March 26, 2007
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CAMPAIGN 2008
Obama woos voters in Florida
Presidential contender Barack Obama told hundreds of people at a fundraiser in West Palm Beach that he favors a ‘paper trail’ in Florida for electronic voting machines.
BY BETH REINHARD
breinhard@MiamiHerald.com
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U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., speaks during a campaign rally at the Kravis Center in downtown West Palm Beach, Fla. ERIK M. LUNSFORD/APWEST PALM BEACH —Democrat Barack Obama made his Florida debut as a presidential candidate with a call on Sunday for people to ”stand up” for affordable healthcare, better public schools and an end to the war in Iraq.The $100-a-person appearance in West Palm Beach, attended by roughly 700 people, was sandwiched between four pricier private fundraisers around South Florida.
Obama called for a paper record of votes in Florida, rallying a partisan crowd still carrying a grudge from the 2000 presidential election, which led to recounts here and in Broward County. Two days ago, Republican Gov. Charlie Crist testified in Congress about his quest to return to paper ballots.
”I want to make sure everybody’s vote is counted, especially down here in Florida,” Obama said to resounding applause.
With the backdrop of a 20-foot-high American flag, Obama said the war in Iraq has diminished the world’s view of the United States and has failed to make citizens safer from terrorist attacks. He is pushing for American troops to begin leaving at the end of this month and be out of Iraq by May 1.
IRAQ WITHDRAWAL
”I am proud that I was against the war from the start,” said Obama, who was an Illinois state senator when the war began. “It’s time to bring our young men and women home.”
Obama’s biggest rivals for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York and former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, both voted to give the president the power to go to war. Edwards has apologized for his vote, while Clinton has said she would end the war if she were elected.
The Illinois senator also lamented public cynicism toward government.
”When Abraham Lincoln talked about a house divided, he meant a nation that was half slave and half free,” Obama said.
“Today we are divided from our own government. We have a sense that special interests and big money set the agenda. . . . We don’t want that small-time, slash-and-burn negative campaigning of the past.”
In keeping with Obama’s rock-star-like aura, more than 100 people arrived hours before the event was scheduled to begin. They crowded around a velvet rope wrapped around the stage.
A campaign spokesman said in an e-mail that there were 1,000 people at the event, but the crowd appeared smaller and took up about one-third of the room. Obama might have drawn a full house if the event had been free.
Coconut Grove attorney Kirk Wagar, a top Obama fundraiser in Florida, said people want to help the campaign get its message out.
”The people who come to our event are investors,” he said.
T-shirts cost $20 apiece, and buttons $3 each. The campaign even charged $2 for placards, generally given out free at big events.
”I want to get up close and personal because I think he is making history,” Ashley Rivera, 17, said of the man seeking to be the nation’s first black president. She came from Weston with her 18-year-old sister, Nicole, and their 56-year-old father, Benny, who shelled out $62 for three T-shirts and a placard.
”We’ve been with him since Day 1,” he said. “I think he’s the only one with the leadership skills to get us out of Iraq.”
Others in the crowd were not ready to commit. ”I’m looking and listening,” said Annette Gumm, 75, of Delray Beach. “I think Democrats have a fine group of candidates.”
ANOTHER VISIT
Obama will be back in the state Friday for private fundraisers in Jacksonville and Tallahassee.
Clinton will be in Miami over the weekend.
The entire field will soon have to report how much money they raised during the first three months of this year. Although the first primary is 10 months away, the funding totals are viewed as key barometers of candidates’ viability.
U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, the Boca Raton Democrat who is co-chairman of Obama’s campaign in Florida, vouched for his bona fides on issues important to the state. ”He’s for a paper trail here in Florida, and he understands our problems with hurricanes,” Wexler said. “I would not be involved with a presidential candidate unless he or she was a true friend of the state of Israel.”
Video | Obama spends the weekend in Fla.
Comments (4)
I gotta admit, I’m getting a bit turned off. Charging for something that’s normally given away–well, that one would be well to explain. If it’s cost, that’s understandable. But the biggest turn off is this little pissing match that he and Hillary are getting in. Now that the video has been traced back to MRS Obama, that disturbs me. If these two are getting childish now, what are they going to be like later? I’ll keep watching, but I’m not hopeful.
Appreciate all the info. Hopefully someone in Obamas camp might read this site. It would help to see the comments on your post. I do think the person with the first comment has a point. There are many months to go and too many wrong steps can be fatal for any of the candidates.
The ad referred to by Jesse (RedHairedCelt) was put together NOT by Michelle Obama but by a former employee of Blue State Digital, a firm employed by the Obama campaign for the purpose of Internet advertising. The ex-employee, Philip de Vellis, no longer works for Blue State Digital. Neither that company nor anyone in the Obama campaign knew about the ad.
Yes, there are juvenile pissing matches going on between enthusiasts of the various candidates.
Sadly, this is the age we’re living in. Anyone with the expertise can put together a caricature ad by splicing film together from here and there. You don’t know what you’re seeing anymore, just as nobody here knows if I’m really Bob Lipton aka twoberry, who in real life is a security guard at a major Florida hospital and passionately devoted to helping Barack Obama become our next president. For all anyone knows, I could be an eight-year-old Asian boy or girl with a wicked sense of humor and that photograph you see of me and Barbara could be anybody.
I’m real, but you don’t know it.
The piece of YouTube crap put together by Philip de Vellis is unreal, but you don’t know it.
Unreal in the sense that the “BarackforAmerica.com” at the end of the video DOES NOT MEAN the ad was produced by the Obama campaign. The ad is a piece of nonsense put together by an average Joe who knows how to splice videos together.
That’s it, pure and simple.
This is a difficult age we’re living in.
The news is just as bad. There are no more Walter Cronkites or Edward R. Murrows on the air, telling us how things really are. “Balanced” reporting consists of having one person scream from the left, and another person scream from the right, and we’re supposed to average the two together and somehow piece out the truth.
Ever wonder why there’s so much angst in the world? I think we’re getting somewhere near the answer to that question, in this lengthy response to Jesse’s comment. Jesse has since realized that the ad was specious, that it did not come from Michelle Obama or anyone else in the Obama camp. And Jesse knows I’m not a bit miffed at her, and never was. In fact, I ALWAYS appreciate attempts to bring out the truth.
That’s the point of this entire comment. To bring out the truth. Even though it’s impossible to do that, in this day and age where people can put words and videos up on a screen and lie about where they came from, or from whom.
Oh, yes. Here’s the link about the origin of De Vellis’s video.