blog - gObama 2008
Georgia gospel on my mind
Monday, January 21, 2008
(Hudson, NH - 11 a.m. local time)
I called Anne Marie from Oakland on her cellphone earlier yesterday, but for some reason the line constantly broke. I felt it was not the right time to get close to her efforts to boost the campaign morale after Obama suffered losses in his popularity under Hillary’s strategy. Hillary was trying to block union worker access into caucus (inside the casinos) using a legal court injunction. Obama won the court case, but one should not underestimate the traditional tension between Latino workers and Afro-Americans, according to a CNN analyst that I watched online.
I don’t know how I feel about this...at least he got 45% which is not bad in such a bizarre desert state made of casinos, hotels, entertainment facilities, and - check this - a nuclear waste dump somewhere in the desert. I was sitting in the kitchen with Karen’s friends, chatting, eating squash and macaroni when the 13 year old son of Lynn (Karen’s friend) silently disappeared to play on his Wii console. I was intrigued to find out how this thing works. Happens that this kid had already checked the news via his wireless internet connection on the machine. So we saw the broadcasted Nevada caucus results with a click of a button from the Wii hand-held device.
Clinton, a New York senator, got 51 percent of the vote and Obama, a senator from Illinois, won 45 percent, according to the Nevada Democratic Party. Former North Carolina Senator John Edwards received 4 percent. The contest drew a record number of Democrats to the caucuses. Obama, 46, didn't give a concession speech. His campaign claimed a victory in the state, saying that even though it received fewer total votes, Obama won one more delegate than Clinton because of the way delegates are apportioned in rural areas.
“Barack Obama did well throughout the state,” Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said in a conference call with reporters. Plouffe said Obama received 13 delegates for the party's national convention and Clinton got 12. (By Kristin Jensen and Nicholas Johnston - Bloomberg.com)
I prepare mentally for my trip to the South, that’s where all the action is and the battle needs to be won there if Obama wants to keep his momentum. I will stop over in Washington for an interview with Associate Prof. Clarence Lusane (American University), who focuses on Obama’s foreign policy. After that stop I head down South to hook up with North Carolina’s visual artist Andre’Leon Gray in Raleigh. I will get some sleep and then go to Columbia, SC again. Check out Andre’s expo here: http://www.myartspace.com/artistInfo.do?populatinglist=home&subscriberid=10py0bh3y9wvk6a1
Another great source of stimulus - leftist brain of liberal minds - is the analyses of Chip’s buddy Steve, who is known as Stephen Zunes, the editor of Foreign Policy In Focus Middle East, a professor of politics and international studies at the University of San Francisco. His piece is called “Barack Obama on Diplomacy.” He blogs under: http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/4901
I guess after reading this article, no stone remains unturned from Steve’s critical observation, which I find quite relevant considering the Middle East crisis is currently underplayed in the debates. But something else is brewing: America is getting ready for the big R ...as in Recession.