Obama Media

Obama’s leaked talking points memo

Newsweek’s Howard Fineman prints excerpts from a leaked set of Obama talking points for appealing to undecided political players like Brooklyn Congresswoman Yvette Clarke, DC Mayor Adrian Fenty and Federico Pena, Bill Clinton’s secretary of transportation.

The document shows him working the margins of the Clinton juggernaut, reaching out to leading African American politicians not yet sewn up by Clinton, John Edwards or other campaigns.

They show a careful attention to detail—down to the names of the politicians’ children—and the call sheets leave space for the candidate (or his personal aide) to note whether the phone connection had been made. Many refer to Obama in the second person as YOU or YOUR—the capital letters meant to focus the reader on precisely what he should say.

The talking points at times are frank—though never disrespectful—in their assessment of those from whom Obama is seeking support, an endorsement or a chat….You have to wonder if Obama is a little too generous with his offers of top roles—for several of the call memos warn him about the same thing: don’t make commitments.

What do Mutual Funds, Buppies and Michael Chabon Have in Common?

Investment News reports that the “$49,185 from employees of the 20-largest U.S. mutual fund groups and related companies in the first quarter” that Obama raised was more than the Clinton, Edwards, Biden and Richardson combined.

The Dallas Morning News reports on Obama’s $500,000 Monday fundraising event in Dallas.

The Illinois Democrat has a broad base of support for his presidential bid, with campaign cash coming in from Wall Street to Hollywood. But nowhere has his candidacy been more anticipated than with black voters who have longed for a national presidential contender since the historic presidential campaigns of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson in 1984 and 1988.

Radar points to Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman’s $25,000 campaign for Obama.

imagine the signal it would send to the traumatized, impoverished, alienated people of the world (of Africa, of the Middle East) if the face of our country was President Barack Obama…. We believe Barack has what it takes both to win an election and to be president. Come on—you know you want to believe it, too.

Robert Kagan: Obama is A-OK

Washington Post columnist Robert Kagan, an adviser to McCain, liked Obama’s address to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs last Monday.

To Obama, everything and everyone everywhere is of strategic concern to the United States. “We cannot hope to shape a world where opportunity outweighs danger unless we ensure that every child, everywhere, is taught to build and not to destroy.” The “security of the American people is inextricably linked to the security of all people.” Realists, call your doctors….

Obama talks about “rogue nations,” “hostile dictators,” “muscular alliances” and maintaining “a strong nuclear deterrent.” He talks about how we need to “seize” the “American moment.” We must “begin the world anew.” This is realism? This is a left-liberal foreign policy?

Ask Noam Chomsky the next time you see him.

Where’s Obama?

The WashingtonPost.com has created a Google Map mash-up campaign tracker. This weekend, Obama’s in SoCal. According to CBS, Obama is

scheduled to conduct a $500 per person fundraiser at the Hollywood Boulevard nightclub Boulevard3, emceed by Cedric the Entertainer, along with one at agent Ari Emanuel’s [Rahm’s brother and the inspiration for Jeremy Piven’s character in Entourage] home Saturday, according to Daily Variety….Obama is also scheduled to speak Sunday at the First AME Church in South Los Angeles.

Final Debate Thoughts

Obama looked great. Kucinich’s and Gravel’s closing barbs helped him to appear calm and cool.

Obama disingenuously referred to his criminally indicted friend of 17 years and political patron Tony Rezko as “this donor” (I wonder if HRC smiled at that one) and as someone “engaged in ethical [sic] behavior and I denounced it.”

Obama appropriately spent more time talking about the rise in black infant he did on the Confederate flag.

Best tie: Edwards’, followed by Richardson’s.

Nary a negative word about hedge funds.

Brian Williams asked horserace, not substantive questions. Does it matter to anyone how Biden feels about the LA Times calling him a “gaffe machine?”

HRC oddly referred to Cho as “this shooter, as he’s called.”

Bill Richardson: Iraq’s “Three Religious Entities”

Gov. Bill Richardson may have more foreign policy experience than anyone on the stage, so was his call to convene “Iraq’s three religious entities” an error or an insight? Did he mean Sunni, Shiite and Kurd– the latter of which is not a religion?

Dems Debate: Brian Williams, First Sentence, First Error

Right out of the box, NBC Williams says that it “has to be the earliest campaign season in modern American history.” That’s not what Georgetown history professor Michael Kazin says (via WNYC’s On the Media):

The nearly permanent campaign has been a feature of American politics since before the Civil War, when mass parties first emerged to contend for the votes of a mass electorate, albeit one then composed almost exclusively of white men. In a nation of ambitious entrepreneurs and furious battles for market share, the race for the presidency — as with most sales efforts — has rarely taken a break…A year before the 1960 Democratic convention, Joe Kennedy had already spent a million dollars on his son’s campaign — including a nine-room office near the Capitol where staffers called potential delegates and party bosses and entered the results on oversized wall maps.For the past half-century, nearly every serious candidate has followed the Kennedys’ lead.

Obama’s SCSU Debate Prep

Lynn Sweet details the way in which Team Obama has been readying itself for tonight’s debate at South Carolina State.

He has been wedging practice and study sessions into his schedule for days to prepare for tonight’s debate …He has prepped at the Washington office of Bob Bauer, his campaign lawyer and held at least one other session. He expanded his tight inner circle for the debate to include issue experts plus kitchen-cabinet member Anita Dunn, a Democratic consultant, and Cook County Board member Forrest Claypool, a close friend of chief Obama strategist David Axelrod….he’s sending out a platoon of top staffers from Chicago — Axelrod, campaign manager David Plouffe, spokesmen Robert Gibbs, Bill Burton, Jen Penski and Dan Pfeiffer — to work the “spin” rooms with journalists before and after the 90-minute debate, to be broadcast live on MSNBC starting at 6 p.m. Chicago time….Obama, as a front-runner, may decide to take no risks and just focus on keeping his answers short and clear. “I wish we had more than 60 seconds for each answer,” he lamented.

Obama, Clinton Tied: WSJ/NBC Poll

The latest Wall Street Journal/NBC poll shows that Obama has pulled into a statistical dead heat with the occasionally-Southern accented HRC:

The finding indicates that, just as the first-term Illinois senator’s robust early fund-raising has undercut one of Mrs. Clinton’s presumed advantages, his relative inexperience hasn’t emerged as a major impediment in his competition with the former first lady who now represents New York in the Senate. Mr. Obama “seems to be gathering momentum as the candidate of change,” says Neil Newhouse, the Republican pollster who helps to conduct the Journal/NBC survey. At a time when Americans want a new direction on Iraq and in Washington generally, adds his Democratic counterpart Peter Hart, “Sen. Obama comes closest to matching what voters are looking for in the broad political environment.”…So far, the survey shows, Mr. Obama has managed the rare feat of becoming widely known without accumulating significant political baggage. More than eight in 10 Americans now recognize his name, up from six in 10 last fall.

Five Takeaways From Obama’s CCGA Foreign Policy Address

I took an early lunch in order to attend Obama’s (delayed) address to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs on his foreign policy objectives. He gave “five ways America will begin to lead again when I’m President;” here are five points I heard.

• Love for Dick Lugar: Obama name-checked his senior colleague to the east twice. The two have worked together on issues of nuclear weapons proliferation and on energy policy.
• Generational pride: He twice referred to the passing of the generational torch: The war in Iraq “was based on old ideologies and outdated strategies – a determination to fight a 21st century struggle with a 20th century mindset,” and “Now it’s our moment to lead – our generation’s time.”
• India and China should be treated as developed countries for purposes of carbon emissions: “We should push for binding and enforceable commitments to reduce emissions by the nations which pollute the most – the United States, the European Union, Russia, China, and India together account for nearly two-thirds of current emissions.”
• Wars other than self-defense are OK: “No President should ever hesitate to use force – unilaterally if necessary – to protect ourselves and our vital interests when we are attacked or imminently threatened.”
• We need fewer “high-alert” nukes: “The United States and Russia must lead by example. President Bush once said, “The United States should remove as many weapons as possible from high-alert, hair-trigger status – another unnecessary vestige of Cold War confrontation.” Six years later, President Bush has not acted on this promise. I will. We cannot and should not accept the threat of accidental or unauthorized nuclear launch. We can maintain a strong nuclear deterrent to protect our security without rushing to produce a new generation of warheads.” He doesn’t address how many nukes should be retired, or “removed from high-alert status?”

Scott Paul and Matt Stoller shared their thoughts earlier today. I agree with Matt’s suggestion: I heard echoes of Gary Hart this morning. Here’s Paul:

Even in a speech as broad as this one, when discussing appropriate circumstances for the use of force, Obama needs to define what “our vital interests” are. Something so important cannot be left to the imagination.