school was considered one of the best in Jakarta.

On a recent visit, a magician performed for the students. The girls wore uniforms of knee-length skirts and no head scarves. Boys and girls shoved each other on the playground. Weekly religious classes are required for all students, whether Muslims, Christians or Hindus, under the government curriculum. A new shiny mosque is in the corner of the courtyard.

"The Muslims learn about Islam, prayer and religious activity," said Hardi Priyono, the vice principal for curriculum. "And for the Christians, during the religious class, they also have a special room teaching Christianity. It's always been like that. We are a public school. We have always been a public school."

When Obama attended 4th grade in 1971, Muslim children spent two hours a week studying Islam, and Christian children spent those two hours learning about the Christian religion.

At holidays, the school made a practice of teaching students about different religions. Students from all religions celebrated Christmas with a Christmas tree and carols. They celebrated the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha by handing out a sacrificed goat to the neighborhood's needy.

Photographs from the time show teachers in sleeveless dresses. The only woman who wore a head scarf was the Islamic religion teacher.

"I was really trendy, for example, no sleeves, and miniskirts," recalled Tine Hahiyari, 78, a Protestant who was the school's headmaster from 1972 to 1989. "When I taught sports, I wore shorts."

Obama in Florida on Sunday

2007-03-24T11:38:00.000-07:00

Obama in town on Sunday

Democrat Barack Obama makes his Florida debut as a presidential candidate Sundaywith a $100-per-person appearance at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach sandwiched in between pricier private fundraisers.

The Illinois senator is scheduled to speak at 1 p.m. For more information, go to https://donate.barackobama.com/page/contribute/wpb.

He will also attend private receptions at the Palm Beach home of Jim Clark, Hallandale Beach home of Jeremy and Rachel Alters, the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables and the Coral Gables home of Roy and Lea Black. For more information about the Biltmore event, go to https://donate.barackobama.com/page/contribute/coralgables.

Obama's last public appearance in Florida, before he officially began his campaign, was in October when he rallied with gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis at Florida Memorial University in Miami Gardens.

Also:

Roy Black Hosts Obama Fundraiser (CBS4) MIAMI There will be DJ Irie to spin a few favorites at a Saturday evening fundraiser at the home of Roy and Lea Black. Barack Obama will be the guest of honor.

The party follows Obama's exhausting South Florida schedule, which begins this morning in West Palm Beach at the Kravis Center for a fundraiser, continue to Hallandale Beach for a private reception at the home of Jeremy and Rachel Alters, then to the Biltmore and then to the Blacks' home.

Obama's Minister Responds to Jodi Kantor's Disgraceful Hitjob on Obama in the New York Times

2007-03-24T11:32:00.000-07:00

March 11, 2007
Jodi Kantor
The New York Times
9 West 43rd Street
New York,
New York 10036-3959

Dear Jodi:

Thank you for engaging in one of the biggest misrepresentations of the truth I have ever seen in sixty-five years. You sat and shared with me for two hours. You told me you were doing a "Spiritual Biography" of Senator Barack Obama. For two hours, I shared with you how I thought he was the most principled individual in public service that I have ever met.

For two hours, I talked with you about how idealistic he was. For two hours I shared with you what a genuine human being he was. I told you how incredible he was as a man who was an African American in public service, and as a man who refused to announce his candidacy for President until Carol Moseley Braun indicated one way or the other whether or not she was going to run. I told you what a dreamer he was. I told you how idealistic he was. We talked about how refreshing it would be for someone who knew about Islam to be in the Oval Office. Your own question to me was, Didn't I think it would be incredible to have somebody in the Oval Office who not only knew about Muslims, but had living and breathing Muslims in his own family?

I told you how important it would be to have a man who not only knew the difference between Shiites and Sunnis prior to 9/11/01 in the Oval Office, but also how important it would be to have a man who knew what Sufism was; a man who understood that there were different branches of Judaism; a man who knew the difference between Hasidic Jews, Orthodox Jews, Conservative Jews and Reformed Jews; and a man who was a devout Christian, but who did not prejudge others because they believed something other than what he believed.

I talked about how rare it was to meet a man whose Christianity was not just "in word only."

I talked about Barack being a person who lived his faith and did not argue his faith. I talked about Barack as a person who did not draw doctrinal lines in the sand nor consign other people to hell if they did not believe what he believed.

Out of a two-hour conversation with you about Barack's spiritual journey and my protesting to you that I had not shaped him nor formed him, that I had not mentored him or made him the man he was, even though I would love to take that credit, you did not print any of that. When I told you, using one of your own Jewish stories from the Hebrew Bible as to how God asked Moses, "What is that in your hand?," that Barack was like that when I met him. Barack had it "in his hand." Barack had in his grasp a uniqueness in terms of his spiritual development that one is hard put to find in the 21st century, and you did not print that.

As I was just starting to say a moment ago, Jodi, out of two hours of conversation I spent approximately five to seven minutes on...

... Barack's taking advice from one of his trusted campaign people and deeming it unwise to make me the media spotlight on the day of his announcing his candidacy for the Presidency and what do you print?

You and your editor proceeded to present to the general public a snippet, a printed "sound byte" and a titillating and tantalizing article about his disinviting me to the Invocation on the day of his announcing his candidacy.

I have never been exposed to that kind of duplicitous behavior before, and I want to write you publicly to let you know that I do not approve of it and will not be party to any further smearing of the name, the reputation, the integrity or the character of perhaps this nation's first (and maybe even only) honest candidate offering himself for public service as the person to occupy the Oval Office.

Your editor is a sensationalist. For you to even mention that makes me doubt your credibility, and I am looking forward to see how you are going to butcher what else I had to say concerning Senator Obama's "Spiritual Biography."

Our Conference Minister, the Reverend Jane Fisler Hoffman, a white woman who belongs to a Black church that Hannity of "Hannity and Colmes" is trying to trash, set the record straight for you in terms of who I am and in terms of who we are as the church to which Barack has belonged for over twenty years.

The president of our denomination, the Reverend John Thomas, has offered to try to help you clarify in your confused head what Trinity Church is even though you spent the entire weekend with us setting me up to interview me for what turned out to be a smear of the Senator; and yet The New York Times continues to roll on making the truth what it wants to be the truth.

I do not remember reading in your article that Barack had apologized for listening to that bad information and bad advice. Did I miss it? Or did your editor cut it out? Either way, you do not have to worry about hearing anything else from me for you to edit or "spin" because you are more interested in journalism than in truth.

Forgive me for having a momentary lapse. I forgot that The New York Times was leading the bandwagon in trumpeting why it is we should have gone into an illegal war. The New York Times became George Bush and the Republican Party's national "blog." The New York Times played a role in the outing of Valerie Plame. I do not know why I thought The New York Times had actually repented and was going to exhibit a different kind of behavior. Maybe it was my faith in the Jewish Holy Day of Roshashana. Maybe it was my being caught up in the euphoria of the Season of Lent; but whatever it is or was, I was sadly mistaken. There is no repentance on the part of The New York Times. There is no integrity when it comes to The Times. You should do well with that paper, Jodi. You looked me straight in my face and told me a lie!

Sincerely and respectfully yours,
Reverend Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. ,
Senior Pastor
Trinity United Church of Christ

Barack Obama Denies Knowing about Hillary "1984" ad

2007-03-23T19:33:00.000-07:00

Senator Denied Campaign Connection but Mock Ad Maker Lived With Press Secretary

By JAKE TAPPER and JONATHAN GREENBERGER

March 23, 2007— The press secretary for Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., recently lived with the creator of the scathingly satirical YouTube video ad that attacked Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., a revelation that seems to undermine the senator's claim that he and his campaign had only "very attenuated" ties with the ad's creator.

Ben LaBolt, the recently named press secretary of Obama's Senate office in Washington, D.C., roomed with Philip de Vellis, the creator of the "1984" ad, in Ohio last year while the two worked together on the successful Senate campaign of then Rep. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.

The relationship does not serve as evidence that anyone on the Obama campaign knew de Villis had made the ad. The Obama campaign and its employees have said they have no knowledge of and had nothing to do with the creation of the ad, and de Villis has written as much on a blog.

But it does seem to belie statements by Obama and the campaign that implied a much more distant relationship between Obama's campaign and de Villis.

Until the Huffington Post Web site uncovered that de Villis was the anonymous poster of the YouTube video, which portrays Clinton as a futuristic dictator, de Villis worked for Blue State Digital, which does Internet work for the Obama campaign's Web site. After de Villis admitted he had made the video, he and Blue State Digital parted ways.

Wednesday evening the Obama campaign issued a statement saying, "The Obama campaign and its employees had no knowledge and had nothing to do with the creation of the ad. We were notified this evening by a vendor of ours, Blue State Digital, that an employee of the company had been involved in the making of this ad. Blue State Digital has separated ties with this individual and we have been assured he did no work on our campaign's account."

Thursday, Obama said of de Vellis that his campaign had "no way of knowing who this person was."

"If I have a phone contract with Verizon and an employee of a phone company does something that you know … we're not responsible for that," Obama said.

Chicago Tribune: Digging Up Barack's Past

2007-03-23T19:29:00.000-07:00

THE MAKING OF A CANDIDATE

The not-so-simple story of Barack Obama's youth

The glare of the presidential campaign is shining on people previously hidden behind pseudonyms in Obama's memoirs. One of them, a convicted felon, demanded money from the campaign. Or else.

By Maurice Possley and Ray Gibson
Tribune staff reporters
Published March 23, 2007, 7:30 PM CDT

In the introduction to his 1995 memoir, "Dreams from My Father,'' Barack Obama noted that except for his family and several public figures, he had changed the names of most of the people in the book "for the sake of their privacy."

More than a decade later, that privacy is rapidly evaporating as the media, Obama's own campaign staff and others have begun to dig into the book and reach out to friends, classmates and associates of the presidential candidate.

Continued

Barack Obama in Iowa

2007-03-22T08:50:00.000-07:00

Barack in Burlington Iowa

2007-03-22T08:47:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama: Don't Believe the Clinton Spin, I opposed Iraq

2007-03-22T08:45:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama on Larry King Live Taking about Iraq

2007-03-22T08:42:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama at International Asssociation of Fire Fighters

2007-03-22T08:40:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Meetup Video

2007-03-22T08:33:00.000-07:00

You Tube: Barack Obama in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

2007-03-22T08:11:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Clarifies Iraq Position in Iowa

2007-03-22T08:05:00.000-07:00

Obama says he's always opposed the war

By Charlotte Eby, Journal Des Moines Bureau

DES MOINES -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama told reporters Wednesday he has been against the Iraq war from the start, countering questions from the campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton in recent days about the sincerity of his opposition.

On a conference call with reporters Wednesday, Obama said he didn't know what would be gained from the parsing of his position of the war.

"I think that my position on the war has been consistent. It has been unequivocal, and that's the only presentation that I've made during the course of this campaign," Obama said.

Obama denied that his support in the Senate for funding the war undermines the idea he is a longtime opponent, arguing troops had to be adequately protected.

"I've always been clear and consistent on the notion that we should not get in there, that once we were in there, then we had to make the best of a bad situation," Obama said.

Obama has called for a phased withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq beginning on May 1, with a goal of having troops out by the end of March 2008.

His early campaign rallies have brought their biggest applause when he talks about a war "that should have never been authorized."

Obama was not yet a member of the Senate when the vote was taken in 2002 authorizing force in Iraq, but he said Wednesday he would have voted against it.

"I am certain that I would have voted to oppose this war," Obama said. He said intelligence showing Saddam Hussein did not, in fact, have weapons of mass destruction was available at the time the vote was taken.

"There was a lot of ambiguity in the case that the (Bush) administration was making," Obama said, noting that dissenting voices in the intelligence community had been widely reported in the media.

Obama was careful not to directly criticize Clinton or Sen. John Edwards, both of whom voted in favor of the resolution authorizing force in Iraq and are his top rivals in the Democratic presidential primary.

"I prefer not to, you know, state it in the negative. I'm, I think, making an affirmative statement about my judgment when it came to this critical issue," Obama said.

Obama on Wednesday also pointed to his 2002 speech at an anti-war rally in Chicago, which he said has turned out to be a "fairly accurate assessment of the consequences of invading."

According to a speech text provided by the campaign, Obama outlined the dangers of military action in Iraq.

"That's what I'm opposed to," he said at the time. "A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics."

Clinton spokesman Mark Daley declined to directly respond to Obama's claim he has been unequivocal on the war.

"Sen. Clinton and Sen. Obama have had the same voting record in Congress on Iraq, and they are united in the need to bring an end to the war," Daley said. "As Democrats, our shared beliefs are much greater than our differences."

State Sen. Joe Bolkcom, a Democrat from Iowa City, said it remains to be seen whether Iowa caucus-goers will hold it against Clinton and Edwards for their votes authorizing the use of force.

"I'm interested in who's got the best plan to get us out of Iraq, and bring our soldiers and troops home n get them out of harm's way," said Bolkcom, who is undecided whom he will support in the Iowa caucuses.

Charlotte Eby can be reached at (515) 243-0138 or {M3chareby@aol.com.

Barack Obama and Iraq

2007-03-22T07:20:00.000-07:00

Clinton Camp Challenges: Where does Barack Obama stand on Iraq?

By PATRICK HEALY

Published: March 22, 2007

New York Times

Over the last week, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign has opened a new offensive against Senator Barack Obama: Former President Bill Clinton has asserted that Mr. Obama was initially ambivalent about the Iraq war, and Mrs. Clinton's strategist has highlighted his votes to finance a war he says he opposes.

But a review of Mr. Obama's statements on Iraq since 2002 shows that he has opposed the war against Saddam Hussein consistently, calling it "dumb" and "rash." Yet when it came later to hypothetical questioning about how he would have voted on the 2002 Iraq war resolution, Mr. Obama has been more circumspect.

With the war a central issue in the campaign and with part of Mr. Obama's appeal among Democrats rooted in his opposition to the war, his stance and the question of whether he has been consistent are likely to be themes throughout his battle for the Democratic nomination, especially if Mr. Obama uses his position to suggest that Mrs. Clinton and other candidates failed to be sufficiently skeptical of the Bush administration.

While Mr. Obama's positions on the war are generally of a piece, he has been more outspoken on some aspects of Iraq than others. In 2002, in the weeks before and after the Senate voted on the war resolution, Mr. Obama, then a state senator, took a strong antiwar line, popular in his liberal Chicago district, and repeatedly said President Bush "has not made his case for going into Iraq."

When it came to the sort of hypothetical questions politicians dislike, like whether he would have voted for the resolution, Mr. Obama was more reserved.

"I think I would have agreed with our senior Senator Dick Durbin and voted nay," he said in November 2002. "What I would have been concerned about was a carte blanche to the administration for a doctrine of pre-emptive strikes that I'm not sure sets a good precedent."

At that time, Mr. Obama said he had based his judgments on following the debate in Washington and on his gut. He did not have access, of course, to the intelligence reports that were provided to senators voting on the resolution. He brought up that fact two years later, in the 2004 presidential race, as he made clear that while he opposed the war, senators who voted for it were acting on other information.

Indeed, reporters asked Mr. Obama about the Democratic presidential ticket throughout the 2004 campaign, because Senators John Kerry and John Edwards had both voted for the Iraq war resolution. In an interview with The New York Times in July 2004, he declined to criticize Mr. Kerry or Mr. Edwards over the Iraq vote, but also said that he would not have voted as they had based on the information he had at the time.

"But, I'm not privy to the Senate intelligence reports," Mr. Obama said. "What would I have done? I don't know. What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made."

The Clinton campaign has lifted part of that comment - "I don't know" - to question whether Mr. Obama would have opposed the war resolution had he been in the Senate at the time. The campaign has also cited other remarks Mr. Obama made in 2004, when he said there was "room for disagreement" on the war resolution vote.

In an interview yesterday, Bill Burton, a spokesman for Mr. Obama, was asked eight times to explain Mr. Obama's "I don't know" remark on Iraq. Mr. Burton repeatedly returned to the last sentence in the remark - that Mr. Obama believed the case for war was not made. Finally, he said he would not comment on a hypothetical about how Mr. Obama might have voted in 2002.

Mr. Burton also said Mr. Clinton was "100 percent inaccurate" in suggesting that Mr. Obama was ever ambivalent about Iraq.

The other line of attack from the Clinton camp, voiced Monday night by Mark Penn, Mrs. Clinton's chief strategist, is that Mr. Obama's Senate voting record on Iraq is nearly identical to Mrs. Clinton's, including votes for financing the war.

Mr. Obama's criticism of the war led him to say, in 2003, that he would have opposed the $87 billion emergency spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan. Once elected to the Senate in 2004, however, Mr. Obama voted in favor of spending bills for the Iraq military campaign and the troops there.

An Obama spokesman said yesterday that Mr. Obama's only problem with the $87 billion bill was the roughly $20 billion part for reconstruction and no-bid contracts. But the subsequent spending bills Mr. Obama voted for also included similar allocations. Mr. Burton, the Obama spokesman, said those bills were less problematic because the money was better accounted for.

Yesterday, on a conference call with reporters, Mr. Obama said his votes for Iraq spending bills did not contradict his opposition to the war.

"Once we were in, we were going to have some responsibility to try to make it work as best we can," Mr. Obama said, according to The Associated Press. "More importantly, you make sure the troops are supported." (The Iraq war began in the spring of 2003, however, so the troops were already in when the $87 billion bill came up for a vote.)

The Clinton campaign has pounded especially hard on those Iraq spending votes as evidence that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton have similar Senate records on Iraq. Clinton advisers say their goal is to show that Mr. Obama campaigned one way and acted another way in office. They said also they also hoped to offset Mrs. Clinton's shifts in her Iraq position by focusing on Mr. Obama, whom they see as a real threat to winning the Democratic nomination.

Harvard Crimson: Barack Obama Goes to Alma Mater to Raise Money

2007-03-21T23:39:00.000-07:00

One of Harvard Law School’s most beloved sons swooped into Cambridge yesterday evening for an intimate, high-dollar fundraising event with about 150 of his former professors, classmates, and their friends.

“We love being in Boston,” Senator Barack Obama, an Illinois Democrat and a 1991 graduate of the Law School, said as he entered the event.

“It’s nice to be back in Cambridge, particularly after I paid off all my parking tickets,” he added referring to his recent public reconciliation with City Hall.

Kirkland and Ellis Professor of Law David B. Wilkins ’77 hosted the event at his Cambridge home, a forest-green Victorian with orange trim tucked at the bottom of a hill near Brattle Street.

The $2,300-a-person event, which was closed to the press and the public, featured no shortage of political heavyweights.

“I’m the most senior member of the party,” Henry Morgenthau III, the scion of the Morgenthau clan that served as advisers to Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt, said as he approached Crimson reporters. It was not clear whether the 90-year-old was referring to the Democratic Party or to the evening’s gathering.

Alan D. Solomont, a major Massachusetts Democratic operative and a former national finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee, was one the last guests to arrive. When he was greeted at the gate by volunteers and an event organizer, one commented: “Now we can really get started.”

The political guns were no match for the academic ones. Obama’s former professors and classmates turned out in force, enthusiastically supporting the man who was the first black president of the Harvard Law Review and later a lecturer in constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School.

One of Obama’s former professors, Loeb University Professor Laurence H. Tribe ’62, helped organize the event.

Tribe, who has called Obama “a political and rhetorical genius,” pulled up to Wilkins’ house in a red Toyota Prius just before 7 p.m. The law professor then proceeded to park illegally, facing the wrong way on a one-way street.

Boston College law professor Kent Greenfield, who organized an alliance of law schools to fight the military’s policy regarding openly gay service-members, said outside the house that “a Barack Obama presidency would do more to repair our broken reputation in the world than anything or anyone else.”

When asked if he knew Obama, Boston attorney Joseph L. Stanganelli, one of Obama’s Law School classmates, answered: “Everyone knew him, and everyone who knew him knows that he’s the real deal.”

—Staff writer Paras D. Bhayani can be reached at pbhayani@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Samuel P. Jacobs can reached at jacobs@fas.harvard.edu.

Obama's Chicago Trinity United Church of Christ

2007-03-20T07:15:00.000-07:00

Activist Obama Church Enters Spotlight

By MICHAEL TARM, Associated Press Writer

Monday, March 19, 2007

(03-19) 23:22 PDT CHICAGO, (AP) --

A then 26-year-old Barack Obama walked down the aisle of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, knelt beneath a cross suspended from its rafters and, as he later explained it, committed himself to God after years as a religious skeptic.

In those early days at the self-described "unashamedly black" church, the future Democratic presidential candidate was moved to tears by a sermon from its activist pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., whom he has portrayed as his spiritual mentor.

Two decades later, Obama himself would be Wright's topic of the day — but not for reasons either man would have hoped.

At a recent Sunday service, following media coverage of Obama's last-minute decision not to have Wright speak at the senator's presidential announcement last month, Wright warned his flock not to believe any reports of a rift between him and the church's best-known member.

"Barack and I are fine," Wright, 65, on an out-of-state trip, said in a recorded message played to about 2,000 attendees. "The press is not to be trusted. ... Don't let somebody outside our camp divide us."

The erudite if blunt-speaking pastor also said Obama had apologized for withdrawing the invitation to speak at the Feb. 10 announcement in Springfield.

Obama had taken "some bad advice from some of his own campaign people who thought it would not be a good idea for me to be in front of the cameras on the day he announced," Wright said, adding that he and Obama had "moved on." Wright attended the announcement, but he did not speak.

Continued

Harvard Crimson: Senior Political Advisors Have it Out at the Institute of Politics

2007-03-20T07:07:00.000-07:00

Top campaign advisers to Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama engaged in verbal combat at the Institute of Politics last night, sparring over the Illinois senator’s stated views on the war in Iraq.

Mark J. Penn ’76, Clinton’s senior strategist, set off a debate when he pointed to a 2004 quote by Obama in which the then-state senator claimed he did not know how he would have voted on the war if he were in the U.S. Senate. Penn said the quote ran counter to Obama’s stated longtime opposition to the war.

“Are we going to tell people the truth about what the candidates have voted for, what they have said, or are we going to do it selectively?” Penn, a former Crimson editor, said.

In response, Obama’s senior strategist, David Axelrod, said the quote was taken out of context, and that Obama had consistently opposed the war.

Axelrod concluded by asking “are we going to spend 10 months attacking each other or are we going to try to lift the people up?”

Continued

Barack Attack: Stumping in Colorado

2007-03-20T06:52:00.001-07:00

Barack attack

By JOHN MOTSINGER Colorado Daily Staff
Monday, March 19, 2007 10:19 PM MDT

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) appeared before a capacity crowd of 1,400 avid supporters at the Sherman Event Center in Denver on Sunday, calling for troop withdrawal in Iraq and lampooning accusations that he lacks experience.

A line snaked around the block as fervent Coloradans waited over an hour to see the presidential hopeful, many paying up to $100 to attend the fundraiser event. Obama finally appeared after a rousing introduction by Colorado State Senator Peter Groff in which he encouraged Coloradans to take the state into “deep blue territory” by giving Sen. Obama their 9 electoral votes.

Though he addressed a broken healthcare system, the “absence of an energy policy,” and children still being “left behind” as the result of underfunded education programs, the greatest applause came when Obama spoke about the war in Iraq, which he said “never should have been authorized.”

“We no longer have good options [in Iraq] ... only bad options and worse options,” he said Citing the economic toll the war has already taken, Obama declared the country cannot achieve its domestic goals while sending $100 billion a year overseas, and mentioned legislation that he introduced in January to begin withdrawing and redeploying troops by May 1 of this year.

Continued

Contact John Motsinger about this story at (303) 443-6272, ext. 113, or at editor@coloradodaily.com.

Barack Obama Stumping in Oklahoma

2007-03-20T06:47:00.001-07:00

Sen. Obama: Bring troops home

JACLYN HOUGHTON

The Edmond Sun

EDMOND — OKLAHOMA CITY — James Allen brought his 13-year-old daughter along to see history in the making on Monday.

The Oklahoma City resident, along with more than 1,000 Oklahomans, filed into the Farmers Public Market Building in south Oklahoma City to hear U.S. Senator and presidential hopeful Barack Obama speak.

Some have said Obama lacks experience needed for the presidency, but Allen felt differently.

“George Washington probably had less experience,” said Allen, 56.

The event was a fundraising rally charging $25 a ticket.

The U.S. senator from Illinois spoke to the crowd on a day that marked the four-year anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq.

Obama shared his opinion on the war.

“We’ve got a war that should have never been authorized,” he said to a cheering crowd that held up signs reading: OU students for Obama. “A war that cost us half a trillion dollars. A war that’s cost us almost 3,200 of our bravest men and women.”

He said he thought the war was a mistake back in 2002 and he hopes that by March 31, 2008, the troops will come home.

“It is time for us to bring this war to a close,” Obama said.

Continued

Barack Obama and Larry King Live

2007-03-20T06:34:00.000-07:00

The Swamp

Chicago Tribune

Obama: 'Bad options, worse' in Iraq

Posted by Mark Silva at 6:30 am CDT

"I don't think there are any good options left in Iraq,'' said Sen. Barack Obama, the Illinois Democrat running for president. "There are bad options and worse options.''

The senator made his assessment of the situation in an interview on CNN's Larry King Live last night. ''At some point, you have to acknowledge that the approach we're taking is not working and we have to try a different approach,'' he said. "The president's attitude has been more of the same. ''

See the rest of the interview, here in the Swamp:

From a transcript courtesy of CNN, Obama's appearance on Larry King Live on Monday night:

KING: "Good evening and welcome to another edition of LARRY KING LIVE.

A very special guest, but first, let me thank all my friends, colleagues and others who have written me and sent flowers and the like over the fact that we had very successful carotid artery surgery on Friday, in the hospital, was out on Saturday and back today.

It's that little thing you see here, that's the whole scar from that surgery. I want to, again, thank you so much for your contact to me and for your so kind and generous feelings.

And now let's get to the business at hand. Senator Barack Obama joins us. He's in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Democratic presidential candidate, U.S.
Senator from Illinois, and "New York Times" best-selling author.

In fairness, we did invite Senator Clinton and Senator McCain to join us on this, the fourth anniversary of the start of the Iraq War, and they declined.

What does that anniversary say to you, Senator?

OBAMA: Well, it says that we have expended an enormous amount of blood and treasure on what I think has been misguided enterprise and that it's time to bring our involvement there to a close.

As you know, Larry, I've opposed this war from the start. In 2002 and the run-up to the war, I gave a speech saying that this is going to be an open- ended commitment, without any clear strategy for success, and that ultimately it would distract us from the war on terrorism and the need to pin down Al Qaeda and finish the job in Afghanistan.

Unfortunately, that's been the case and now, whether you were for or against it then, I think we all have to recognize that we're not going to achieve a military solution in Iraq, that stability in Iraq is going to depend on political accommodations between the various parties, the Shia, the Sunni, the Kurds.

We've got to redouble our diplomatic efforts internally, as well as externally, and that's why I put forward a bill in the Senate that would start bringing our combat troops home beginning on May 1st of this year, with a target date of getting all combat troops out of Iraq by March 31st of next year.

Continued

Denver Post: Barack Obama in Denver, Colorado Raising Money

2007-03-19T13:20:00.000-07:00

Obama: "The country calls us"

By Karen E. Crummy
Denver Post Staff Writer

Article Last Updated: 03/19/2007 06:34:40 AM MDT

ocratic presidential contender Barack Obama, portraying himself as the candidate for the common man, called upon hundreds of people in Denver on Sunday to shed their political apathy and embrace a movement to reclaim their government.

The Illinois senator said he understood that people no longer had confidence in their elected leaders and that they believed "government feels like a business instead of a mission." His campaign, he told the roughly 1,500 people in attendance, is their campaign, and "the country calls us."

"We have to take over Washington," he shouted into a microphone at the 1770 Sherman Street Event Complex. "At every juncture when the people decided to change this country, it changed."

Continued

Controversial "1984" Ads about Hillary Clinton

2007-03-19T13:10:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

2007-03-19T13:01:00.000-07:00

Obama makes campaign stop in Oklahoma

Last Update: Mar 19, 2007 1:18 PM

OKLAHOMA CITY) March 19 - Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama is planning his first campaign stop in Oklahoma.

The US senator from Illinois will attend a fundraiser at the Farmer's Public Market Building at 311 South Klein in Oklahoma City. About one-thousand tickets were sold for 25 dollars each, and state party officials say the event is sold out.

Obama is the second Democratic presidential candidate to visit the state this week. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson attended a private fundraiser in Oklahoma City yesterday.

Party officials say US Senator Joe Biden of Delaware also is tentatively planning a trip to Oklahoma this week.

Barack Obama Speaking in Oakland ( Frank Ogawa Plaza) March 17

2007-03-19T12:50:00.000-07:00

You Tube Video: Barack Obama in Oakland Speaking to 10,000

2007-03-18T13:10:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Draws 10,000 People in Oakland

2007-03-17T22:43:00.000-07:00

10,000 people in Oakland Support Obama

OAKLAND (AP) — Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama attracted a crowd of 10,000 or more to his first rally in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Having glided to the top tier of Democratic candidates on a message of hope, the Illinois senator told the crowd in downtown Oakland Saturday that his campaign "is a vehicle for your hopes; it is a vehicle for your dreams."

But he also used the appearance to contrast himself with his chief rival for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton. Without naming her, Obama made an issue of Clinton's much criticized 2002 vote to authorize the war in Iraq, for which she has refused to apologize.

Continued

Susan Estrich: Barack, Israel and Al Sharpton

2007-03-17T12:24:00.000-07:00

Obama, Israel And Al Sharpton

Fri Mar 16, 3:00 AM ET

It wasn't exactly a Sister Souljah moment, but recognizing the suffering of the Palestinians on the eve of his maiden address as a presidential candidate before AIPAC, the national pro-It wasn't exactly a Sister Souljah moment, but recognizing the suffering of the Palestinians on the eve of his maiden address as a presidential candidate before AIPAC, the national pro-Israel lobby, as Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) did this week, was certain to get the notice of the crowd." lobby, as Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) did this week, was certain to get the notice of the crowd

"Nobody is suffering more than the Palestinian people," is what Obama said in Iowa on Sunday.

"Awarding first place in the suffering matrix is odious and infelicitous," is what Rabbi Steven Silver of Redondo Beach, Calif., told a reporter interviewing delegates to the AIPAC meeting on Monday. "I think a lot of Americans would find that comment offensive, too." His son, a Clinton partisan, was reportedly spreading the word to others about Obama's comments

In Obama's speech to the conference, the Illinois Senator went out of his way to affirm his support for Israel. "I am pro-Israel," he said. He and Hillary said all the same things about fighting terror and supporting Israel's security. But Hillary never mentioned the Palestinians in her well-received speech, while Obama said: "All of us are committed to two states living side by side in peace." Even more troubling to his critics was Obama's inclusion of cynicism as an obstacle to peace in the Middle East. "One of the enemies we have to fight," Obama said, "is not just terrorists, it's not just Hezbollah, it's not just Hamas — it's also cynicism."

Many supporters of Israel are skeptical of anyone who is not sufficiently cynical about the prospects of peace; the idea is that it's only realistic to be cynical. There was, reportedly, much murmuring about Obama's attack on cynicism and what it portends for Israel, particularly when coupled with his earlier recognition of Palestinian suffering.

In truth, there is nothing new in any of Obama's comments. He's running on hope and optimism, after all. It's not as if he's singled the Middle East out. And as for the suffering of the Palestinians, I've heard similar comments from Israel's best friends in pointing out the price of their failed leaders. And sure enough, that is precisely the context in which Obama made his remarks. "If we could get some movement among the Palestinian leadership, what I'd like to see is a loosening up of some of the restrictions on providing aid directly to the Palestinian people." Nothing necessarily wrong there.

Of course, all of this was happening even as Obama was being dragged into an even more public tussle with Rev.

Al Sharpton, the high-profile New York activist to whom Obama has apparently been insufficiently solicitous. Sharpton has made clear that he is not necessarily going to endorse his fellow black, and has loudly denied the increasingly obvious explanation that his political judgments are driven by his ego. Obama's willingness to stand up to Sharpton may or may not cost him in the black community — my guess is it will ultimately cost Sharpton more, which Al is smart enough to figure out — but it certainly generated attention to the rift.

You can see in Obama's moves signs of either the sort of independence that could win this race for him or the sort of inexperience that could lose it for him. Hillary was a hit at AIPAC. In a roomful of donors for whom Israel is the number one issue, she left no doubt as to her commitment. She gave them what they wanted, which is what you would expect her to do. The conventional step for her opponent would be to do precisely the same thing. Hillary has made her peace with Sharpton. Many expect him to endorse her.

But Obama is not going to beat Hillary at the conventional game. That's her hand. If he's going to win, not to mention preserve his integrity in the process, he has to be who he is. Whether that is viewed as naivety in action or the insight of a new generation of leaders is the judgment voters will ultimately have to make.

Barack Obama Woos the Audience in New Hampshire

2007-03-17T12:09:00.000-07:00

Obama Greeted Warmly at Famous N.H. Site

Last Updated:
03-17-07 at 10:40AM

CLAREMONT, N.H. -- Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama had little difficulty winning over the audience at a senior center made famous by the husband of his biggest rival.

The Illinois senator spoke Friday at the Earl M. Bourdon Senior Center where former President Bill Clinton and House Speaker Newt Gingrich shook hands in 1995 and promised to create a bipartisan commission on campaign finance reform. The commission never materialized.

"I know this is a pretty famous spot," Obama said. "I think it's wonderful this place has that history."

The crowd waited an hour for Obama to arrive and swarmed him for autographs after he spoke.

"By the way, you had us from your first hello," said Carol Thebarge, who went on to ask Obama about President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq.

The subject of Iraq also produced the event's most contentious moment, when a man compared Bush to Hitler and unsuccessfully pressed Obama to do the same.

"I wouldn't draw those analogies," Obama said. "I think this campaign season offers us an opportunity for a fresh start."

But he repeated his call for the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who has been criticized for the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. Obama noted that he had voted against confirming Gonzales.

"What I said was, 'This is a guy who sees himself as George Bush's lawyer as opposed to the people's lawyer," he said.

Barack Obama on Today Show 3/15

2007-03-16T10:51:00.000-07:00

Barchelle: Media Piece about Barack and Michelle Obama in Ebony

2007-03-16T10:48:00.000-07:00

An Ad for Barack Obama Created By Students

2007-03-16T10:46:00.000-07:00

Fox News: We Lie, We Distort, We Shamelessly Attack Barack Obama

2007-03-16T07:51:00.000-07:00

The Lies They Tell: How to Stop the Fox Propaganda Machine

As presidential aspirants announce their candidacies in an already mind-numbing procession, the “Sliming Bowl” is well under way. No candidate has been smeared more than Barack Obama, and no smearer mre relentless than Fox News, as the short video (right) by Brave New Films demonstrates.

“Sliming” is the rabid, rapid, media barrage of persistently repeated lies and innuendo mastered by the right-wing media machine, which aims to tar candidates with negative associations before their campaigns get rolling. Or alternatively, to bruise them enough so that they will suffer under the burden of damaged goods as they try to gain footing.

The conservative roots usually puts out a speculative story through Fox News or Matt Drudge (of the Drudge Report), a powerful mouthpiece for the Bush White House. Then the right-wing echo reverberates as the lies make their way to talk radio and the right-wing blogosphere. Eventually, it gets picked up and carried by the mainstream media, with few understanding where the story originated.

In fact, disinformation conjured by the conservatives often has its most profound impact with the steady cooperation of the corporate press in repeating their lies. How many people still think that Al Gore said he invented the Internet?

Obama bashing
While McCain has taken a much-deserved beating for his hypocrisy, blatant efforts at total disinformation have been aimed at Barack Obama, the fresh-faced Democratic candidate and senator from Illinois.

Obama has been hammered for a whole grab-bag of alleged misdeeds, most which he had nothing to do with—such as his name, his early schooling, and his parentage—while other “nuggets of expose,” like the fact that he smokes cigarettes, is treated like a deep, dark media secret.

Fox News, with its Muslim bashing, leads the way in the smear campaign against Obama. A catalogue of Fox’s propaganda aimed at Obama has been collected by Greenwald, whose highly popular film Outfoxed got wide distribution through Blockbuster, Netflix, and thousands of house parties across the country two years ago.

Paul Waldman, of Media Matters and the Gadfly, charts the first of what are already many false stories spread about Barack Obama—that he attended a fundamentalist madrassa when he lived in Indonesia as a boy. Waldman writes:

When insightmag.com, a website owned by the right-wing Washington Times, put out a breathless report trumpeting the fantasy, Fox News immediately jumped on board, as did Limbaugh, Hannity and the rest of the talk radio bile spewers. “Why didn’t anybody ever mention,” asked Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy, a man who makes Larry King look like Oscar Wilde, “that that man right there was raised—spent the first decade of his life, raised by his Muslim father—as a Muslim and was educated in a madrassa?”

This sentence contained no fewer than five falsehoods: Obama wasn’t raised by his father, his father left the family when Obama was two years old, his father wasn’t a practicing Muslim, Obama wasn’t raised as a Muslim and he didn’t go to a madrassa. “Well, he didn’t admit it,” chimed in co-host Brian Kilmeade. “I mean, that’s the issue."

Obama: I've Never Been A Muslim

2007-03-16T07:31:00.000-07:00

Obama takes issue with report identifying him as Muslim

By Helen Kennedy

New York Daily News

(MCT)

NEW YORK - Barack Obama wants everyone to know: I am not a Muslim!

Under a headline reading "Just because the L.A. Times writes it, does not make it true," the Obama campaign took issue Thursday with a story that said the Illinois Democrat attended services at a mosque and "bowed to Allah" when he was a small boy in Indonesia.

"Barack Obama is not and has never been a Muslim," the campaign stressed. "Obama never prayed in a mosque. He has never been a Muslim, was not raised a Muslim and is a committed Christian who attends the United Church of Christ."

Obama, who lived in Jakarta between the ages of 6 and 10 with his mother and Indonesian stepfather, has said he was raised in a secular household and attended both Catholic and Muslim schools. Indonesia's population is mostly Muslim.

His spokesman, Bill Burton, said he didn't think the campaign statement was too strongly worded.

"As folks get to know Sen. Obama, it's important that people get the facts straight," he said. "Sen. Obama has been very clear and direct about who he is and where he comes from."

His campaign reacted just as strongly to a story aired on Fox News in January that falsely said he attended a radical Islamic madrassa, or religious school, as a child.

A Diageo poll last month found that 6 percent of voters think Obama is Muslim.

Meanwhile, in horse race polls, a new Harris survey found Obama closing on Democratic front-runner Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y..

Clinton still leads Obama 15 percent to 12 percent among all adults, but her lead is down from 20 percent to 10 percent last month.

A Time magazine poll found Clinton's lead over Obama narrowed to eight points among Democrats, down from a 12-point lead late last month.

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Visit the Daily News online at http://www.nydailynews.com

Princetonian: I am an Obamaniac

2007-03-16T07:13:00.000-07:00

True confessions of an Obamaniac

By Catherine Rampell
Princetonian Columnist

At a recent journalism job interview, I was asked to survey the field of 2008 presidential candidates. Who did I like, and why?

I started to rattle off a list of positions that had caught my eye — positions on electoral ethics, health care, poverty, gay rights and other issues. Then I caught myself. "Who am I kidding?" I finally confessed. "Right now, I support Barack Obama, and for entirely irrational reasons."

This certainly didn't win me any points. Instead, it elicited some nervous, somewhat disapproving laughter, as they waited for me to redact the comment. But, I had told the truth.

I found myself saying that Obama is capable of restoring some sense of dignity to the office of President of the United States. I said I liked the energy behind his campaign. I said that he excited me, that I admired him as a person and the values he represented.

Continued

Barack Obama Changing American Attitudes About Race, Politics, and Presidential Candidates

2007-03-16T06:58:00.000-07:00

All eyes to be on Obama in Oakland's melting pot

Candidate's race won't guarantee votes, locals say; downtown rally on Saturday

When schoolteacher Mari Houssni-Adler went to Oakland's Jack London Square last weekend wearing a homemade "Obama 08" T-shirt, she turned heads.

"People were curious. They stopped me and seemed surprised that a middle-age white woman was supporting Barack Obama," the San Jose woman said.

Obama's run is challenging at least some racial stereotypes in politics, and his candidacy has reignited the discussion about whether an African American can be elected president.

On Saturday the Democratic senator from Illinois will make his first public Bay Area appearance as a presidential candidate in Oakland, where his candidacy is evoking a strong sense of pride alongside caution that his race alone will not guarantee him votes. After extensive outreach by the campaign, an afternoon rally in downtown Oakland is expected to draw as many as 10,000 people.

While Obama's race clearly matters for people and is part of the reason for the surge of interest, even in multiracial Oakland he's far from sealing the deal.

"It's a great opportunity for African Americans to re-enter vigorously the political arena," said Black Wall Street Merchants Association President Ed Dillard of Oakland. While calling Obama's ethnicity "extremely important," Dillard added, "Gone are the days when black people vote for people just because they're black."

Continued

Obama is a Uniter

2007-03-14T12:13:00.000-07:00

Eugene Robinson : Obama believes his approach to politics can unite, solve problems

Washington Post

The reason to begin with the what-is-he issue is that it's a good handle on a key tenet of Obama's political philosophy. He is both an African-American and the biracial son of a black Kenyan father and a white American mother; both a product of the streets of Chicago, where he worked as a community organizer, and a son of the streets of Jakarta, where he played as a kid. Obama is the personification of "both-and."

He said his belief that American politics has seen enough "either-or" — and that he can shift the paradigm to "both-and" — is what led him to undertake "the risks and difficulties and challenges and silliness of a modern presidential campaign."

Thus, on the question of inner-city poverty and dysfunction, Obama proposes a suite of orthodox solutions — early childhood education, after-school and mentoring programs, efforts to teach young parents how to be parents. But he also emphasizes personal responsibility: "The framework that tends to be set up in Washington — which is either the problem is not enough money and not enough government programs, or the problem is a culture of poverty and not enough emphasis on traditional values — presents a false choice."

Continued

New Hampshire: Barack Obama's Office Opening in Manchester

2007-03-14T12:07:00.000-07:00

You are invited to attend Barack Obama's office-opening party!! The headliner will be former South Dakota Senator Tom Daschle. Here's the 411:

Office-Opening Party with Senator Tom Daschle
Monday, March 19, at 6:00 p.m.
60 Rogers Street, 2nd Floor
Manchester, NH 03104

Washington Post: David Ignatius Gives Foreign Policy Advice to Mr. Obama

2007-03-14T11:58:00.000-07:00

A Manifesto for the Next President

By David Ignatius

Wednesday, March 14, 2007; Page A15

Zbigniew Brzezinski has written a new book that might be a foreign policy manifesto for Barack Obama. Its message is that America can recover from what Brzezinski calls the "catastrophic" mistakes of the Bush administration, but only if the next president makes a clean break from those policies and aligns the country with a world in transformation.

The former national security adviser says he hasn't yet picked the candidate who could deliver on his book's title of a " Second Chance" for America to reverse its decline as a superpower. But by stressing the need for a foreign policy makeover, his prescriptions seem tailor-made for a certain junior senator from Illinois. In his every word and gesture, the young, transracial Obama would say to an angry world: Take a new look. I represent a country that is different from the one you think you know.

Continued

Barack Obama Speaking in Oakland ( Frank Ogawa Plaza) March 17

2007-03-14T11:29:00.000-07:00

Schedule

Location	Date and Time
Oakland City Hall Plaza (Frank Ogawa Plaza) 1 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza Oakland, CA 94612 map cross street: between 14th and 15th Streets at Clay district: Oakland Hills	Sat Mar 17 (3pm)

Description

Come to this free rally outside Oakland City Hall to hear Senator Barack Obama speak. Known for his oratory skills, the presidential candidate will be speaking on a variety of issues of both international and domestic concern. Whether you're a die-hard supporter, undecided or a complete conservative, this event appeals to all. Come see one of the most powerful, charismatic speakers of our time.

Barack Obama has the Smarts to Listen to College Students and Veteran Field Organizers

2007-03-14T11:19:00.000-07:00

Iowa students help drive election bus

March 14, 2007

BY JENNIFER HUNTER Sun-Times Columnist

DES MOINES -- Just after his presidential announcement in Springfield, Barack Obama winged his way to Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He spoke at John F. Kennedy High School, and when the speech ended and a few hands were shaken, he and his wife, Michelle, were whisked away. They scooted aboard a yellow school bus full of college-aged Democrats. The Obamas spent an hour driving with the 25 students from 10 Iowa colleges, chewing over policy issues such as the war in Iraq and munching on trail mix.

The students had expected to meet with one of Obama's aides and were stunned when they got the real deal. "The cool thing about it was that it was the day he announced and after all the people he could have had meetings with, he was meeting us, college Democrats," recalls Patrick Rynard of Drake University.

When the ride ended at Waterloo, Rynard passed Obama a binder of suggestions about how to woo the student vote. Later, an Obama aide flashed Rynard's binder, then coyly wouldn't tell anyone what was in it.

Scholarly adviceA few phone calls led me to Rynard, president of the College Democrats of Iowa, and he wasn't loath to talk about his advice to Obama when we met on the Drake campus Monday. The thoughtful 21-year-old political science senior has spent a lot of time figuring out how to organize students. His directives to Obama come from three years of intense involvement with the Drake Democrats, volunteering with John Kerry and a stint in Gov. Tom Vilsack's office.

He has seen how powerful student support in Iowa can be and recalls how the vote of Grinnell College students had a sobering effect on incumbent Republican state Rep. Danny Carroll, who was trounced in last November's election by Democrat Eric Palmer.

"Grinnell," says Rynard, "is a perfect example of how a college organization can have a big, big impact on an election."

Some of the advice he gave Obama's team goes like this:

• Don't send in a field worker to organize the campus. Let student Democrats do it themselves. "If you leave the student leaders on campus and not make them interns or volunteers, you'll get them turning out 10 times the number of volunteers," Rynard says.

• Avoid colleges (such as William Penn) where apathy rules. Stick to places such as Iowa State, the University of Iowa and Drake, where students are politically engaged.

During the 2004 Iowa caucuses, Rynard was one of Kerry's drivers and he knew during the last few weeks that Howard Dean was doomed and Kerry was going to make it. "The media was saying Dean had momentum but I watched Kerry working his heart out, and the crowds began to grow, and people became more receptive." Dean had organized students to hit the phones but Kerry had a stronger field team.

'More exciting than classes'Obama has learned from this and hired field staff in Iowa and is setting up offices around the state, including one in the trendy East Village area of Des Moines.

Still, it will be a hard slog as every single Democratic and Republican candidate hits Iowa to campaign for money and caucus support. The recent visits by Obama, Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson have caused Rynard to skip some classes lately: "This is way more exciting than classes and way more practical."

However, his lecture this Monday after we meet is Presentational Speaking and he won't miss it. Knowing how to present in front of a large group is way de rigeur for a future campaign adviser.

2007-03-14T11:01:00.000-07:00

Obama: Washington has its own Fires

Senator Barack Obama used quite a few firefighting metaphors in criticizing the nation’s capital this morning, telling the International Association of Fire Fighters that Washington is the sort of place where people “create other kinds of fires” – whether it’s messing with funding for first-responders or saying he is too green to run for president.

After referring to firefighting as a “noble calling,” Mr. Obama said, “This country knows that, but sometimes Washington forgets. They praise your work. They cheer you on when you race up the stairs. But when it’s time for you to get health care or buy the radios and equipment you need, those supporters disappear like a puff of smoke.

“Instead of making your job easier, they create other kinds of fires that you have to put out,” he added.

“Washington has become a place where politics has become a business instead of a mission,” he said, “a place where the cynics and the lobbyists have turned our government into a game only they can afford to play; a place where we spend a lot of time keeping score of who’s up and who’s down and not enough time rolling up our sleeves.”

As for his own presidential candidacy, Mr. Obama remarked, “I know what some of the pundits say, I haven’t been in Washington that long. It’s true that I haven’t been in Washington that long, but I’ve been in Washington long enough to know that Washington needs to change. That I know.”

Barack Obama in Davenport, Iowa

2007-03-14T09:29:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama in Burlington, Iowa

2007-03-14T09:26:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama Has Irish Roots

2007-03-14T08:27:00.000-07:00

The United States has a long tradition of presidential hopefuls drawing on their Irish connections to win votes.

Hillary Clinton has already been working her Irish links, through her husband, Bill, but now she finds competition from the least likely source.

Family historians have unearthed the Irish roots of Barack Obama, the son of a Kenyan goatherder who is being touted as potentially the first black US president.

Ancestry.co.uk identified his great-great-great-grandfather on his mother’s side as Falmouth Kearney, who fled Ireland and the Great Famine at the age of 19. He arrived in New York from Liverpool on March 20, 1850, then moved on to Ohio to be among relatives.

Simon Harper, managing director of the website, said: “A great deal has been made of Obama’s Kenyan roots, however, his European ancestry has been overlooked.

“If Obama becomes the next US president, he may well be the first to have Kenyan ancestry, but he will also join a long list of those with Irish ancestry, including Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and of course, John F. Kennedy.”

The first mention of Mr Obama’s Irish ancestor was found in the 1860 US Federal Census, which listed his occupation as a farm hand

Barack Obama Will Give Commencement Address for Southern New Hampshire University

2007-03-14T08:06:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

SNHU Communications Office

Manchester, N.H. (March 14, 2007) – Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., will serve as speaker and will receive an honorary degree at Southern New Hampshire University’s 75th commencement. The ceremony for undergraduate and graduate students is scheduled for 11 a.m. on Saturday, May 19, at the Verizon Wireless Arena; doors open at 10 a.m.

Barack Obama Electrified Crown in Clinton, Iowa

2007-03-12T12:50:00.000-07:00

Obama electrifies Clinton crowd

By Danica Baker

The Clinton Herald

Herald Staff Writer

CLINTON — Hundreds of area residents packed the Clinton Community College auditorium and overflowed into a lecture hall to hear Sen. Barack Obama, D–Ill., speak on Saturday afternoon.

The standing-room-only crowd of more than 300 people hushed as Dr. Don Flory and his wife, Marcia, addressed the crowd, noting many had inquired as to how the couple was fortunate enough to have the front row seat.

“We’re here today because our youngest son is in the U.S. Army Infantry,” Marcia said to thunderous applause. “Thank you. We appreciate your support, as our troops do as well.”

She said her son, Zack, has served in the military for the past three years, but his tour was extended indefinitely because of the stop-loss policy. She remarked while the soldiers have state of the art equipment, there are many basic supplies they ask for, such as latex gloves because it is common for the soldiers while on patrol to have to handle victims bodies. Marcia said Zack has asked for binoculars “so he can see the snipers” and Nomex gloves and hoods as protection from fuel bombs and flash burns. She noted the community has been generous to supply drives, recently donating enough to send 20,000 pairs of latex gloves to soldiers overseas.

Don Flory added that as a machine gunner in Baghdad, his son has been involved in intense fighting, both reported in the media and some that has gone unreported.

“He has seen buddies killed and maimed, and dozens more civilians suffer a similar fate,” Don said. “His private question to us has been ‘why are we the soldiers asked to sacrifice for a civil war?’”

With that, the Florys introduced Obama. Obama thanked the crowd for coming and said the country has some real challenges facing it, citing a broken health care system, inadequate education system, absence of an energy policy and an economy that is leaving many people behind.

Obama garnered resounding applause when he said, “Finally, we’ve got a war that never should have been fought, should never have been authorized.”

He continued, “Our troops have done everything we’ve asked of them. They’ve performed magnificently. The failure has been in a civilian leadership that has not given them a mission in which they can succeed.”

“We cannot have our people policing a sectarian civil war,” he added. “We have now spent over a half trillion dollars, we have close to 3,200 lives that have been lost. We are seeing as much instability as there’s ever been in the Middle East. We are less safe that we were before the war started. It is time to bring our troops home.”

Obama said he has a specific plan to bring the troops home and introduced a bill a few weeks prior to that effect, detailing a plan to start bringing troops home as of May 1 with the goal of having all troops home by March 31, 2008. He remarked that one thing that could be done right is treating veterans properly when they return home, including medical care and smoothing the transition back into the workforce. Obama noted that is not being done now and said it is shameful.

“We can do better. I think we have higher expectations of ourselves as a nation and as a people,” he said.

He said politics has become petty and small with people more focused on making negative attacks then on discovering common ground.

Obama said he is proud of his record in bringing people to work together and remarked that he cannot help affect some of the changes needed without the support of the American people.

“This is going to be an election for change,” Obama continued. “And you are going to be the agents of change. I hope this campaign becomes a vehicle for your hopes and your dreams, because if that happens, I’m absolutely convinced that nobody can stop us.”

After his remarks, Obama met with area residents, shaking hands and letting many people take pictures. His communications director, Tommy Vietor, said the success of events such as the one held in Clinton is attributable to the volunteers who put so much work into planning and details. He commended volunteers and the community for showing such an active interest and genuine concern.

Obama then walked to the lecture hall where more than 100 people listened to the talk in an overflow area. Again, he took time to meet with as many citizens as possible. He later said it is very important to him to meet with the public and hear their concerns.

In response to criticism that he doesn’t have enough experience, Obama replied he thinks people usually mean that he hasn’t been in Washington that long.

“I’ve been in Washington long enough to know that Washington needs to change and that’s part of the reason we’re running this campaign,” the candidate said.

Massachusetts Party Chair Going With Barack Obama

2007-03-12T12:28:00.000-07:00

Democrats' party chief casts his lot with Obama

The Boston Globe | March 09, 2007

By Brian C. Mooney

Philip W. Johnston, the Massachusetts Democratic Party chairman who served in the Clinton administration, declared his support yesterday for Senator Barack Obama, Senator Hillary Clinton's top rival for the party's presidential nomination.

Calling Obama "the future of our party," Johnston also said the first-term Illinois Democrat's strong opposition to the war in Iraq was an important factor in his decision. Johnston, who met with Obama last week in Washington, said he will join the candidate's national finance committee and offer advice on healthcare.

Johnston, who plans to step down this spring as state party chairman, was appointed New England regional administrator of the US Department of Health and Human Services during President Clinton's first term. He now operates a healthcare consulting business.

Backing Obama "was a difficult choice, in that I had been a Clinton appointee and I know Hillary, and I respect her a great deal," Johnston said.

Johnston, who won the Clinton administration post because of his strong ties to Senator Edward M. Kennedy, said he is disappointed that Mrs. Clinton, a second-term senator from New York, has not acknowledged that she made a mistake by voting in 2002 to support the Iraq war resolution.

Johnston is not the first significant Bay State Democrat with Clinton ties to join the Obama.

Click here to read the story at Boston.com.

Barack Obama in Iowa Talking About the Middle East

2007-03-12T11:55:00.000-07:00

Obama Urges More Compassion in Mideast

By: Thomas Beaumont - Des Moines Register
March 12, 2007 11:47 AM EST

Muscatine, Ia. - Illinois Sen. Barack Obama on Sunday told a small group of Iowa Democrats that U.S. policy in the Middle East can be compassionate as well as tough - while he also provided these influential voices in the leadoff caucus state with an up-close view of him as a presidential candidate.

Obama told the Muscatine-area party activists that he supports relaxing restrictions on aid to the Palestinian people. He said they have suffered the most as a result of stalled peace efforts with Israel.

"Nobody is suffering more than the Palestinian people," Obama said while on the final leg of his weekend trip to eastern Iowa.

"If we could get some movement among Palestinian leadership, what I'd like to see is a loosening up of some of the restrictions on providing aid directly to the Palestinian people," he added.

Obama was responding to a question by Sue Dravis, one of about 40 party leaders who met with him privately before a forum at West Middle School.

The session in the school library - while more than 1,000 waited for Obama in the gymnasium down the hall - gave a glimpse of the candidate few Americans have seen, despite the intense media exposure he has attracted.

Since launching his campaign a month ago, Obama has headlined events around the nation and in key states such as Iowa. He has drawn large crowds of political activists and people hoping for a closer look at the candidate.

His third trip to Iowa was no different, with capacity crowds meeting him in Dubuque, Clinton and Davenport on Saturday.

The turnout at Obama's campaign events has prompted questions about how the political celebrity will campaign for support in Iowa, where caucus backing often is earned through direct contact.

"After some of the initial novelty of the campaign fades off, as we enter the summer months, we're going to have the opportunity to campaign in that fashion," Obama said in a Des Moines Register interview.

Obama has tried to incorporate more intimate sessions with key party leaders in Iowa, as he did at each of his stops Saturday, as well as before his event later Sunday in Burlington.

In the Muscatine school library, Obama shook hands and posed for pictures for about half of the 30 minutes he spent with the group. He took questions for the remaining 15 minutes.

Clara Oleson, a longtime Democratic caucus activist from Springdale, said the idea of pulling him aside before the larger public event was a creative way to attempt to work in some retail politics.

"This is a very interesting approach. He's attracting crowds, so they have to find a way to get him some time with the party leaders," said Oleson, a retired workplace rights advocate.

Obama's short round of questions with the group touched on health care, immigration and Dravis' question on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Dravis, a member of the Muscatine County Democratic Central Committee, said that Obama "did a very nice job" answering her question, and that his position represents "a good first step" in solving the complex problems in the Middle East.

Israel's survival as a powerful democratic ally in the Middle East must remain a top priority, Obama said.

"There is also no doubt that we have a huge strategic stake in bringing about a peaceful resolution to the conflict," he said. But the United States cannot broker that resolution until the Palestinian government recognizes the nation of Israel.

The Palestinian Authority is controlled by Hamas, a political party that does not recognize Israel's sovereignty and is listed by several countries - including the United States - as a terrorist organization. The United States and other nations imposed restrictions on aid when Hamas gained power last year.

In the meantime, the suffering of the Palestinians could be eased if their government renounces terrorism, Obama said. "I think you can get a sympathetic perspective" from the United States and its allies.

Barack Obama in Iowa

2007-03-12T11:44:00.001-07:00

Northern California Unites for Barack Obama

2007-03-12T11:40:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama: Campaigning in South Carolina Part 2

2007-03-12T11:35:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama: Campaiging in South Carolina Part 2

2007-03-12T11:35:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama: Campaigning in South Carolina

2007-03-12T11:34:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama: At the University of New Hampshire

2007-03-12T11:32:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama: Rally in Austin, Texas

2007-03-12T11:29:00.000-07:00

Louis Farrakhan Praises Barack Obama

2007-03-09T11:43:00.000-08:00

'Nightline' Exclusive: Farrakhan Lauds Obama's 'Fresh Approach' to Politics

March 8, 2007 — At age 73, Minister Louis Farrakhan is watching one of the 2008 presidential candidates in particular with a keen eye: Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

"I like him very much. I like him, he has a fresh approach," the Nation of Islam's leader said. "And I'm fearful, because there's a structure in our government that no matter who sits in the seat of power, there are forces that one has to contend with if one is able to attract the masses of their votes. Barack Obama is doing quite well."

Farrakhan said that if Obama was avoiding controversial black leaders like himself, Rev. Al Sharpton, and Rev. Jesse Jackson for fear of alienating white voters it would be an acceptable price to pay for an Obama victory.

Continued

Barack Obama Well Received by Jewish Community

2007-03-09T11:37:00.000-08:00

Obama woos Jewish voters

Democratic candidate perceived as genuine friend of Israel, say Jewish leaders

Yaakov Lappin

Published:

03.09.07, 19:57 / Israel News

Senator Barack Obama is fast dispelling apprehensions that may have been held by some US Jewish voters about his candidacy for the US presidency.

His energetic campaign and charismatic personality have managed to sweep many Democrats to his side, and recent polls place Barack neck and neck with Democratic competitor Hillary Clinton.

Barack's recent speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in Chicago at the beginning of March has, at the very least, secured his position as a genuine friend of the State of Israel, Jewish leaders have told Ynetnews.

During the speech, Barack recounted a visit to Israel in 2006, and described the damage he saw caused to a home in Kiryat Shmona by a Hizbullah rocket before the Lebanon war.

"Just six months after I visited, Hezbollah launched 4,000 rocket attacks just like the one that destroyed that home in Kiryat Shmona and kidnapped Israeli service members," Obama said.

"And we pray for all the service members who have been kidnapped. Gilad Shalit, Eldad Regev, and Ehud Goldwasser. I met with the Goldwasser family this week in my office, and I offered to help in any way I could. And I was struck by the bravery and determination, but the understandable welling sadness of a family who had heard nothing about their beloved son.

It's important to remember this history -- that Israel had unilaterally withdrawn from Lebanon only to have Iran to supply Hizbullah with thousands of rockets," he added.

Josh Block, Director of Media Relations at AIPAC, said that Obama's speech was "certainly well received."

New York Post: John Podhoretz Suggests a Repeat of 1976

2007-03-09T08:07:00.000-08:00

Spirit of 76

New York Post

John Podhoretz

March 9, 2007 -- YOU would think, given the state of play in the world right now, that the next president would have to be an experienced leader, someone who'll be ready on the first day to stare down the mullahs in Iran, the psycho in North Korea and the sectarian murderers in Iraq.

That would seem to suggest Barack Obama's 2008 red-hot candidacy is doomed to burn out as the election draws nearer. Or so the Old Political Hands will tell you.

The Old Political Hands would say this: Maybe Americans think they can take a gamble on a relatively inexperienced president when things seem reasonably calm, as they did in 1992 and 2000 - after the Soviet Union had collapsed and before a terrorist attack killed 3,000 Americans in a single morning. The danger now is simply too profound for Americans to entertain a risky move like electing a Bill Clinton or a George W. Bush - a novice with no foreign-policy record.

But there was a moment at least as dangerous as the one we're in right now when Americans did exactly that. The year was 1976 - and what happened then could be a guidepost to what might happen for Barack Obama. It was the last time a truly blank-slate candidate with an extraordinarily slender record but an eerily perfect biography came roaring out of nowhere to capture the presidency.

The parallels are inexact, but they're there. In 1974, Democrats trounced Republicans in a midterm election in which voter anger over GOP corruption and unhappiness over an unpopular war played an enormous part. In 2006, Democrats trounced Republicans in midterm elections with the same issues in play (though the 2006 Democratic victory was minuscule compared to the colossal Democratic gains in 1974).

Barack Obama in Iowa this Weekend

2007-03-08T10:41:00.000-08:00

Obama Campaign: U.S. Senator Barack Obama to Visit Dubuque , Clinton , Davenport , Muscatine and Burlington

3/6/2007

Contact: Tommy Vietor, (515) 883-2008 or (202) 997-3462

Obama’s Visit Will Focus on the Challenges Posed by the War in Iraq

DES MOINES – U.S. Senator Barack Obama’s Iowa campaign announced today that he will visit Dubuque , Clinton , Davenport , Muscatine and Burlington on Saturday, March 10th and Sunday, March 11th. Obama’s visit will focus on the challenges posed to our country by the war in Iraq .

Below are the cities Obama is visiting as well as approximate times. More logistical information, including site and ticket locations, will be made available later this week.

Saturday, March 10

Midday Town hall meeting in Dubuque

Afternoon Meet the candidate event in Clinton

Evening Rally in Davenport

Sunday, March 11

Morning Meet the candidate event in Muscatine

Afternoon Meet the candidate event in Burlington

Harkins Says Picture with Obama a Coincidence

2007-03-08T10:36:00.000-08:00

Radio Iowa News

Harkin says picture with Obama coincidence, not endorsement

Thursday, March 8, 2007, 11:07 AM

By Matt Kelley

Iowa Senator Tom Harkin was photographed at a private fundraiser in Boston earlier this week with Illinois Senator Barack Obama, a Democratic presidential candidate. Harkin had been supporting former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack for president, but Vilsack has dropped out. Harkin says his appearance with Obama was coincidence, not an endorsement.

Harkin says "I happened to be at a fundraising event for myself in Boston. It happened to be in the same building on the same floor down the hall from where Barack Obama was having his event. Barack just simply found out I was down the hall and came down to stick his head in my door, so to speak, and say 'hi' to the people who were there and, of course, cameras were clicking and took pictures and that's all there was to it."

Harkin says he's focused on his own re-election in 2008 and, as for the presidency, says "I don't have a horse in this race."

Barack Obama in Selma, Alabama

2007-03-08T10:31:00.000-08:00

Obama 08: Out of One Many

2007-03-08T10:25:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama Ad Roll

2007-03-08T10:22:00.001-08:00