Rochester Area for Obama

See my DC Blog here.

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 14:52:18 EST

I dont have pictures up yet because I am not home. But they will be up soon.

http://todcandback.blogspot.com/

Kids for Obama Canvass in South Minneapolis

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 08:39:38 EST

Kids for Obama Canvass in South Minneapolis

One day to change the world.

Now is the time to do what we've been working for: vote for Barack Obama for president.

Yesterday, a group of Kids for Obama canvassed their neighborhood in South Minneapolis:

Holding handmade signs inscribed with things such as purple scribbles, “dinosaurs for Obama,” and “vote for these tiny futures” a group of seriously vociferous elementary-school-aged kids marched down 38th Street in South Minneapolis.

This election is so important, and we all have to do our part.

Go to VoteforChange.com right now and find your polling location.

If you have an hour, or three, or an entire day to help, please volunteer at your local Action Center or making phone calls -- after voting, of course.

Everything comes down to today -- we can't let up now. Sign up to volunteer.

Collin Peterson: "Obama: A no-brainer for agriculture"

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 15:01:18 EDT

U.S. Representative Collin Peterson writes in the Fergus Falls Daily Journal:

I have the distinct privilege of representing some of our country’s hardest working farmers and agricultural workers, and serving as Chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture where we shaped the 2008 Farm Bill. As many of you know, I feel strongly about the importance of agriculture to this country. Farmers are part of the backbone of this country, responsible for our food security, and increasingly important contributors to our drive towards energy independence.
One thing I know for sure is that in order for our agricultural economy to be strong we’re going to need a President that we can work with. We need a President who understands the importance of federal agriculture programs, a President who will share our priorities and work with us to accomplish them.
I’ve taken time to study the records of both candidates and where the interests of Minnesota and American agriculture are concerned the only candidate who has supported agriculture is Senator Barack Obama. He’s not a perfect candidate – no one is – but at the most fundamental level, Barack Obama has shown me that he understands agriculture, appreciates its critical role in this country, and will work with farmers.
I cannot say the same of his opponent, Senator John McCain, who recently proposed abolishing the farm safety net and tax credits for renewable energy. Senator McCain has a long record of leading the charge against agriculture research, against biofuels, and against critical programs for sugar and dairy producers.
On all of the key issues for farmers and Minnesota agriculture, from preserving the farm safety net to developing renewable energy and making essential infrastructure improvements that are important to farmers, Senator Obama has been on the side of our nation’s farmers while Senator McCain has been against them.
Senator Obama has represented a key farm state and has maintained an open door to farmers from Illinois. He supported the 2008 Farm Bill, which will provide certainty and stability to producers and the entire farm sector, invest billions of dollars in conservation, and feed tens of millions of low-income families.
On the other hand, Senator McCain opposed the Farm Bill and said he would have vetoed it, just like President Bush did. This position has been criticized by leaders of numerous groups, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, National Farmers Union, National Corn Growers Association, American Soybean Association, and the National Association of Wheat Growers. It indicates to me that Senator McCain is badly out of touch with how agriculture really works in our country.
One of the most promising elements in our agricultural economy is the ongoing development of biofuels and other renewable energy sources. Increasing production and use of biofuels and other sources of alternative energy is decreasing our reliance on imported oil, injecting billions of dollars of capital into rural economies, and enhancing our local economies. The industry has grown from a combination of the entrepreneurial spirit and creative innovation found in American agriculture and the successful federal programs that helped lay the foundation for broader investment and growth.
Senator Obama strongly understands and supports these “ag-focused” energy development programs and even introduced legislation that created the first mandate for the production of renewable sources of diesel fuel. His leadership on renewable energy earned Senator Obama a Golden Triangle Award from the National Farmers Union and endorsements from a number of Democratic and Republican former Presidents of the National Corn Growers.
Senator McCain, on the other hand, has one of the worst records in Congress on renewable fuels. He has repeatedly opposed and voted against all of the key biofuels programs and even said, “Ethanol has absolutely under no circumstances any value whatsoever.”
Finally, I’ve been impressed by the fact that Senator Obama has put members of his campaign team on the ground throughout rural American and has had them listening to what rural voters have been telling them. From what I can see he is an able leader who is committed to working with us for the good of agriculture – in Minnesota and throughout the nation -- and the rural communities who depend on it.
I believe that anyone who understands the economic importance of agriculture – and farmers in particular – should support Barack Obama.

"America will once again rise from the ashes of the Bushes if you give us a chance to lead"

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 21:02:45 EDT

In Hibbing last night, Hillary Clinton drew on her years of public service and made a lucid observation on the choice Minnesotans have in this election.

This election is really coming down to one simple slogan. It's a slogan that embodies what Democrats stand for, what we fight for, what we believe: "Jobs, baby, jobs!" That's what it's about and that's why we need Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

With Democrats in the White House and in the Congress, we will end the tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas, we're going to start creating jobs in America again. We did it before and we can do it again.

Barack Obama has a plan to jumpstart the American economy, provide middle class tax relief, and provide quality, affordable healthcare to every American. This fact, and the reality that on every one of these issues John McCain is disturbingly out of touch with middle class families, was not lost on Hillary:

Senator McCain has repeatedly said that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong."

Well, maybe they are if you're looking through rose-colored glasses. But if you're living with both feet on the ground

and you're going in and out of people's homes and you're listening to what's on your minds, there isn't any way you could reach that conclusion.

But to George Bush and John McCain the middle class isn't fundamental, it's ornamental. They don't understand that if you don't have a strong and prosperous middle class, we will not have a strong and prosperous America.

"The evidence is clear," continued Hillary, a champion for working families in her own right, "Barack Obama and the Democrats are for you. And that's why I hope you will be for the DFL candidates up and down the ballot to delivver the change we need."

Folks in Minnesota are struggling to cope with a failing economy and looking for real leadership from the next President. Since President Bush has taken office, health care costs have risen 4.3 times faster than average wages in Minnesota, and over 430,000 Minnesota residents – and over 45 million nationally – lack health insurance today.

The situation in Minnesota is just a microcosm of what's happening across the country, a situation which will only get worse if John McCain is allowed to continue the failed policies of the last eight years.

That's why we have to take action to prevent that from happening:

There isn't anybody who really thinks we could survive the next 4 years if they're like the last 8 years and recognize our country. The income inequality will continue to expand, people will start losing their hope and their belief in the American dream.

I know that you probably have friends and even families, coworkers and neighbors who are not yet decided; who may even be thinking of voting for the McCain-Palin ticket.

That dog don't hunt anymore. You can't keep rewarding the same bad policies and expect to get anything better.

"So I hope each and everyone of you will go out and talk to those who are yet undecided. Maybe try to persuade those you think are heading in the wrong direction," added Hillary.

Join the tens of thousands of volunteers across Minnesota who have responded to Barack's call to service. You can phonebank, go door-to-door, volunteer in your Campaign for Change office, or even clean up a local park or roadway in your community.

It's all about making change in your community, and we're proud that you're making a difference.

Or, as Hillary put it in Hibbing last night: "This is our moment, this is our time."

Michelle Obama Speaks Out

REBECA CHERY — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 22:34:26 EDT

I pledge allegience to the flag of the United States of America...indivisible with liberty and justice for all. The truth speaks today in Pensacola, FL Michelle Obama brought the message that resounded in Rochester, MN just one week before...CHANGE is here & NEW infrastructure, new government, new education, new healthcare, and a very bright future is in our hands. Our vote makes all the difference & is changing the nation one day at a time. Justice, peace, and liberty for all!!

Campaigns are about how you finish

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 11:31:11 EDT

Earlier today, DFL Associate Chair, Donna Cassutt sent out the email below promoting the Campaign for Change's Get-Out-The-Vote (GOTV) effort...

In 17 short days, Minnesotans will go to the polls to vote in the most historic election of our time. That is, of course, if they are asked. We know that the number one reason people don’t vote is that no one asked them to.

Will you join me in these final few days of the campaign and ask our fellow Minnesotans to join us at the polls on November 4?

This weekend, we are pleased to launch a new website, www.gotvforchange.com. In the final days leading up to Election Day, we’ll need thousands of volunteers to fill thousands of shifts as we Get Out the Vote in all corners of Minnesota. We’ll be walking door to door and calling our neighbors, encouraging them to vote for the entire DFL ticket.

Visit www.gotvforchange.com right now to sign up.

Many of you have been working hard during a very long campaign. You've been incredible. You might be tired. You might be thinking it’s someone else’s turn to help out. You might think that we’re going to win. But we can’t give up now.

Campaigns are about how we finish and we're almost there. No one will remember how many doors we knocked on or how many phone calls we made if Senator Obama doesn’t win Minnesota. But when he does, because of your efforts, we will know that we pushed to the end to make it happen. Let’s keep pushing.

I’m fired up and ready to go. Are you? Click here to sign up right now.

We need your help to encourage our neighbors to go to the polls in the final days of this campaign. We know the most effective way to motivate voters is by calling them or visiting with them on their doorstep. Whether you can volunteer a few hours or several days, it is critical to our success that you sign up now to talk with your neighbors to ensure Minnesotans vote for change on November 4.

You might say – well, I don’t want to wait until the weekend before Election Day to start helping. Excellent. We have offices throughout Minnesota that are up and running day and night right now and we’d love to have you stop by and pitch in.

Click here to find an office near you .

Thank you so much for all you do, and will do to help get out the vote. With your efforts, we will elect Senator Barack Obama as the next President of the United States, send Al Franken to the Senate, elect three new Democratic members of Congress and secure a veto-proof majority in the Minnesota House. With your help, the DFL will win – up and down the ballot – in all corners of the state.

Sincerely,

Donna Cassutt
Associate Chair
Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party

P.S. There is too much at stake to stay home. It will take each and every one of us to do our part to achieve victory on November 4. Please visit www.gotvforchange.com to sign up now.

American Hunters and Shooters Association founder: Obama will protect gun rights

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 10:29:11 EDT

Photo Credit: Bemidji Pioneer - Submitted photo

Ray Schoenke, the founder and president of the American Hunters and Shooters Association, is in Minnesota talking to rural Minnesotans about Barack's respect of the rights of sportsmen and women and the Obama-Biden plan to restore the economy.

From the Bemidji Pioneer:

Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama won’t take away Americans’ guns, says the head of the American Hunters and Shooters Association.

“We’re a gun rights organization and we are stating Obama’s not going to take away your guns,” Ray Schoenke, who is founder and president of the AHSA, said in an interview Thursday night.

Last summer, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled a Washington, D.C., total ban on handguns as unconstitutional. In overturning the ban, Justice Antonin Scalia said that “the individual right is confirmed, that law-abiding citizens have the right to own a gun,” Schoenke said.

“That pretty well set the issue aside,” he said. “He basically said government cannot confiscate your guns. Congress cannot enact laws that can take your guns away. Which means Obama can’t take your guns away, nor can McCain. That whole issue is over with.”

Coming up with laws for rural American and for urban centers “takes away their fear issue,” he said of the NRA. “To me, it’s misrepresentation, distortions and lies. It’s the only thing they have. It’s unfortunate that McCain and Palin buy into it.”

“The gun rights issue is behind us and conservation is important,” he said. “Obama is ahead of McCain, and I think he’s clearly ahead when it comes to the economy. That’s why I strongly urge hunters and shooters throughout Minnesota to look to Obama and support him.”

Rather than relying on attack ads and distractions, Barack is focused on dealing with the economic challenges Americans are facing.

Barack will give tax cuts to 95% of middle class families. He'll end the tax breaks for companies shipping jobs overseas, and put them where they belong by cutting taxes on small businesses that grow local economies.

But we need your help to make sure people know the truth, and are focused on all the issues.

Log on to My.barackobama.com to get involved. Be sure to check out the brand new “Neighbor to Neighbor” canvassing campaign that makes it easy to reach out to voters in your own neighborhood.

Letters from the Field: "Rally's positive tone is welcome"

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 08:22:28 EDT

Preston Hollister of Rochester writes to the Post Bulletin:

As an independently thinking voter who tries to apply Christian principles in the political process, I was heartened by the positive tone of the Michelle Obama rally Monday.
I was sitting next to an enthusiastic young woman of color on one side, a 30-year-old pierced male student from St. Cloud on the other, with a retired friend self-described as a McCain supporter in front of me -- a white 50-year-old male.
Michelle encouraged us to support her husband (of course) but went on to ask that we pray for this election and all stay involved in the process of government after Nov. 4. Government of all the people, for the people, and by the people under God is what we need with the current economic and global challenges we face.
Preston Hollister
Rochester

In the past few months, people across Minnesota have begun the real differences between candidates in this election, and they've begun to respond.

The election ends in 18 days. On November 5th, will you have done all that you could have?

Albert Lea Tribune Endorses Barack Obama for President

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 20:16:37 EDT

The Albert Lea Tribune writes "Obama is a clear pick for president"..

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama deserves your vote for president of the United States.

His vision for a better country includes nation building — the United States of America. His opponent, Arizona Sen. John McCain, has a motto of “Country First,” but his policies seem to be more like country club first.

Obama wants to implement domestic policies that make a difference in the lives of ordinary people, such as improving the inefficient health care system, taking proper care of veterans, ending the war in Iraq and bolstering the federal student loan program.

His plan for taxes makes the wealthy Americans shoulder their fair burden for government and lessens the burden on everyday folks. The past 30 years has pushed more and more tax burden onto the middle class, while oil companies, drug companies and other special interests line their pockets. It’s time for that to stop. It’s time for a president who comes from lower- or middle-class people, a president who relates to average Americans.

McCain says he is different than President Bush. To be sure, he is. Either McCain or Obama would be better than Bush. No matter who wins, America is better off.

Even so, McCain represents corporate interests. He still calls for tax cuts for the rich and thinks it will solve the economic crisis. Even wealthy investor Warren Buffet favors Obama’s economic plan.

Further, electing Obama also sends a message to the rest of the world that Americans want to heal the international rift caused by the go-it-alone Bush administration.

Look at leadership, too. Obama mulls choices before making them. In Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, Obama picked a vice president. McCain made a rushed and amateurish choice in Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. He picked a running mate, not a vice president.

McCain once seemed his own man but allowing the Karl Rove gang into his campaign only has made him look like part of the same Republican machine that is to blame for the problems of the past eight years. What happened to straight talk?

Obama leads a campaign staff that works well as a team and has come a long way in two years. He is a natural leader.

It seems some of the great presidents have reached across party lines and even appointed members of the other party in their cabinets. Two are Ronald Reagan and Franklin Roosevelt. Obama seems willing to do the same. This Democrat is not as partisan as past candidates in the national stage. He is the right choice for America.

MONDAY: Michelle Obama Returns to Minnesota

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 20:41:33 EDT

On Monday, Michelle Obama returns to Minnesoa to speak with Minnesota voters about the clear choice they have in this election between change and more of the same.

Michelle discuss the everyday challenges that working families face as our economy worsens and talk about Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s long records of standing up for women and families.

Here are the details, check back for an opportunity to RSVP for these events online:

MONDAY, OCTOBER 13

Rochester, MN

COMMUNITY EVENT WITH MICHELLE OBAMA
Taylor Arena at the Mayo Civic Center
30 Civic Center Drive SE
Rochester, MN 55902

Doors Open: 10:30 AM
Program Begins: 12:00 PM

The event is free and open to the public. Free tickets are available at on a first-come, first served basis at the following location:

Ticket Location
Olmstead Co. Obama Campaign for Change Office
401 16th Ave. NW, #105
Rochester, MN 55901
Right off of 52, just past the Famous Dave's and the Perkins
Map & Directions

Tickets Available: 12 noon - 9 pm Saturday and Sunday
For more information contact the Olmstead Co. Obama Campaign for Change office: (507) 536-9785.

***For security reasons, do not bring bags or umbrellas. Please limit personal belongings. No signs or banners permitted.***

St. Paul, MN

CHANGE WE NEED RALLY WITH MICHELLE OBAMA
Macalester College
Leonard Center
125 Snelling Ave S
St. Paul, MN 55105
Map & Directions

Doors Open: 2:30PM
Program Begins: 4:00PM

This event is free and open to the public. Tickets are NOT required but an RSVP is strongly encouraged.

To RSVP, please visit mn.barackobama.com. Space is available on a first come first serve basis.

***For security reasons, do not bring bags or umbrellas. Please limit personal belongings. No signs or banners permitted.***

New TV Ad on Last Night's Debate: "Can't Explain"

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 10:37:47 EDT

Today, the Obama-Biden campaign released a new 30 second TV ad, “Can’t Explain”, which highlights health care in the debate last night. In the ad, which features footage from the debate, Joe Biden sheds light on the truth about John McCain’s health care plan, telling America that McCain pays for his health care plan by taxing your health care benefits, and he calls that, “the ultimate bridge to nowhere.”

"Can’t Explain" will air across the country on national cable beginning today.

Watch the ad...

Countdown: One Month to Election Day

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 14:27:50 EDT

With just 33 days until Election Day we need to step up our efforts to convince undecided voters to vote for Barack Obama.

To put him over the top here in Minnesota, Barack needs us to step up in our own communities, because we know our neighbors better than anyone.

Sign up now to join a weekend canvass in your area and make a difference in your community.

Kal Penn's Minnesota road trip

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:29:57 EDT

Andrew Zucker, the Youth Vote Director in Minnesota, just sent out this email...

Dear Xavier,

It's hard to believe, but there are only 6 weeks to go before Election Day. Now is the time to make sure you and everyone you know are registered to vote to help bring the change America desperately needs.

Earlier this month, "Harold & Kumar" star Kal Penn did his part by going on a road trip through Minnesota, registering students to vote and promoting our new online voter registration tool, Vote for Change.

Watch a video of Kal Penn stopping by a fraternity house to promote Vote for Change:

You'd be surprised by how many college students aren't registered to vote -- including your own classmates. When Kal was in college, he moved from house to house, and sometimes couldn't remember where he was registered.

With Vote for Change, that's no longer a problem. Keep track of where you're registered to vote, or find out if you're registered at all. You can also use it to vote absentee or find your polling location.

To win this election and bring about change for our generation, we're going to need as many young people registered to vote as possible.

Watch this video now and invite all of your friends to check out Vote for Change:

http://mn.barackobama.com/MNvoteforchange

Thanks,

Andrew

Andrew Zucker
Youth Vote Director
Minnesota Campaign for Change

KAAL on Obama Campaign Town Hall Meeting

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 09:23:13 EDT

KAAL reports on yesterday's National Security Town Hall in Rochester:

(ABC 6 News) - Polls are showing a tight margin between Barack Obama and John McCain. As we get closer to Election Day we can expect to see more local politicians rallying for their presidential candidate.
In the first town hall meeting for Senator Barack Obama in Rochester, national security experts took the stage stumping for the democratic hopeful.

They unveiled Obama's foreign policy vision for national security.

It includes withdrawing troops from Iraq within 16 months and refocusing the fight towards Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
"Focus on the people who actually perpetrated 9-11 on us that's taking this to Afghanistan and making sure Pakistan is brought into this," Tim Walz.

Republicans in our area stumping for John McCain were quick to respond to the proposal. In a phone interview Minnesota Republican Chair Ron Carey criticizes Obama's plan.
"On Iraq, Barack Obama says he wants peace, but if he continues to oppose the strategy that has lead to a tremendous reduction of violence, his calls for unconditional withdrawal could result in a renewed violence," said Carey.
Democratic Congressman Tim Walz disagrees.
"The currently policy under President Bush supported by Senator McCain has been solely focused on Iraq, that had nothing to do with 9-11, and had used our resources, our troops to the point where it's very difficult to focus on the greater need," said Walz.

Click here to watch KAAL's video from the Town Hall.

Friday at Noon: Rally to send a message to John McCain

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 15:08:28 EDT

The Minnesota DFL Party sent out this email to its supporters this morning:

Dear Friend,
This Friday at 12:00 noon -- while John McCain and Sarah Palin touch down ever so briefly in Minnesota at an airport hangar in Blaine -- you can fight back.
Join the Minnesota DFL Party, Barack Obama's Campaign for Change, Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and Minnesota House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher at the "Rally to Restore America's Economy."
WHAT:          Rally to Restore America's Economy
DATE:           This Friday, September 19
TIME:            12:00 noon
WHERE:         Peavey Plaza, downtown Minneapolis (at 11th Street and Nicollet Mall)
WHO:            Mayor R.T. Rybak, Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, a special musical guest -- and Minnesotans like you who want change.
RSVP:             http://MN.BarackObama.com/EconomyRally
Unbelievably, John McCain still thinks that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong." And all too believably, he's dragging his campaign into the gutter to try to distract us from his full-throated support of George Bush's disastrous economic policies.
And don't forget that the last time they were in Minnesota, John McCain and the Republicans spent virtually their entire convention attacking Barack Obama -- not to mention people like you who are trying to create change in your communities.
But while John McCain is offering nothing to fix our serious economic problems, Barack Obama is offering real change. Join fellow Democrats and Obama supporters and Rally to Restore the Economy.
Barack Obama will put the economy back on track in Minnesota again. Barack's comprehensive economic plan -- which includes tax cuts for 95 percent of American families -- will bring new jobs to our state, stimulate economic growth, and put money back into the pockets of hardworking Minnesotans.
The DFL Party has always been based on the principle that real change comes from the bottom up, not from the top down. Barack's campaign for change is rooted in this same principle.
On Friday, we can send the message to John McCain that Minnesota wants change -- not more of the same. Click here to RSVP to Friday's Rally to Restore the Economy.
Thanks,
Donna Cassutt
Associate Chair
Minnesota DFL Party
PS: Change begins with all of us, and we can't make change without you. Join us on Friday to send a message to John McCain and start taking our economy back.

Women can make the difference

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 10:36:50 EDT

Michelle Obama sent out the following email yesterday regarding Minnesota's Women's Week of Action.

Friend--
It's hard to believe there are less than 50 days before Election Day.
That's not a lot of time. And since women voters could decide this election, we have to take this opportunity to talk to our friends and family about what's at stake.
We've seen the power of women throughout this campaign -- educating each other about the issues and building this movement by sharing our personal stories.
That's why, over the next few weeks, women all across Minnesota will be reaching out to one another through special Women's Week of Action phonebanks and canvasses.
On every issue important to women -- from access to healthcare and universal pre-school to equal pay for equal work -- Barack is the only candidate who can bring about the change we need.
Join a Women's Week of Action event and let other women in your community know why you're supporting Barack.
Barack was raised by a single mother and grandmother. He understands the tough choices that working women in this country face every single day -- because he lived it. And now, he and I are raising two young girls. They are the reason we're in this race -- to make the world a better place, full of opportunity, for them and for all of our children.
I know that Barack and Joe Biden are a strong team for women and families across the country because they have the record and the commitment to prove it -- but it's up to supporters like you to help get this message of change out into your communities.
Barack and Joe will pass tax cuts for 95% of American families, ensure that women get equal pay for the same jobs as men, put the needs of working and middle class families ahead of special interests, and change our broken school system so that every single child in this nation has a world-class education from pre-school through college.
But they can't do it alone. This campaign is counting on us. If women come together to support Barack and Joe, we can bring about the change we need.
Get started today by reaching out to other women in your community:
http://mn.barackobama.com/MNwomensweek
The future of women and all of our families is at stake in this election.
Thank you so much for all that you do,
Michelle

Find a Women's Week of Action event near you.

Obama campaign response to McCain/Palin brief stop in Minnesota

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 18:31:50 EDT

Nick Kimball, the Obama campaign's Minnesota spokesman issued the following statement regarding the brief McCain-Palin airport stop planned for this Friday:

We welcome Senator McCain and Governor Palin back to Minnesota for their brief stop at the airport. Senator McCain's stubborn insistence that the "fundamentals of the economy are strong" shows that he is disturbingly out of touch with what's going on in the lives of middle-class Minnesotans.
And, unfortunately, not leaving the airport grounds won't do anything to change his out of touch perspective. Barack Obama understands the fundamentals of the economy and will cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans.

Rochester is home to Barack Obama's biggest supporter

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 08:43:13 EDT

From the Rochester Post-Bulletin:

Igor Vovkovinskiy commands attention wherever goes. At 7-feet, 8-inches tall, it kind of goes with the territory. For the last several months now, this soulful Rochester man has found a cause for which he has enthusiastically lent his towering frame.

Vovkovinskiy has thrown himself into politics. A fervent supporter of Sen. Barack Obama, he often sports a T-shirt emblazoned with the words, "World's Biggest OBAMA fan." He regularly attends DFL political rallies and doesn't mind using his height for political advantage. If it draws people in and gets them talking about politics, so much the better, he says.

"I believe in Barack Obama so much that I really want to use everything that I have at my advantage to help him," Vovkovinskiy said.

Daily volunteer

At Olmsted DFL Headquarters in northwest Rochester, Vovkovinskiy, 25, volunteers about four or five hours each day answering phones, handing out campaign literature and entering data into a computer. His work station, designed to accommodate his large body, includes a chair made of heavy oak and sturdy enough to not wobble when he sits down.

It might seem like grunt work, but Vovkovinskiy says he's enjoying himself immensely.

For months, Vovkovinskiy was largely bedridden, either at home or in the hospital, hobbled by a painfully infected left foot that has required six surgeries. In contrast to that confinement, his political activity has been a joyous outlet for him. It's connected him with simple things -- talking politics, enjoying the weather at rallies and socializing with people of like-minded views.

Vovkovinskiy says his political activity is driven by multiple issues and concerns. One is health care. Vovkovinskiy knows something about the subject, having received his fair share of medical care since arriving in the U.S. two decades ago. (He conservatively estimates the price tag at $6 million.) And it frightens him to think what it must be like for people without health insurance.

"I don't think people should have to choose between putting food on the table and getting health care," he said.

There is also the appeal of Obama himself. Critics might complain about his lack of experience, but Vovkovinskiy sees it as a bonus. It means that Obama isn't compromised or corrupted by Washington's back-scratching culture and is free to make his own decisions.

"He doesn't owe anything to anyone," he said.

Well-known

It's not always easy being one of the world's tallest men, Vovkovinskiy acknowledges. He doesn't go to places like the Mall of America anymore because often people "just run up and start screaming and yelling and calling me names." But he doesn't mind drawing attention to himself in Rochester as Obama's "biggest fan." There's a comfort level, built growing up here.

"People know me, because I've been here for nearly 20 years now. I don't really get (many) questions asked. So when people ask about my (Obama) shirt or something like that, I'm glad to answer whatever questions they have," he said.

Vovkovinskiy's biggest wish is to shake Obama's hand. It almost happened two years ago when the Illinois senator came to Mayo Civic Center for a rally. But something unique to Vovkovinskiy's experience happened. As Vovkovinskiy extended his hand, Obama walked right by him, never making eye contact.

"I'm still thinking he was ignoring me. I want him to come back here and shake my hand," he said.

Statement of Senator Barack Obama on the Anniversary of the 9/11 Attacks

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 08:28:12 EDT

In remembrance of the seventh anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Senator Obama released the following statement:

Today, we honor the memory of the lives that were lost on September 11, 2001, and grieve with the families and friends who lost someone they loved in New York City, at the Pentagon, and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. We will never forget those who died. We will always remember the extraordinary efforts of our firefighters, police and emergency responders, and those who sacrificed their own lives on Flight 93 to protect their fellow Americans. And we give thanks for the Americans defending us every day in our communities at home, and in our military abroad.

On 9/11, Americans across our great country came together to stand with the families of the victims, to donate blood, to give to charity, and to say a prayer for our country. Let us renew that spirit of service and that sense of common purpose. Let us remember that the terrorists responsible for 9/11 are still at large, and must be brought to justice. Let us resolve to defeat terrorist networks, defend the American homeland, stand up for the enduring American values that we cherish, and seek a new birth of freedom at home and around the world.

Heartland for Change RV Tour to Visit 24 Minnesota Towns

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:05:17 EDT

Barack Obama’s Minnesota Campaign for Change will be hitting the road next week, with the launch of a Greater Minnesota Heartland for Change RV tour across the state, highlighting Barack’s comprehensive plans to bring jobs, health care and economic resurgence to Minnesota’s small towns, cities and middle-class families.

Find a Heartland for Change stop near you by visiting http://MN.BarackObama.com/MNHeartlandChange.

The Heartland Change RV has been making its way across the country listening to voters who have been hit hard by the failed Bush/McCain economic policies of the last eight years.

In addition to local elected officials at each stop, several other Minnesota leaders will headline events at various points on the tour:

•   Minnesota House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher
•   State Auditor Rebecca Otto
•   Minnesota House Majority Leader Tony Sertich
•   Assistant Minnesota Senate Majority Leader Tarryl Clark
•   Former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland
•   Former Minnesota Agriculture Commissioner Jim Nichols

The RV will make stops in 24 towns, giving folks an opportunity to share their concerns, talk about the issues they're dealing with, and hear Barack's ideas for making the economy work for Minnesota families once again.

If you aren't able to make it to one of the 24 scheduled stops, you can track the Heartland Change RV's journey online at http://MN.BarackObama.com/MNHeartlandTour starting next week.

The News Out of St. Paul: Community Organizing, Community Responsibility

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:04:40 EDT

Whether combating anti-Semitism in post-World War II Minneapolis or standing up for farmers facing foreclosure and the loss of their livelihood during the Farm Crisis of the mid-80s, community organizers like Hubert Humphrey and Paul Wellstone empowered ordinary people to do extraordinary things on behalf of the common good.

During the Republican National Convention, thousands of ordinary Minnesotans came together, driven by their belief that America can't afford another four years like the last eight, to support for Barack Obama and Joe Biden's campaign for change.

These "everyday organizers" developed their community organizing skills at Camp Obama, where over 500 grassroots supporters from every corner of Minnesota learned the techniques and strategy that will drive this campaign to victory.

And while the Republicans were in St. Paul talking to their special interest and lobbyist friends, these ordinary Minnesotans were making phone calls and going door-to-door talking to their friends and neighbors about Barack Obama's plan to make the economy work for American families.

Women reached out to women and neighbors to neighbors, with remarkable success. Over the last three days, more than 1000 volunteers knocked on over 25,000 doors and identified thousands of Obama supporters across Minnesota, spreading Barack's message of change directly to the people.

While the Republicans were in town, deriding community organizing, the Campaign for Change was out in the community doing just that--bringing new voices into the process by registering voters, encouraging folks to help those affected by Hurricane Gustav, and coming together at benefit concerts and on college campuses to change this country.

Tomorrow, after the lobbyists and the McCain attack squad have left St. Paul, the Minnesota Campaign for Change will still be out in the community, making phone calls, knocking on doors, and spreading Barack's message of hope and change.

For years, Minnesotans have proved that when ordinary folks devote part of their busy lives to organizing and building their communities, they have the power to affect change. And that's what's happening today across this state, and across this country.

If you haven't already, please sign up to volunteer in your community and consider joining your neighborhood Team Obama. Together, we can bring change to Minnesota and to America.

Check out some of the best photos from Minnesota's Week of Action:

Canvass for Change During the RNC

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 12:15:50 EDT

Our thoughts and prayers continue to be with our friends in the Gulf Coast region. As we all come together to help in the recovery efforts (click here to donate), the Campaign for Change also plans to get volunteers out into the community and talk with their neighbors about Barack Obama's ideas to bring the change we need.

Barack Obama and Joe Biden know that Minnesota families need immediate and lasting relief, not another four years of the last eight years. That's why they're calling for an additional round of rebate checks to jumpstart the economy and help families cope with soaring prices.

Click here to sign up for a Week of Action event near you.

Your Story: Pam from Rochester, MN

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 15:08:00 EDT

The people who make up this movement come from all different backgrounds, but they share a common goal of helping bring about fundamental change in Washington. If you haven't already, share your story.

Pam from Rochester writes:

In late 1959 I met John F. Kennedy. In 1968 I worked for his brother Bobby's campaign in Illinois and watched in horror as he, too, died for his ideals. I have not worked for a campaign since then, never feeling quite right about who was running. I watched with interest when John Kerry and John Edwards ran against Bush/Cheney. Although I really like one of the two, I still did not feel strongly enough to actually take the step of campaign work.

Now, I feel that there is truly a candidate out there who just might be the real thing. Someone who doesn't say the ""politically correct thing"" to win support; but rather tells it like it is. Someone who doesn't tone down how bad things really are getting here at home. Doesn't promise things he knows that he cannot deliver. An individual who really listens to what the small guy has to say, and then tries to do something about it.

Should this man win in November, he won't be able to carry the burden by himself. With the backing of the American public, and the leadership of Barack Obama, our homeland can become the beacon of the world that the world knew back in the 1960's. If you have any doubts or reservations, read his latest book.

I am ready to don the campaign hat once more.

Now is the TIME

REBECA CHERY — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 20:13:37 EDT

LIVING THE TIME OF CHANGE IS A PRIVILEGE AND HONOUR. I BELIEVE MY TESTIMONY AS AN AMERICAN, AFRICAN AMERICAN, & WOMEN IS PROOF OF THE FOUNDATION THE UNITED STATES HAS BUILT UPON. MICHELLE OBAMA'S SPEECH WORDS OF COURAGE, STRENGTH, LOVE, INTEGRITY, AND MUCH MORE ON BARACK, THE US TODAY,AND THE FUTURE IS REAL. I AM ELATED THAT THE TIME HAS ARRIVED. GOD BLESS AMERICA FOREVER.

Last Chance to Attend a Convention Watch Party!

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:20:11 EDT

Tonight, Barack Obama will make history and deliver his nomination acceptance speech in front of more than 70,000 people in Denver.

We've got over 100 watch parties planned across the state. Find a watch party in your area on the map below, or click HERE to search using your zip code.

While the Republicans are in town

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:38:22 EDT

Jaci Urness, Field Director of the Minnesota Campaign for Change, sent out this email yesterday:

This Thursday, Barack Obama will accept the Democratic nomination at the Open Convention in Denver.

Next week, John McCain and his lobbyist and special interest friends are coming to St. Paul for the Republican National Convention. They will officially nominate John McCain to continue George W. Bush's disastrous economic policies for another four years.

We can bring change to Minnesota and America, but we need to reach as many Minnesota voters as possible with Barack's message of change.

Sign up to join fellow Obama supporters and grow our movement in your community next week.

When John McCain and the Republicans come into town next week, it won't be to reach out to everyday Minnesotans like you -- it will be to push the same tired, cynical attack politics and raise money for more negative ads.

There's no better time to show Minnesotans what's different about our grassroots Campaign for Change than during Republican convention week. Together, we've built a movement from the ground up that the Republicans just can't match.

That's why supporters are coming together in our communities on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to talk with voters face-to-face about some of the issues that are affecting Minnesota families the most -- like high gas prices, creating new jobs, and ending tax giveaways to corporations shipping jobs overseas.

No experience is required to participate. All you need is a hunger for change and a willingness to turn your enthusiasm into action.

Find a training or voter outreach event near you and sign up today:

http://mn.barackobama.com/mnweekofaction

Thanks for your help,

Jaci

Jaci Urness
Minnesota Field Director
Campaign for Change

MN.BarackObama.com - Your Home for Minnesota Democratic Convention Coverage

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:08:45 EDT

The Democratic National Convention is underway and we'll be covering it right here at MN.BarackObama.com all week long.

To watch a live stream of the convention go to http://www.demconvention.com/

The Obama Cart Story

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:03:41 EDT

When I saw the story of the Obama Cart and the Johnsons (Bill and Dixie) I thought how great it would be to be part of it but figured that my little town is never a place "on the way" to anywhere. I emailed Bill and he wrote right back that they would be pleased to come through our town. I could not believe it! They were coming here!

Let me tell you about Bill and Dixie. They are down to earth and the sweetest people, "salt of the earth" some may say. Proud Americans. Easy to talk to and ready with a smile and a story. They instantly connected with the people at the event and mingled easily.

Bill and Dixie made me proud to be an Obama supporter. I have been lagging as the campaign drags on. I have always been a supporter and I always will be. But as you are involved with a campaign I have found the rollercoaster ride can make your stomach sick!

These people, Bill and Dixie not only bring the Obama Cart with them, they bring the heart and souls of all die hard Obama supporters with them. The true America that is in them and around them is something to see and feel.

Everyone that was there was so impressed with the journey that these two have decided to take for all of us. The miles and meals on the road, the new people and the attention. I think that what I took away from this visit is that the America we used to know is still here, it is just hidden away from the light. Barack Obama will bring us all back into the light. He will give the people that are willing to hold up the least of us the tools and resources they need to get it done. He will give the least of us a chance to work and feel like there is a tomorrow to look forward to.

The parts of my heart that felt fear have begun to heal, thanks to Bill and Dixie. Two people that ask for nothing but to spread the words of Barack Obama.

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Rochester Post-Bulletin: Obama brings fire back to 75-year-old

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 12:04:38 EDT

This morning's Rochester Post-Bulletin includes this story about a 75-year-old Caledonia woman who is fired up about Barack's candidacy:

Back in the day, Julia Massman knew them all. She had shaken their hands and heard them speak at state conventions -- political leaders like Wendy Anderson and Rudy Perpich and Hubert Humphrey.

Then the Caledonia woman fell away from active involvement in the DFL Party and stayed away for years. Then she began to feel her political soul stirred again.

Though she had never been a national delegate or even tried to be, Massman campaigned actively at the DFL district convention in Albert Lea to be a national delegate. She won it on the basis of a speech she delivered at the district convention that included this simple declaration:

"I'm a 75-year-old, Irish, Catholic white woman, and I'm supporting Barack Obama," Massman recalled.

Massman knew there was political potency in the statement. It directly refuted the conventional wisdom at the time that older, white women, particularly supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton, never would support Obama's candidacy.

At age 75, Massman -- a former dairy farmer, mother of 13 and grandmother of 27 -- will be attending her first national convention as the state's oldest national delegate when the Democratic National Convention kicks off Monday in Denver.

Massman makes no secret of what it was that re-ignited her passion for politics. The moment for her came during Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. Massman instantly was converted.

Massman calls Obama intellectual and thoughtful, someone who has grown up in different places and countries and knows what it's like to live in those environments.

"He represents the perfect American. I'm Irish-Dutch. He's Irish, Scotch and Kenyan, and most Americans are more than one nationality. We are a melting pot, after all," she said.

DFL leaders say the DFL delegation will be one of the most diverse ever. It will include 25 African-Americans, six American Indians, 10 Asian-Pacific Islanders and seven Latinos. Its youngest will be 17-year-old David Gilbert-Pederson of Minneapolis. Its second youngest will be 18-year-old Sam Hagedorn, a native of Rochester and a graduate of Mayo High School.

John Stiles, the state DFL Party's communications director, said the DFL delegation will almost certainly be more reflective of the state's diversity than the GOP delegation, which he said will be almost "entirely white," older and mostly Christian, "with no people of different religious beliefs in it."

Barack Morning Buzz - 8-23-08

Barack Daily Buzz - Victory2008.net — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 11:14:48 EDT

Barack Morning Buzz - 8-23-08
See You at the Convention

(1) Watch the First Obama-Biden Rally Live Today in Springfield, Illinois at 3 PM ET
www.barackobama.com

(2) Obama Taps Delaware Senator Joe Biden to be Running Mate
Associated Press
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6yk0gOuccM

(3) Old Hand Boosts Obama Ticket
Adam Nagourney and Jeff Zeleny-New York Times
http://www.theage.com.au/world/old-hand-boosts-obama-ticket-20080823-40uw.html

(4) Obama Picks Senate Veteran Biden as Running Mate
Caren Bohan-Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN1928744420080823

(5) Obama Picks Joe Biden as Democratic Vice Presidential Nominee
Suzanne Goldenberg-Guardian-UK
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/aug/23/barackobama.joebiden?gusrc=rss&feed=worldnews

(6) It's Official-Joe Biden is Obama's Pick for Vice President
James Oliphant and Mike Dorning-Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/chi-joe-biden-vice-president-barack-obama3,0,4543080.story

(7) Obama Picks Biden as Vice Presidential Running Mate
Laura Litvan-Bloomberg
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aC5PDvRVKqqc&refer=home

(8) Obama Makes Biden His Pick for Running Mate
Russ Britt-MarketWatch
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/obama-makes-biden-his-pick/story.aspx?guid=C7280743-2CF8-4B65-B0AE-74040C2E0A29&dist=SecEditorsPicks

(9) Obama Picks Biden as His Running Mate
Sydney Morning Herald-Australia
http://www.smh.com.au/news/us-election/obama-picks-biden-as-his-running-mate/2008/08/23/1219262609334.html

(10) First Thoughts-It's Joe Biden
Chuck Todd, Mark Murray and Domenico Montanaro-MSBNC-First Read
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/08/23/1285720.aspx

(11) Joe Biden was the Right VP Pick
Scot Lehigh-Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/08/23/joe_biden_was_the_right_vp_pick_for_the_right_reasons/

(12) Reaction to Obama Choosing Biden as Running Mate
Associated Press
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iloS1HpcfjHk6kQtkxbnxv1dP4xgD92O15R00

(13) Michigan Reaction to Obama's Pick of Biden
Associated Press
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-mi-veepstakes-reacti,0,907395.story

The next Vice-President: Joe Biden!

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 03:21:48 EDT

Breaking news: the text message is out and it's official... Barack Obama has selected Joe Biden to be his running mate!

Please take a minute to share your story with Joe and welcome him into our movement for change.

We'll make sure to share some of your stories with Senator Biden so he gets a chance to better know the remarkable folks who've built this campaign from the bottom up.

Be sure to watch the first Obama-Biden rally live at 2 p.m. CSTon www.BarackObama.com.

Obama-Biden '08!

Rally for Change in Rosemount

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 13:36:52 EDT

On Tuesday, August 19th, the Campaign for Change is holding a Rally for Change in Rosemount with Minneapolis Mayor RT Rybak, Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson, Congressional Candidate Steve Sarvi, State Rep. Shelley Madore, and Minnesota House Candidate Phil Sterner.

These special guests will talk about their support for Barack and why he is the one candidate who can bring about the change we can believe in.

Here are the details:

RALLY FOR CHANGE
Tuesday, August 19th, 7:00 p.m.

Rosemount Community Center (Auditorium)
13885 South Robert Trail, Rosemount
RSVP online: http://my.barackobama.com/mnrosemountrally

The Obamacart is coming, The Obamacart is coming!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 23:38:58 EDT

I have been asked to host the makers of the "OBAMACART" in my home over night during their trip across the country from Division, MT to Unity, NH. A man named Bill Johnson from Montana made this cart and decorated it with paint resembling the Obama trademark "rainbow" symbol before the primaries were held in Montana and decided that a way for people to come together in unity was to make a big statement and take us all from Division to Unity...literally! Bill and his wife will begin their trip in a few days and will make stops in small towns along the way. I e-mailed them and asked if they would like to stop here. They were all for it! So we are the lucky recipients of a piece of history. The Obama campaign is involved in this and we are getting the press here to get it all on tape and in the papers. We hope to have a surrogate for the Obama campaign here as well. This will be the biggest rally Cresco has ever seen! I am proud have been considered for this event. They will be collecting donations for Obama AS WELL as LOCAL candidates before heading out to Milwaukee in the morning.

We plan to be at Beadle park (train park) on HWY 9 in Cresco at 7pm on the 25th of August. Bring your friends and neighbors.

A Special Invitation from Amy Klobuchar

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 09:49:14 EDT

Below is a note from U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, inviting Minnesota women to join her and hundreds of other women from across the state at Women for Obama kick-off celebrations next Wednesday, August 20th:

Dear Friend,
Women make a difference in every election, and this year we have a chance to move America in a fundamentally new direction.
Barack Obama is the candidate who will bring real change to Washington - but it is going to take supporters like you to help him succeed this November.
That is why I, on behalf of our Minnesota Women for Obama Steering Committee, would like to invite you to join me and hundreds of women as we officially launch “Minnesota Women for Obama” at three kickoff celebrations across the state.
Wednesday, August 20th
Doors Open: 7:00 PM
Program Begins: 7:30 PM

Duluth
The Midi Restaurant -Fitger’s Building
600 East Superior Street
Duluth, MN 55802

Minneapolis
The Woman’s Club
410 Oak Grove
Minneapolis, MN 55403

Rochester
Rochester Public Library
101 2nd Street SE
Rochester, MN 55904

We hope you will join us to learn about the many ways you can get involved with the campaign.   You can RSVP online here: http://MN.BarackObama.com/MNWomenKickOff.
Join Congresswoman Betty McCollum, Attorney General Lori Swanson, State Auditor Rebecca Otto, Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, State Senator Tarryl Clark, and others in celebrating this historic event.
In addition, through the magic of modern technology, you will get to hear from a very special guest who will discuss the campaign and tell us why she is supporting Senator Obama.
Barack needs women with all different skills and backgrounds in every corner of Minnesota doing their part to help bring change to Washington.
Reach out to your mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, and girlfriends and invite them to join you for this very special event. We look forward to having you with us.

Thank You.
Senator Amy Klobuchar
On behalf of the Minnesota
Women for Obama Steering Committee

All events are free and open to the public. RSVP for one of the three kick-off celebrations at: http://MN.BarackObama.com/MNWomenKickOff

McCains resume

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 18:08:35 EDT

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- In his frivolous Paris and Britney ad, Sen. John McCain
has asked the right question: Is Barack Obama ready to lead this country?

Since last January, Sen. Obama's fitness for the presidency has been the only
question that matters in American politics. The pollsters and pundits agree that if
Obama can show the voters that he's up to the job, he'll win. If not, he won't.

But that begs another question: Is McCain fit to lead America?

That question hasn't been asked, nor has it been answered.

The assumption seems to be that McCain's years of experience in the military and in
Congress of course give him the background and tools he'd need in the White House. As
Britney might say, "Duh! For sure he's qualified!!! He's Mac!!!"

But is that true? Does McCain have the right stuff?

A careful look at McCain's biography shows that he isn't prepared for the job. His
resume is much thinner than most people think.

Here are some reasons why McCain would be a mediocre president.

Lack of accomplishments

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Like the current occupant of the White House, McCain got his first career breaks
from the connections and money of his family, not from hard work.

The son and grandson of Navy admirals, he attended Annapolis where he did poorly.
Nevertheless, he was commissioned as a pilot, where he performed poorly, crashing
three planes before he failed to evade a North Vietnamese missile that destroyed his
plane. McCain spent more than five years in a prison camp.

After his release, McCain knew his weak military record meant he'd never make
admiral, so he turned his sights to a career in politics. With the help of his new
wife's wealth, his new father-in-law's business connections and some powerful friends
had made as a lobbyist for the Navy, he was elected in 1982 to a Congress in a
district that he didn't reside in until the day the seat opened up. A few years
later, he succeeded Barry Goldwater as a senator.

McCain hasn't accomplished much in the Senate. Even his own campaign doesn't trumpet
his successes, probably because the few victories he's had still rankle Republicans.

His campaign finance law failed to significantly reduce the role of money in
politics. He failed to get a big tobacco bill through the Senate. He's failed to
change the way Congress spends money; his bill to give the president a line-item veto
was declared unconstitutional, and the system of pork and earmarks continues
unabated. He failed to reform the immigration system.

Every senator who runs for president misses votes back in Washington, so it's no
surprise that McCain and all the others who ran in the primaries have missed a lot of
votes in the past year. But between the beginning of 2005 and mid-2007, no senator
missed more roll-call votes than McCain did, except Tim Johnson, who was recovering
from a near-fatal brain aneurysm.

Shallow

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

McCain says he doesn't understand the economy. He's demonstrated that he doesn't
understand the workings of Social Security, or the political history of the Middle
East. He doesn't know who our enemies are. He says he wants to reduce global warming,
but then proposes ideas that would stimulate -- not reduce -- demand for fossil
fuels.

McCain has done one thing well -- self promotion. Instead of working on legislation
or boning up on the issues, he's been on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" more than
any other guest. He's been on the Sunday talk shows more than any other guest in the
past 10 years. He's hosted "Saturday Night Live" and even announced his candidacy in
2007 on "The Late Show with David Letterman."

McCain has not articulated any lofty goals. So far, his campaign theme has mostly
been "McCain: He's None of the Above."

In the primaries, he campaigned on "I'm not that robotic businessman, I'm not that
sanctimonious hick, I'm not that crazy libertarian, I'm not that washed-up actor, I'm
not that delusional 9/11 guy." In the general election, he's emphasized that he's not
that treasonous dreamer.

No leadership

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

McCain has frequently taken on near-impossible missions that go against the grain of
his party. It's the basis of his reputation as a maverick. But McCain has never been
able to bring more than a handful of Republicans along with him on issues such as
campaign finance reform or immigration. Democrats on the Hill have accepted McCain's
help on some issues, but except for a few exceptions (John Kerry and Joe Lieberman),
they've never warmed to him.

To achieve anything as president, McCain would have to win over two hostile parties:
The Democrats and the Republicans.

Living in the Sixties

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

McCain is still fighting the Vietnam War. But he's not fighting the real historic
war, which taught us the folly of injecting ourselves into a civil war that was none
of our business. We learned that, in a world where even peasants have guns,
explosives and radios, a determined and popular guerrilla force can defeat a modern
army equipped with the mightiest technology if that army has no vital national
interest to protect.

Instead, McCain is fighting an imaginary Vietnam War, where a sure victory could
have been achieved with just a little more bombing, just a little more
"pacification," just a little more will to win at home. This fantasy clouds McCain's
judgment on foreign policy.

Most of the other high-profile politicians who fought in Vietnam -- Colin Powell,
Chuck Hegel, John Kerry, and Jim Webb -- aren't stuck in the past, and they don't
view the Iraq War as a chance to get Vietnam right.

No principles

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

After years of honing a reputation as a guy who'll say the truth regardless of the
political consequences, McCain has crashed the Straight Talk Express. On almost every
issue where he took a principled stand against the Republican line -- taxes,
immigration, oil drilling, the Religious Right -- he's changed his views.

We ought to like politicians who change their mind when the facts change; it shows
maturity, judgment and flexibility. But politicians who change their mind to suit the
prevailing winds show the opposite.

The bottom line

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Successful presidents come from two molds: visionaries, or mechanics. The
visionaries -- think Reagan or FDR -- see what others can't and say 'Why not?" to
inspire the country. The mechanics -- think LBJ or Eisenhower -- know the ins and
outs of government and are able to harness the power of millions of humans to
accomplish great things, or at least keep the wheels from coming off.

McCain fits neither style. He's neither a dreamer, nor a detail guy. His major
accomplishment, in Vietnam and in the Senate, has been merely to survive.

Just surviving doesn't make you're a hero, or a decent president. America needs to
do more than survive the next four years.

Be the First to Know Barack's VP Choice

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 10:51:31 EDT

Find out via text message the moment Barack makes his VP choice by texting VP to 62262.

Or click here to find out who the VP choice is via email.

Goin' to the State Fair?

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 14:16:52 EDT

It's time for the Minnesota State Fair, and Barack's Campaign for Change is going to be present, registering voters and talking with folks about the need to bring real change to Minnesota.

We need your help! Sign up today to join us!

I wanted to share an email that just went out to Minnesota myBO groups from Kim Bachand and David Jensen. Kim and David helped Carl Holmquist and other volunteer organizers make sure the Obama campaign had a presence at last year's fair, and have volunteered to take the lead in recruiting volunteers for this year. Way to go, y'all!

Barack Obama Volunteers Needed for the Minnesota State Fair!
Join Us for Twelve Days of Fun Ending Labor Day!
Thursday, August 21st - Monday, September 1st

Sign Up for 1 of 4 Daily Shifts at: http://mn.barackobama.com/mnstatefair

WE NEED LOTS OF VOLUNTEERS -- LIKE YOU!
To show the strength of our movement, we need to be visible, talk with voters and sign and register them up for the General Election. We'll have two booths this year, one within the DFL building with the other location yet to be determined. Our tables at both booths will be staffed every day from 7:30 am -10 pm with volunteer shifts from 7:30-11:30, 11:30-3:30, 3:30-7:30 and 7:30-10. Here's where we need your help!

WE'VE MADE VOLUNTEERING EASY!
Click here to sign up by day for one or several shifts during the fair.

http://mn.barackobama.com/mnstatefair

Obama State Fair Volunteer Staffers Kim Bachand or David Jensen will be in contact with you to confirm your schedule, cover your volunteer assignment along with other details.

MINNESOTA STATE FAIR INFORMATION.
- Our Obama table is located inside the DFL building, at the corner of DanPatch Avenue and Cooper Street. Further details will be forthcoming on the other booth location
- Volunteer admission fees will be paid by the campaign. A ll other expenses including parking, food and beverages are at the expense of the volunteer
- For information about the fair, visit the official MN State Fair website, www.mnstatefair.org.

IT'S A MINNESOTA TRADITION!
During the State Fair over 1.7 million people from 87 Minnesota counties
will come to the State Fair, go on rides, visit the animal barns, eat food
on a stick and talk politics.

So join us at the State Fair. Talk with Minnesota voters about Senator
Obama's message of hope and change. Volunteer Today!

http://mn.barackobama.com/mnstatefair

If you have any questions, please e-mail us at statefairmn@gmail.com.

Sincerely,

Kim Bachand
David Jensen

PS: Don't have time to volunteer but are planning on attending the fair?
You can still participate in the MN Obama movement by wearing your Obama
gear for visibility and direct interested parties to the Obama Booths!

Sen. Klobuchar Announces Rural Minnesotans for Obama

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 12:22:54 EDT

Senator Amy Klobuchar was on hand at Farm Fest to announce the Rural Minnesotans for Obama Steering Committee and to discuss Barack's New Energy for America plan.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar:

Barack Obama supports bipartisan efforts on agriculture and energy that Senator McCain has rejected, including this year's Farm Bill. Senator Obama's comprehensive energy plan will help Americans cope with the energy crisis in the short term by providing an immediate $1,000 per family rebate, and will make the long-term investments we need to create our new energy future. Barack Obama's plan is one that will provide middle class and rural families real relief.

You can read Barack's plan here: http://www.NewEnergyforAmerica.com.

See below for the Rural Minnesotans for Obama Steering Committee.

State Rep. Tom Anzelc, Balsam Township
Former US Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland
Former State Rep. Ruth Johnson, St. Peter
State Rep. Al Juhnke, Willmar
Former State Rep. Henry Kalis, Walters
Former Minnesota Deputy Commissioner of Agriculture Anne Kanten, Milan
Colleen Landkamer, Blue Earth County Commissioner
State Senator Keith Langseth, Glyndon
Former Minnesota Commissioner of Agriculture Jim Nichols
Former Congressman Alec Olson
State Senator Mary Olson, Bemidji
State Rep. Aaron Peterson, Appleton
State Senator Sharon Erickson Ropes, Winona
State Senator Tom Saxhaug, Grand Rapids
State Senator Rod Skoe, Clearbrook
Andy Steensma, Mayor of Luverne
Former State Rep. Gene Wenstrom, Elbow Lake

James Adams, Mankato
Howard Anderson, Moorhead
Audrey Arner, Montevideo
Sandra Aronen, Cottonwood
Paul Baumgartner, Roseau
Joel Beard, Moorhead
Phillip Benent, St. Charles
Cory Bergman, North Mankato
Eunice Biel, Harmony
Leslie Bohnert, Mankato
Bob Brill, Harmony
James Brocsder, Marshall
Mary Kay Brocsder, Marshall
Shelley Budenske, New Ulm
Joyce Burgess, Mankato
John Butze, Glyndon
Travis Carpenter, Mankato
Carol Chambard, New Ulm
Deborah Clyne, New Ulm
Josh Covarrubias, Sleepy Eye
Harold Crowe, Ada
Virgil Debban, New Ulm
Rose Depuy, Moorhead
Jim Dick, Mt. Lake
Myah Douglas,
East Grand Forks
Dean Doyscher, Mankato
Steven Dummer, New Ulm
Darwin Dyce, Ghent
Lori Dyce, Ghent
Eric Elias, New Ulm
William Erickson, Crookston
Robert Ewert, Bingham Lake
James Falk, Murdock
Karen Falk, Murdock
Mary Fernstrum, Marine
George Ferre, Mankato
Darlene Filzen, New Ulm
Marilyn Fischer, New Ulm
Christopher Gaffer, Mankato
Michael Gatica, Crookston
Charlene Gilman, Lake Crystal
Jill Gould, Willmar
Frederick Gould, Willmar
Ronald Gravley, Mankato
Doreen Green, Frazee
Michael Green, Mankato
LaVerna Gulden, New Ulm
Kelli Hamilton, Mankato
Evalyn Hansen, Moorhead
Kathleen Hanson,
Lake Bronson
Nicole Haugh, Mankato
Paulette Hayenga, Windom
Tim Henning, Adrian
Brooke Herling, Montevideo
Randy Hilbert, New Ulm
Roger Hippert, New Ulm
Cynthia Hoffmann, New Ulm
Preston Holtz, Mankato
Sharon Holzer, New Ulm
Joan Huffman, Fairfax
Vanessa Jaster, St. Peter
Nancy Johansen Huffman,
New Ulm
Richard Johnson, Madelia
Ardis Johnson, Madelia
Jill Johnson, Mankato
Patricia Johnson, New Ulm
Ruth Johnson, St. Peter
Kent Kalm, Mankato
Jim Kanten, Milan
Kent Kanten, Milan
Tim Kanten, Milan
Michael Karp, Mankato
Brian Kass, Mankato
Barb Knutsen, Montevideo
Alex Knutson, Mapleton
Tyler Knutson, Montevideo
Greg Kortuem, Mankato
James Kotz, Mankato
Jon Lagerstedt, Gibbon
Merlon Lagerstedt, Gibbon
Maureen Laughlin, Ortonville
Kim Le, Moorhead
Vicki Lindberg,
Thief River Falls
Frances Lorentz,
North Mankato
Paul Macht, Lucan
Kimberly Maiers, Mankato
Pam McCrory, Bemidji
Will Michels, Mankato
Deanna Mitchell,
North Mankato
Patrick Moore, Montevideo
Harold Motter, Mankato
Jacqueline Ness, New Ulm
Duane Ninneman, Ortonville
Allan Nygaard, Starbuck
Arland Otto, Delavan
John Parenteau, Mankato
Darlene Parker, Storden
Wayne Pauluk, Springfield
Al and Karen Perish,
Browerville
Sandra Petersen, Windom
Debra Peterson, Lake Crystal
Darla Pfeiffer, Windom
Karen Piper, Mankato
Kevin Piorier, New Ulm
Maryann Reddemann, Storden
Jamie Rehnelt, Windom
Richard Robbins, Mankato
Allen Rohlik, Olivia
Justin Ross, Marshall
Marion Rude, Gary
Leann Rudenick, Mankato
Jeff Russell, Cokato
Zachary Russell, Hutchinson
Daniel Ryan, Mankato
Eunice Sandmann, New Ulm
Sterling Schmidt, Alexandria
Herman Schutter, Mankato
Paul Schwartz, Morris
Julie Seys, Mankato
Melissa Shoge, New Ulm
Sandra Snell, North Mankato
Colleen Sorenson, Westbrook
Benjamin Stock, Mankato
Melvin Suess, New Ulm
Lucinda Swenson, Moorhead
Richard Swing, Good Thunder
Andrew Thom, North Mankato
Lori Thompson, Barnesville
Jo Lynn Thoreson, Baudette
Joseph Timmins, Melrose
Carol Timmins, Melrose
Rebecca Tkachuk, Moorhead
Shirley Torgerson, Mankato
Helene Trebesch, New Ulm
Ralph Weber, Sanborn
Brenda Wiger, New Ulm
Mark Wiger, New Ulm
Jean Wilder, Windom
Julie Willis, Mapleton
David Wintersteen, Moorhead
Karen Wittgraf, Gibbon
Deanne Worm, New Ulm
Betty Young, Eagle Lake
Audrey Zenner, Willmar

Are you a Rural Minnesotan for Obama? Sign up here to recieve more information and details on upcoming events.

As Obama Supporters Rally at Farm Fest, AP Looks into McCain's Opposition to the Farm Bill

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 11:50:16 EDT

Today, as U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar headlines a rally of Obama supporters at Farm Fest to announce the Rural Minnesotans for Obama Steering Committee and to discuss Obama’s New Energy for America plan there is much buzz about McCain’s weakness on agricultural issues and in key farm states.

From MSNBC.com:

Battlegrounds: McCain’s ag weakness
Posted: Wednesday, August 06, 2008 9:18 AM by Domenico Montanaro
Want to know why our new NBC News battleground map is so pro-Obama in the agricultural Midwest (Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin)? The AP takes a look at how McCain's opposition to key farm bill provisions has hurt him in the region.

And the AP:

McCain opposes farm bill and ethanol subsidies backed by Obama, risks losing key Midwest votes
By MIKE GLOVER , Associated Press
DES MOINES, Iowa - Republican presidential candidate John McCain opposes the $300 billion farm bill and subsidies for ethanol, positions that both supporters and opponents say might cost him votes he needs in the upper Midwest this November.

His Democratic rival, Barack Obama, is making a more traditional regional pitch: He favors the farm bill approved by Congress this year and subsidies for the Midwest-based ethanol industry. McCain instead has promised to open new markets abroad for farmers to export their commodities.

In his position papers, McCain opposes farm subsidies only for those with incomes of more than $250,000 and a net worth above $2 million. But he's gone further on the stump.

"I don't support agricultural subsidies no matter where they are," McCain said at a recent appearance in Wisconsin. "The farm bill, $300 billion, is something America simply can't afford."

McCain later described the measure, which is very popular throughout the Midwest, as "a $300 billion, bloated, pork-barrel-laden bill" because of subsidies for industries like ethanol.

It's not a stand that pleases Republican Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa.

"I would not advise him to take that position," Grassley said. "For sure, he can't lose Missouri and that's in the upper Midwest. Could he lose Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin and still be elected president? Yes, but I wouldn't advise him to have that strategy."

Grassley, a conservative Republican, and his Senate colleague from Iowa, liberal Democrat Tom Harkin, have achieved enduring success in this state largely by mastering the politics of farm issues. Harkin chairs the Senate Agriculture Committee, which wrote the new farm legislation.

"I don't see any scenario in which McCain can get to the White House without carrying some upper Midwestern states," said Harkin, an Obama backer. "I've never really understood in all my years why Sen. McCain has gone out of his way to speak against and vote against policies that are important to the upper Midwest."

There's a history of close elections in the region. President Bush carried Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota and South Dakota in 2004, earning 35 electoral votes. But his Democratic opponent, John Kerry, prevailed in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois, giving him 41 electoral votes.

Veteran GOP strategist Gentry Collins said McCain can defend his record on farm issues, including opposing "corporate welfare" for big operations, but he said there's more at work.

"The upper Midwest is crucial in this election, and Midwestern voters value authenticity. They value experience," Collins said. "I don't think agricultural issues are the only issues Midwestern voters care about. There are some bigger-picture issues, broader issues where he's strong."

But on another important issue to Midwesterners, McCain opposed a tax break for developing wind power. Obama supported the tax break.

"We're employing close to 2,000 people right now in Iowa in the wind energy industry," Harkin said.

McCain has been most outspoken on ethanol subsidies, and that has Republicans worried in Iowa, the nation's biggest producer of the fuel. Other top ethanol producers include Illinois, Minnesota, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin and Missouri.

"It does challenge him in states like Iowa, the No. 1 ethanol state," said Bill Northey, Iowa's Republican agriculture secretary. "It does make it tougher to make the case."

Drake University political science professor Dennis Goldford said McCain's problem on farm issues reflects a deeper issue he faces as he's courted conservative GOP activists, many of whom are deeply suspicious of him.

"He's essentially reverting to standard Republican supply-side economics," said Goldford. "That's where he's got a problem. He's got to find his own voice and so far he hasn't had a voice."

Iowa Gov. Chet Culver, a Democrat who has campaigned for Obama, said he's puzzled by McCain's position. He points to other Republicans who have a different view.

"President Bush and I just had a good conversation about how critically important ethanol is, and how Iowa is positioned so well to lead the nation," said Culver. "I have no idea why John McCain doesn't support it. It hurts him in Indiana, and Missouri and Ohio, and it's not the message right now that any of us want to hear."

Obama has a modest lead in national polls, but electoral votes will decide the election. Obama is poised to do well on both coasts, while McCain is favored in the South and some parts of the West. That leaves the upper Midwest as a swing battleground.

"The Midwest is crucial in this campaign," said Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, a Democrat and an early backer of Obama. "Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and perhaps Indiana are very important states. McCain is behind, and he's in danger of falling further behind."

Retired Firefighter Goes Door-to-Door for Barack in Rochester

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 16:22:44 EDT

Today's Rochester Post-Bulletin included an article about Joe Book, a retired firefighter and Campaign for Change volunteer.

Obama volunteer likes message of change
By Matthew Stolle
Post-Bulletin, Rochester MN

Joe Book was performing an act of political penance last week. He was door-knocking in northwest Rochester, seeking to drum up support for Illinois Sen. Barack Obama's run for the presidency.

Book, a 28-year retired veteran of the Rochester Fire Department, doesn't particularly enjoy door-knocking. In fact, he hates the activity.

"I got a hundred better things to do than this," Book said, pausing on a sidewalk, clipboard in hand.

Yet Book, 52, cites two overriding factors for his willingness to involve himself in the Obama campaign as an unpaid volunteer.

The first is Book's regret for voting for George W. Bush in the 2000 election, a decision he admits was largely driven by his disgust with President Clinton's scandal-plagued, boorish behavior in the White House and then-Democratic presidential contender Al Gore's failure to repudiate it.

The second reason is his belief that Obama represents the best chance for steering the United States in a new direction. The change message that has been at the core of the Obama camp has resonated powerfully with the former firefighter.

When it comes to his political views, Book is something of an open book. Even as he goes door-to-door, Book maintains a steady conversational pace. He wants a new direction in foreign policy, with a greater focus on Afghanistan. He is enthused about Obama's plans for expanding health care insurance to more Americans.

But the subject that really gets Book's juices flowing is energy issues. The debate over man-made global warming may rage in some circles, but Book is convinced that the phenomenon must be dealt with as a reality. The United States, he says, can no longer afford a delay in embracing a new energy future, based on wind and solar power, electric cars and a lighter carbon footprint. The Republican mantra of drill, drill, drill is fool's gold in Book's mind.

"I got five grandchildren," Book says. "This is a last chance, if we don't do this now."

Although Book's personal prognosis can come across as grim, his personality is upbeat and optimistic. For a person who can at times speak apocalyptically about America's future, Book has enough faith in the future that he's building a new house, one based on new green technology.

He is also convinced of one man's ability to make a difference. Hence his door-knocking activity one Sunday morning. At one door in a northwest Rochester home, Book is greeted by a woman clad in a nightgown. She tells Book she was planning to take a shower, yet she holds the door open and agrees to answer Book's questions.

By early afternoon, Book was feeling upbeat about the responses he was getting from his door-knocking. The economy and the war in Iraq were among the top issues for some. The majority of respondents had expressed an openness, if not an intention, to vote for Obama, he said.

"No one has slammed the door in my face yet. That's kind of nice," Book said.

Post-Bulletin: Obama opens campaign office in Rochester

Xavier Lopez-Ayala — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 13:50:47 EDT

Today's Rochester Press-Bulletin included an article about this past Saturday's office opening there.

Sen. Barack Obama opened a presidential campaign office in Rochester over the weekend as the Obama campaign readies its ground game for the November election.
The opening of Obama's Campaign for Change office, located at 401 16th St. N.W., Suite 105, took place on Saturday at an event headlined by Democratic Congressman Tim Walz.
"The office will be used as a sort of regional headquarters for the campaign to organize our neighbor-to-neighbor efforts," said Nick Kimball, a spokesman for the Obama campaign In Minnesota.
The office is one of nine that the Obama campaign has opened across Minnesota.

If you're from Rochester of the surrounding area, stop by and say hi!

If you live elsewhere in the state, find your local field office by visiting http://mn.barackobama.com/mnoffices.

Barack Morning Buzz - 8-4-08

Barack Daily Buzz - Victory2008.net — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 08:41:35 EDT

Barack Morning Buzz - 8-4-08
Happy 47th Birthday Obama!!!

(1) Obama Assails McCain as Tool of Big Oil
Caren Bohan-Reuters
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080804/pl_nm/usa_politics_obama_dc_1

(2) Obama TV Ad Calls for Return of Windfall Profits Tax
Tom Raum-Associated Press
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080804/ap_on_el_pr/obama_2

(3) Obama Kicks Off Week Focusing on Energy with New Ad
Julianna Goldman-Bloomberg
http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20080804/pl_bloomberg/avzbwtc_bqik_1

(4) McCain Likely to Let Obama Choose VP First
Jonathan Martin-Politico
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20080804/pl_politico/12271_1

(5) Can Obama Turn the Democratic Party Upside Down with the Biggest Voter Mobilization Drive in History?
Steven Rosenfeld-AlterNet
http://www.alternet.org/election08/93718/can_obama_turn_the_democratic_party_upside_down_with_the_biggest_voter_mobilization_drive_in_history_/

(6) Obama's Crime? Acting Too Presidential
James Rainey-Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-onthemedia4-2008aug04,0,7232176.story

(7) Candidates' VP Picks Could Decide the Race
Carla Marinucci and Joe Garofoli-San Francisco Chronicle
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/08/04/MN1O123K3S.DTL

(8) Obama Urged to Strike Back over McCain's Personal Attack Advertising
Time Reid-The Times-UK
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4453975.ece

(9) It's Time for Obama to Get Tough
Glenn Hurowitz-AlterNet
http://www.alternet.org/election08/93739/it's_time_for_obama_to_get_tough/

(10) Answering McCain's Attacks
Fred Hiatt-Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/03/AR2008080301574.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

(11) Indiana Getting Attention from Obama Campaign
Liz Sidoti-Associated Press
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080804/NEWS0502/808040343

(12) Obama Leads McCain Among Low Wage Workers
Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN0339387820080804

(13) American Actress Gwyneth Paltrow Urges Americans Living Abroad to Vote for Obama
Jon Swaine-Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/uselection2008/barackobama/
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1488655367/bctid1709855534

(14) Paris Hilton's Mom Takes Offense at McCain's Humor
Associated Press
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hYXNxmjlnpC2aHwsOdPmg6u7f3PAD92BENC0

(15) Why McCain is Still in It
Nate Silver-Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe-silver4-2008aug04,0,2423895.story

Ravelry Knitters for Obama Raffle

Debbie — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 09:29:43 EDT

Just entered the online raffle... if you are a knitter or crocheter or know someone who is (or just appreciates wonderful knitted products), check out the Ravelry KFO online raffle (located right here). You can contribute between July 4th and August 7th (midnight). The drawing will be held on August 29 and announced on August 30th at 9 AM CST. $5.00/ticket and what wonderful items including: the 50 state afghan (handknit, of course), a crocheted blanke, yarn galore (Unity, Audacity, Yes We Can, Fired UP, Tides of Change, etc), fingerless Obama gloves, knitting books, spinning packages, patterns, and more. Go to https://donate.barackobama.com/page/contribute/pf?outreach_page_id=12014 and then copy your donation receipt and send it to obamaknitters@gmail.com and tell them which items you would like to earmark for your tickets. It's that easy. Have fun!

Our last online raffle for the primary raised $9,000.00. Help us to surpase that goal!

Fired up and ready to go...

Knitting Enthusiast

Debbie — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 13:34:45 EDT

Not sure just how long I'll keep this up but wanted to share my enthusiasm for our Ravelry Knitters for Obama group. During the Primary season we knit and crocheted 100 preemie hats and bibs per Primary state. We're an amazing group of men and women of all ages and all walks of life from all over the country working together to put in action Obama's call for community service. We currently have two major projects underway... one is knitting and crocheting hats, scarves, and washcloths for homeless vet shelters and the other is creating an afghan to raffle off as a fundraiser for Obama. We have over 1700 members and are looking for more knitters or crocheters. So, if you want to help, let me know and we'll get you connected with this fantastic group of men and women.

I'm also involved in a group which is an Inauguaration Scarf Knitalong... knitting a little bit on a scarf until Inauguaration. I'm knitting a V for Victory Scarf and can't wait to wear it.

That's it for now. If you're a knitter or crocheter... come join our group. The more members we have, the more items we can donate to the Homeless Vet Shelters.

The nominee is.......

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 20:52:35 EDT

First I want to say I am bummed. All but 3 of my blogs have disappeared from my "space" here.

I suppose they needed the room, it was getting to full.

How can I express my feelings the other night, the night that the democratic nomination took the final turn towards Obama. The night I sat for 5 hours watching MSNBC, refusing to turn to any other station. I did not want to have any type of Clinton hype on this night. My calander was cleared, my kids were fed and watching a movie downstairs (they are 14 and 15) Every now and then they would come up and check to see how it was going.

I did not eat supper, I snacked on some crackers and squeeze cheese! lol ( I never eat it, but I needed something!)

To me it just seemed like it was just a game, sitting there and watching the number of delegates needed as it went down and down. I thought to myself, "this is like when I wanted the campaign to put up signs all over Iowa and they waited till the week before the caucuses, It made such a big impact. Much more than if they would have been there all along" They did the same thing with the super delegates. It made such an impact, it was exciting to watch 14, 13, 11, 10, 9.....4! What a wonderful plan. I decided then an there to once again have faith in the campaign, they really do know what they are doing. There are few times that I have doubted them, I knew there had to be a plan. Slow and steady wins the race.

As they announced that Barack had won the needed delegates to become the "presumtive nominee" I just held my breath. I held it in, waiting for something, something to happen. My daughter came up stairs yelling "Barack won! Barack won!" I breathed out. I cried, I smiled, I thanked God above, I sent text messages to every Obama supporter I had programed into my phone. I spent the next half hour talking on the phone and sharing the news. I still had an astrick of my own NOT next to Obamas name, but next to Hillarys name. In my brain I was still wondering what was going to happen with her.

Hillary disappointed me. I have not held much against the Clintons, trying hard to keep that bridge intact. I was saddened, but still tried to understand her point of view ONCE AGAIN! I was very sad that she leaked out there the possibility of a VP slot. Of course it took up most of the news cycle for the last several days. I felt like she was trying to steal the thunder of Baracks nomination and the monumental task that he had accomplished. What of the 18,000,000 votes that he obtained when running against a "presumtive" winner. Barack ran and WON against "THE MACHINE". There was very little talk of this. Here and there you would hear about this ground breaking accomplishment. For the last two days on MSM and talk radio, it has all been about this "dream ticket"

I no longer believe she should get this nod. She was thinking of herself and not the party. It was arrogant and stubborn. It was driven from anger and clouded judgement. We must look at this as what would have happened if she had been given the presidency and came apon a decision that angered her and one that she may not get her way with. What would her "clouded judgement" gotten us into? This was a very telling speech that she gave. I have no mercy in my feelings. One must be a good loser as well as a good winner. Of all the things that Barack has gone though in this campaign, he has shown good judgement and an even temper. I trust him with my life. I trust him with my country, and I trust him with my world.

Watching the man I have come to feel is a part of my family, tell the country he was now the nominee of the democratic party, made me feel so much pride. The pride of a nation that by majority looked beyond the color of a mans skin to the what lies beneath the surface. They took a listen to his story and a good look in his eyes. The people may not have liked everything that was said, they may not have liked some of the stories that came out about Barack and some connections he had made in the past. But what they made was a connection, a connection to someone that that was real. Someone who was just trying his best to make some really big changes, someone that had the mentality, enthusiasm and spirit to make things happen.

Barack is calm, cool and collected. I believe that to him there is no choice that is a small one. I think that Barack will never jump to conclusions because I have seen him through-out this campain, take his time, ask the right questions to the right people and deliver an appropriate and correct answer over and over again.

This is a pivitol time in American history. We have made history, we are part of history. Because of Barack Obama the man, we have become a stronger nation already. Many more people are registered to vote than ever before, people are excited about POLITICS, senate and house seats are being won by democrats!

Let us give credit where credit is due. Lets let the campain pick the VP. Lets cover ourselves in the warm light that comes with making history. Lets not worry about things we do not have control over. Lets work together to keep the light shining.

We have millions of people to talk to, we have millions of people to register to vote.

What is your plan for today? This weekend? Next weekend? We only have 22 weeks!

Hillary is Playing the Only Game She Knows

Monty Flinsch — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 07:53:13 EDT

Last night, watching the Hill/Bill show prior to Barack's announcement it dawned on me that Hillary is trapped in a routine that is several decades old. It's the politics of fear and power and coercion. Hillary did not create this reality and she's not to blame for it's persistent presence in our political landscape. She is however responsible for failing to realize that a new era is dawning and that she has missed an opportunity to take the game to the next level.

My guess is that Hillary is about $40M in debt, sees her power base slipping away and is afraid of becoming irrelevant. Reasonable fears, as long as your motivation for being president is personal, but not in any way reasonable if you're truly a servant of the people trying to make a difference. That's why I'm an Obama supporter. The tone is distinctly different, the motivation is different, and I believe the results will be different.

Hillary will clutch at the last straws of possibility until her debt is retired, she gets a leadership post in Barack's campaign, and Bill gets the respect she thinks he deserves. We must bow to the Clinton dynasty. I will certainly bow to them, as a gesture of respect as they gracefully step back and let a true leader show them how the game is played in the new era. If Hillary demands and gets the VP slot, I will probably step back a bit. It's probably a political necessity, but this campaign has been about hope, not compromise to the powers that be. Let's hope Hillary wakes up today and has a revelation, I certainly have.

Obama in 2008 - Hope Conquers Fear

How Barack Obama helped me become a democrat.

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 12:54:18 EDT

Many of you may know me from the blogs. Lately I have been absent. Mostly because the atmosphere had become negative, but lately just because I love to be outside and the children have also had many things going on at the end of the school year. (Plus my house is a wreck now that I am looking at it and not the computer or TV! I had to clean it up! lol)

I started out over a year ago as just another carbon producing, world populating, world polluting human. I did not belong to any particular "party" let alone to any type of organization that was taking a view, stance or opinion on anything besides the normal things that parents do for their children in school..Band boosters, sports boosters ect.

Like most of the world Baracks candidacy was as surprising to me as it was to the world. When I heard Barack speak, he was speaking TO me not AT me. I realized that I had missed out on so many things in my life, chances to speak up and speak out. I missed the point so many times that I had that right to speak out. No one made me feel like I was important to the my local government let alone the US government. This one man, Sen. Barack Obama was letting me know that I was important. His life a testament to real change and hope. I know those words get used a lot in all sorts of circles. But they are the things that we need right now.

We need change in a real and decisive way. We need hope to get us there. Barack Obama will give us the tools we need, but we have to step up and take them AND use them. The real world is not a sweet and lovely place. There are people crying, starving, hurting, killing and dying all around us. We can not sit back and ignore this because it is not in most of our backyards. If we do that for much longer it will be in our back yards and it will be much harder to get ourselves right again.

Barack Obama has brought out in me the person I should have always been. Maybe you say, that if I had been active all along I would not have been drawn to such a candidate, that I would have gone right to Sen. Clinton. I think that in my heart I know for a fact that Sen. Clinton has done a lot of good for this country and during this campaign I have tried to stay mercilessly positive about her and her husband. I was not aware of the many things they had done because I was not paying attention. They did not want me to pay attention because there were also a lot of things they did that hurt the country. I think that they really did try in their time to do what they thought was right. I know that Barack will make mistakes too. I think that he will own up to them and not try to hide them. I think that he will fix the problem and not sweep it under the rug or try to blame someone else. That is the difference between the two candidates to me.

Barack Obama as asked me to do something. To be responsible for my own change and my own hope. Because if we take the responsibility of ourselves and pass it on to others the world will begin to make real changes. We have waited to long for our president and congress to do it for us. We have to be the ones standing up, we must stand up with our new president and let the world know that America is back. We are a democratic nation of hope mongers and change agents. We have always been, but sometimes it was being beaten out of us by the fear mongering they we were sold.

We have a real chance this time. There can be a landslide victory for Sen. Obama in the fall. We just have to get the people to the polls. We have to continue the excitement and the hope mongering. We have to continue to believe that we as Americans are better than what the world sees us as right now.

John Mcain is really just George W. Bush in older and stiffer clothing. He tends to fly off the handle when questioned and has changed his mind on so many things since 2001 that it is incredible for anyone to think that Barack Obama could not win against him in the fall. We must be diligent in our knowledge and in our persistence to make sure things are done right during the general election right up to the voting booths and counters. We need to volunteer to be a part of the process, we need to get in there and make sure our votes are counted. We will not be denied the White House because we had something better to do that day than make sure everyone that wants to vote, gets to vote. Take the day off work, sit at your local voting station. Get your friends to come. If you are not outspoken enough, find someone who is. We must STAND UP. Stand up and not be held down. We are the people! I can not say that enough. It is in our hands, win or lose it is in our hands.

So yes, Barack Obama took a woman who had no way of knowing what the political world meant and made me look it up, become involved and yes, save the world. I am a democrat, I am a proud democrat.

Thank You Sen. Barack Obama. I was almost lost to the world. You helped save me. And for this I am eternally greatful. I will repay you with my help in securing you the highest office in the land. President Barack Obama.

Now doesn't that sound great?

Laura

Laura

We are the bridge.

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:24:41 EDT

I know I am gonna get jumped on but here it is.

I really think that Hillary Clinton really really thinks that she is the best. I do not think that she holds any real contempt for Barack except for the fact that he is young, exciting and is winning right now.
She believes that she has the knowlege, connections and experience to get the job done. She believes that out of all the people that were running for president, she really is the one who can get things done.
I used to believe that she hated Barack. But I think this does not come from contempt, but just from the fact that she feels in her heart that she has worked for this most of her life. And she has.
She and Bill can not understand why others just cant see that, and it makes them mad. They only know how to fight this fight politically and the people they are trying to reach out to are not politicians so thier arguement falls flat. Barack is talking to a new audience, one that is immune to the political process and really is new to it all together for the most part. Barack has a hard time getting his arguement to stick with those who are politial because they can not and do no want to believe that someone can change things and that Hillary is the one who knows the ropes and is the best bet.

These two groups of people have a large divide and somehow we have to get a bridge there. Hillary and Barack can not do it. We have to. We have to be the bridge. We need to stop the divide and stop harping on one another.

If anyone can bring this together is it us. And it only can be WE THE PEOPLE.

Rochester Faith Community For Obama Group Blog

Rochester Faith Community For Obama — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 03:14:06 EDT

WELCOME TO THE ROCHESTER FAITH COMMUNITY FOR OBAMA (RFCFO) BLOG.

                                                   United Churches For Faith - Action - Change Ministry-In-Government: Reconciling Faith With Politics
City-Wide Inter-Faith Community Prayer For Obama
& Inspirational Call-To-Political Action Rally
     *** VOTE-FOR-CHANGE ***
   --- RFCFO Group Voter Registration
        Forms Available At This Event ---

Monday, May 12, 2008

6:30PM

Host Church: Memorial AME Zion Church ***** Host Pastor: Dr. Kenneth Q. James

549 Clarissa Street

Rochester, New York

Get Ready - Get Ready - Get Ready

Make sure you are registered and ready to cast your vote this November !!

RFCFO GROUP CO-CHAIRS:

Bishop Ronald J. Hoston (585) 546-6067 Jurisdictional Prelate, New York Central Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Pastor, Greater Bethesda COGIC, 120 St. Bridgets Drive, Rochester, NY 14605

Bishop Jeffrey L. Melvin (585) 527-8135 Jurisdictional Prelate Rwanda, East Africa Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Pastor, Power House Kingdom Cathedral COGIC, 48 Clifton Street, Rochester, NY 14608

TO CONFIRM YOUR ATTENDANCE, PLEASE SIGN-IN ON THE RFCFO EVENTS PAGE:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/myevents

RFCFO Group Liaison/Events -Blog - Fundraising Administrator:

Rev. Gwendolyn Dorsey (585) 733-7506 Group E-Mail: RFCFO@Rochester.rr.com

RFCFO Group Coordinators:

Pamela Monroe (585) 527-8135

Rev. Wanda Wilson (585) 957-6827

"YES WE CAN" ***** ROCHESTER FAITH COMMUNITY FOR OBAMA (RFCFO) ***** MINISTRY IN GOVERNMENT ***** RECONCILING FAITH WITH POLITICS ***** "UNITED CHURCHES FOR FAITH - ACTION - CHANGE" *****

Our RFCFO Group "officially" endorsed Senator Barack Obama For President at our OBAMA ENDORSEMENT NEWS CONFERENCE on March 31, 2008. ***** PERSONAL QUOTES FROM RFCFO CO-CHAIRS AND GROUP LIAISON/ADMINISTRATOR ***** "All of us collectively serve a constituency that Senator Barack Obama has touched with his plan for this country. We all are engaged with them in the challenges that Americans face including health care, jobs, economic justice, education, social justice. and other crucial issues. We believe that Barack Obama brings some resolve to these issues. We also believe that Barack Obama has the insight, the tools, the desire and the ability to include the traditionally excluded without excluding the traditionally included. We believe that he is the best person to bring this country together." (Bishop Ronald J. Hoston, Co-Chair RFCFO) ********************** "Senator Obama stands out as the best candidate for President, most importantly for his own personal faith beliefs. We support Barack Obama's proposed policies that address the important concerns that are on the minds and in the hearts of American citizens and we support the ideals of his "Movement For Change" in America. We are calling on the Rochester Inter-Faith Community to pray fervently for Senator Obama's continued Divine Protection, Inspiration and Direction." (Bishop Jeffrey L. Melvin, Co-Chair RFCFO) ************************ Barack Obama's "Message of Hope" aligns with Romans 9:24-25/KJV: "For we are saved by hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man (woman) seeth, why doth he (she) yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it." I wholeheartedly believe that GOD has empowered and anointed Barack Obama to serve HIS people at such a time as this, to serve as a powerful and much needed "change-agent" to transform America. Like so many Obama Supporters, I stand excited, ready, willing and able to work closely with the Co-Chairs of our Rochester Faith Community For Obama Group and with those Faith Partners who will join with us to do the hard work ahead that is crucial to help Barack not only win the Democratic nomination, but also the 2008 Office of President of our United States of America. (Rev. Gwendolyn Dorsey) ***************************** As the Faith-Believing Organizers of the RFCFO Group, we believe in the key core values professed by Barack Obama with regard to faith, appreciation of diverse cultures and respect for diverse religions. Like Barack, we too believe in "FAITH AS A SOURCE OF ACTION FOR JUSTICE", and we also believe in the "summmoning of a Higher Truth to inspire what seems impossible, moving America to embrace a common destiny." Like Barack, we too are grounded in the conviction that "we should never forget that GOD granted us the power to reason so that we would do HIS work here on earth". Barack Obama truly understands as we do that "government alone cannot solve all our problems -- we have an individual responsibility to be our brother's keeper and our sister's keepers". Indeed, "each of us, in our own lives, will have to accept responsibility for instilling an ethic of achievement in our children, for adapting to a more competitive economy, for strengthening our communities, and for sharing some measure of sacrifice". (Barack Obama) *****

***** TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY ! *****

ISSUES: EQUALITY, CIVIL RIGHTS, CIVIL LIBERTIES, PEACE, SOCIAL JUSTICE, ECONOMIC FAIRNESS, AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE, EDUCATION, SECURITY, FOREIGN POLICY, PRIVACY, ETHICS, GOOD GOVERNMENT, ELECTORAL REFORM.

MINISTRY IN GOVERNMENT ***** RECONCILING FAITH WITH POLITICS ***** UNITED CHURCHES FOR FAITH - ACTION - CHANGE

HI this is me! just wanted to say HI

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:08:24 EDT

I just got a video camera for my computer, and have had fun listening to myself talk!

Just wanted to make a personal HI! to everyone here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNt3cCVeczA

Who are we?

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 23:35:27 EDT

have you found yourself pondering what happened to you?

I sometimes wonder what happened to the woman who ran her job, her children and life with skill. The woman who watched the local news at night just for the weather. The woman who had absolutly no idea that Iowa voted first. I did not even know that there were primarys and the general election. Why? what? who? where?

How did the television programs like "Morning Joe", "Hardball", "Countdown", "John Stewart"," Steven Colbert" "Dan Abrams" and any other show end up on my TV. I just figured out that FOX was republican, WHAT?! I also found out that Carvel is married to that Mary lady....

I am finding out more and more everyday, and I am totally bitter! I was the American that the Clintons and the republicans dreamed of. I was totally unaware and they were counting on me to just stay in my little world and trust them to "just take care of everything" with thier hedge funds, corperate contracts, dirty money and fake promises.

Why should they tell the truth? no one is payiing any attention. No one wants the truth, it is way to scary. We are just to stupid to handle the truth. We will all get scared and start asking questions.

Then came the skinny black guy with the funny name. I heard him speak. He was different. He is different. I have heard this man get attacked over and over again for telling the truth. This only makes him stronger in Americas eyes. An American president that stands up and tells the truth, what a breath of fresh air.

We have lost over 4000 Americans. LOST. as in not getting back, ever. This is a deep scar on America. A wound that can not be easily healed. Thanks to the republican rule of the last 8 years we can not take time off of work to march in the streets, lord knows we can not afford the gas money to get to D.C!

I want to make pertectly clear that my intention on writing this is out of pure frustration and bitterness. I want to let the world know that I am an average American. I am not a latte drinking, Prius driving, white collar, Birkenstock wearing liberal. I am new to this. I am as I said, the average American. I work full time, I raise children, I own my home, I drive a American car. I have 4 dogs that live outside on my farm. I was raised in California, I have lived in NV, MD, DC, FL, NC, VA and IA. I know who I am. Or at least I think I do.

I know who I used to be. I was a sleep walking through my life. A walking political dream. Now I am considered an "activist" for the entire hospital I work for. WHAT!! everytime someone comes to talk to me, I smile. I think it is funny. Especially when they ask me a question and I have the answer....easily. I spent a day traveling with my boss. We rarely have the time to talk at work. AS soon as I got in the car, she started on the political thing "so" she said "tell me about this race, so like, who is who and what is going on" I let her ask me questions for the entire hour. If I did not know the answer, I passed on the question and let her know that I did not have the answer. I then decided that thank God she was with me asking questions and not someone who was republican, then I was taken back by my thoughts. "I am a liberal" I am influencing people. I need to make sure I am keeping up on this stuff. I need to be right! I now have a responsibilty. It is a huge one. If I misspeak just once, I will lose credibility. I was a little freaked out. I have really gotten myself into it deep.

I am proud of myself and of everyone who has gotten involved in this movement. I am glad to take this on. I will raise my awareness of this process like I have raised my children, to the best of my abilty, with the best of intentions and with the upmost of hope for the future.

Thank you Barack Obama for this opportunity. Thank you fellow bloggers for the encouragement to keep it up. Thank you to my husband and children for putting up with me and listening to me.

Winning More Delegates Month by Month

James (Jamie) J., Mantorville - S.E. MN — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 01:21:52 EDT

Our guy Barack has won more pledged delegates than Hillary in every single month.

He won more in January, February and March. Even without the Texas Caucus he won more in March. Barack has won more Super Delegates voting started in January, month by month or combined.

We all know he has had tough days, but not one month has been a net loss for barack or gain for Hillary.

If the way his campaign is run, financially and as an organization, is a reflection of how he would run the country, he has allready won. If Hillary's opperations, especially her financials, reflect her skills, we would be in big trouble, especially in health care.

Black Box Voting. Have you heard about this?

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 18:17:26 EDT

The video below provides bits of the backstory for our discovery of a potentially devastating method of rigging MAIL IN VOTES, AUDITS and RECOUNTS. Black Box Voting is currently doing proof of concept testing on our "Theory of a crime" and will release details next week on how it's done, so that preventive measures can be put in before November. We'll see how the ballots and the special "optical scan marking pens" being sold by vendors actually perform in our tests. Any information you can provide on the specific paper stock and especially, the paper coatings used by ballot printers will be much appreciated right now.

Information leading up to this discovery came from a frame-by-frame analysis of video, including these:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txoLlfrBENk (pay close attention to the last segment)
and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOESAfrPSKI

We believe it is possible to undetectably alter thousands -- possibly tens of thousands -- of paper ballots, using a technique known as "check washing." This would require applicator bottles (for ballot alteration in a vehicle during transport), paper towels, and in central ballot storage locations, for large quantities, cans of odorless paint thinner, denatured alcohol, or acetone. Our upcoming tests will show if our theory is correct, whether it can be done in a van, how many ballots can be done per hour, whether the special "AccuVote marking pens" sold by LHS Associates and Diebold (Premier) are easier to "wash" for remarking.

These two "ELECTION REALITY TV" videos above are prequels; video of our demo will be released next week. Maybe our theory of a crime won't work. We'll see.

The new video, linked above, shows top-level New Hampshire state officials lying about chain of custody matters. In one particularly bizarre incident, they attempt to hide the fact that ballots are sitting right there in an area of the warehouse (at 5:20 pm) that they have emphasized is "closed" at 4:30 pm. When a citizen catches them on video in the "closed" area, they simply deny that the ballot boxes are ballot boxes!

Earlier, they had staged a bit of public theatre in which they made it a point that "Hoppy" of the Butch and Hoppy ballot transport team, will have trouble going back to get his bag because the area is "closed" at 4:30. But after dark at 5:20, a Connecticut citizen named Walter Reddy caught top state officials and Hoppy on film in the very area that was supposed to be "closed", and the next night at 6:54 pm, a Florida citizen named Jeannie Dean caught them again.

Apparently the state officials did not realize the ballot boxes (empty and otherwise) had been caught on video, and after saying "those are not ballots" they hurriedly turned out the lights! Imagining state-level public officials standing there in the dark would be comical if it didn't represent the rape of our democratic republic.

The same boxes identified as "NOT ballots" are later identified, on camera, as Rockingham County ballot boxes, by the same state official who claimed they weren't ballots the night before. Of course, we knew they were ballot boxes, because we followed the ballot pickup van during Rockingham County pickups!

So what did they do? Open it up and deal with ballot intake and chain of custody in a properly public and transparent fashion?

Nope. The next night, New Hampshire state officials engaged the services of a police dog to obstruct citizens from looking in the window -- aROOH-ROOH-ROOH! (Nice doggy.)

Sarasota citizen Jeannie Dean, teeth chattering in the frigid New Hampshire night, zoomed in with a camera and boosted the sound on her video and once again, caught 'em in the act of secretive ballot delivery in the dark, wandering around in areas already proclaimed "closed after 4:30 pm."

"They" included New Hampshire Deputy Secretary of State David Scanlan, New Hampshire Archives Director Frank Mevers, Archives Records Manager Brian Burford, and of course, "Butch and Hoppy" -- Armand "Butch" Dubois and Peter "Hoppy" Falzone.

A public records request by Black Box Voting for documents pertaining to the assignment of the K-9 unit has elicited "There are no records." We asked for phone bills, New Hampshire officials have said it will take 90 days to find them. We have asked for checks, credit card receipts, etc. for cleaning supplies, paint thinner, smocks, latex gloves, etc. They say it will take 90 days to find them. (Or find which ones to purge? Guys: We have your stuff on video.)

Much of what I've just told you relates to next week's proof of concept testing. What you will see in THESE videos is the backstory that helped us figure out the mechanics of how a massive ballot-tampering operation could be accomplished with just a few key people.

This project, funded and produced by BLACK BOX VOTING, used the concept of a rolling calvary of experienced citizen voting rights leaders. We collaborated on video targets and shared our videotape. Using combined evidence captured by several different citizens were we able to piece together how the New Hampshire primary could have been stolen.

CHAIN OF CUSTODY AND VOTE SUBSTITUTION: Along with voter eligibility fraud tactics and computer tampering, these will be "all the marbles" this November for mail-in votes (Oregon, Washington: nearly 100 percent; California, Arizona: approx 50 percent; Ohio, New Mexico, approx 30 percent.) Chain of custody and vote substitution can defeat any manual spot-check and, as we saw in New Hampshire, can nuke the validity of any recount.

IS THERE ANY WAY TO SECURE ELECTIONS?

YES. Citizen controls! "Get it right on Election Night." This is not about "bipartisan" observers who are political party operatives and hacks. This is about CITIZEN CONTROLS. Because the instruments of government that we have created, and our votes -- our method of exercising control over the government that we have created -- belong to US, not "them" -- not the government, not political parties. US. U.S. We the People.

AND NOW, ABOUT THOSE COMPUTERS...

Following another investigation, requiring months of diligence and plenty of computer and public records experience, JIM MARCH, JOHN BRAKEY, MICHAEL SHELBY: Maricopa County Arizona have produced an in-depth citizen evaluation: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/73271.html

The article above provides the overview for a number of issues discovered in the largest location in Arizona, the most systemic -- national in scope -- being their discovery of an illicit component in the Sequoia voting system. Pay special attention to Appendix A in the full report: http://www.bbvdocs.org/sequoia/Maricopa-County-Elections-Report.pdf

* * * * *

And as for the many locations that still use paperless DREs or fail to audit chain of custody and procedural safeguards, as they say in New York, "fahgeddaboudit." There is no reason whatsoever to trust those elections.

YOUR DONATIONS ARE NEEDED NOW MORE THAN EVER, TO WATCHDOG 2008:

http://www.blackboxvoting.org/donate.html or mail to:
Black Box Voting
330 SW 43rd St Suite K
PMB 547
Renton WA 98057

Black Box Voting is supported entirely by individual citizen donations.

The Speech

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:18:46 EDT

The Speech:

That is what people will say, "The Speech" of the 21st centry was the one that Barack Obama gave on the 18th day of March 2008. The speech was one of truths, a one that opened up the conversations between all races. The speech also opened some wounds, wounds that will heal more completely once the scar tissue is removed and the old and tired tissue is gone. The new fresh wound will take care to heal completely. It is a big wound, it will take time to heal. With proper care it will heal though. There will be a scar there so that we will all remember what happened so that we will not return to that horrible past and repeat our mistakes. We will be able to look apon that area and tell our children and grandchildren about it.

We can cry over things lost, people hurt, hearts broken and the bitterness that may linger in our heart of hearts. But the truth remains. Although Barack did not HAVE to give this speech, he did GIVE it. He gave it to us all. A present. What we choose to do with it is our choice. What are you going to do?

I plan on thinking about what I say, what I do. Tiny little things that I still hold in my mind. I am a white woman. I do not consider myself racist. If I go to a bigger city and pass by a group of black men, yes, I too feel a bit of fear. Why? because I have watched to much TV, I have been taught to be afraid, I have lingering thoughts. I wonder now, how would I feel if everytime a woman walked past me and a group of friends she grabbed her purse and looked away and walked a little faster. I would wonder why? What have I done? Imagine a lifetime of this treatment. I would begin to resent those type of people. Next time, I must look up and look at each one in the face. It will be hard, I will be learning.

This is a great time in this country. That this man would take the great leap of faith in the American people. He has nothing to gain from this except the knowledge that maybe someone learned something today.

I did Barack, I did. I let your words get to my heart, my soul. I sat and cried, I prayed that everyone in the world could hear your words. I wanted a healed America NOW! I must be patient. I must do what I must do to get you to the White House.

Please let this be done!

Hillarys tax problem (From Huffington Post)

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 14:47:55 EDT

Arianna Huffington

On Clinton's Tax Returns, a "Frankly Disturbing" Lack of Transparency, and Surrogate-ancholy

Posted March 17, 2008 | 12:33 PM (EST)

It's hard out there for a surrogate. Especially for a Clinton surrogate being asked why Hillary Clinton has not released the last eight years of her tax returns.

...

There are 20 years worth of returns that have been released. What's missing are the last 8 years -- years in which Bill Clinton has been making money hand over fist, and involving himself in all kinds of interesting financial deals (see Ron Burkle, Yucaipa, and the ruler of Dubai).

Lowry then quickly pivoted away from tax returns (clearly the 20 year line, as lame as it is, was the only arrow in her quiver) to make points about earmarks and the terrific work Bill Clinton's foundation has done on HIV/AIDS in Africa -- neither of which Russert had asked her about or have anything to do with tax returns.

...

While Clinton has been tossing verbal bouquets to McCain and attacking Obama for not being "vetted," Obama has been living up to his promises about making government more transparent. Not only did he release his latest tax returns in April 2007, he also just made public his list of earmarks, and sat down at the end of last week with the Chicago Tribune and Sun Times to answer all their questions about Tony Rezko.

...

to ask what her policy as president would be regarding the transparency of huge donations from foreign interests to her husband's charitable fund (see the $31.3 million donation and additional $100 pledge to Bill Clinton's foundation after he helped a Canadian mining mogul secure a massive uranium deal with Kazakhstan)?

...

In short, it's well past time for Hillary Clinton to be as "vetted" as she claims to already be -- and to have this vetting done now by Democratic voters rather than later by GOP hit squads. She needs to live up to the standard she laid out for Rick Lazio, the opponent in her 2000 Senate race. At that time, she said it was "frankly disturbing" that Lazio was holding back on releasing his tax returns.

What a difference eight years -- and tens of millions of dollars (some of them from questionable deals) -- can make.

Fla and MI options distract from the OBAMA Message

James (Jamie) J., Mantorville - S.E. MN — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 15:54:43 EDT

TRADE OFF: MI RE-VOTE AS CAUCUS STATE FOR 1/2 DELEGATES, FL SEATES ONLY 1/2 DELEGATES!

I think Florida should be seated at 1/2 it's value, as unfair as that is. All names were on the ballots. Barack should have figured the Clintons would not play nice. But at 1/2 value he could take the reduced under 30 deligate hit - especially if he were able to get Michigan to re-vote as a caucus state (at half value penalty) where he was not even on the ballot, allowing him to win or break even on the whole deal and more importantly, get back to his message!

Some other variations might allow all alternates from Florida to be assigned/approved by Barack as an inticement! Kerry must be seething after all the clinton flip-flops on this and the media buy-in. I know this isn't fair. I think it will help stop the Clintons and Republicans from steeling the message.

(reposted from my Friend Annie) addresses, phone numbers and emails to most of MSM!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 20:05:23 EST

Sender: annie

Subject: next
Received: 3/5/08 3:17PM

Okay. We will continue.

Barack Obama said last night in his speech...

Well we are here tonight to say that this is not the America we believe in and this is not the future we want. We want a new course for this country. We want new leadership in Washington. We want change in America.

John McCain and Senator Clinton echo each other in dismissing this call for change. They say it is eloquent but empty; speeches and not solutions. And yet, they should know that it's a call that did not begin with my words. It began with words that were spoken on the floors of factories in Ohio and across the deep plains of Texas; words that came from classrooms in South Carolina and living rooms in the state of Iowa; from first-time voters and life-long cynics; from Democrats and Republicans alike.

If I am the nominee of this party, I will not allow us to be distracted by the same politics that seeks to divide us with false charges and meaningless labels. In this campaign, we will not stand for the politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon.

I owe what I am to this country I love, and I will never forget it. Where else could a young man who grew up herding goats in Kenya get the chance to fulfill his dream of a college education? Where else could he marry a white girl from Kansas whose parents survived war and depression to find opportunity out west? Where else could they have a child who would one day have the chance to run for the highest office in the greatest nation the world has ever known? Where else, but in the United States of America?

Hope. Progress. Barack Obama.

The time is now.

Please get involved.

Back Obama up with knowing where he stands on the issues. http://www.barackobama.com/

Please call five intelligent people and ask them to get involved.

Ask each of them to call 5 people.

Donate (No donation is too small) - http://my.barackobama.com/p...

Go to the Library of Congress and look at what bills Obama has introduced, written and or co-sponsored. http://thomas.loc.gov/

Write mainstream media about their presentation of the facts (below is a list)

Contact Howard Dean and say no to changing the signed agreement on Florida and Michigan & to not allowing this vote be decided by "Superdelegates" - http://www.democrats.org/co...

Encourage endorsements of unions, congressman, governors, and public officials.

I do hope you'll all get involved - even if it is donating $5.00 or contacting Main Stream Media or forwarding this email.

I know it takes effort. But anything worth having is worth fighting for - in a dignified way.

This is from a blog. Hopefully the info is correct.

"If you want to be heard, and I mean REALLY heard, you must bombard the main stream media with your notes of disgust about them handing the day to HRC yesterday by allowing her negativity and false rumors to dominate the news cycle. If we make can make 1.5 million calls, I bet we can send 1 million e-mails too!

Contacts are as follows:

ABC News

77 W. 66 St., New York, NY 10023

Phone: 212-456-7777

General e-mail: netaudr@abc.com

Nightline: nightline@abcnews.com

20/20: 2020@abc.com

CBS News

524 W. 57 St., New York, NY 10019

Phone: 212-975-4321

Fax: 212-975-1893

Email forms for all CBS news programs

CBS Evening News: evening@cbsnews.com

The Early Show: earlyshow@cbs.com

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I understand it is difficult to remain positive in light of the recent attacks this campaign has seen from Clinton. I too woke up this morning unhappy with the results but after some orange juice, cereal, and some news I am reluctant to call for a change in battle strategy in this campaign.

Being positive, honorable and dignified is always harder to do - it is always harder to embrace your opponent knowing that she is going to turn around and try and cut you down.

It is more expensive to maintain the moral high ground in elections because some people like hearing Gloria Steinem belittle John McCain's struggles as a POW.

Some people like seeing a big-mouth challenge the front-runner and then they forget all about that challenge when the time came to talk openly and debate.

Some people like half-answers and machiavellian innuendo when talking about a man of devout Christian faith.

Some people like taking patriotic, open and honest dialogue and twisting it into something un-American, grotesque and demeaning. Some people like it even more when they can target a black woman of the caliber of Michelle Obama - slander her in anyway they choose - and then simply write it off as politics as usual.

Some people like seeing the smallest hint of impropriety being blown up and used to smear a honorable and noble man.

Some people like mocking statesmen.

Some people like tearing down heroes.

Not THIS hero. Not THIS time.

I would urge all of Obama's supporters, official and non-official, to resist the temptation to go negative in this primary election. That is the Clinton way. That is the Bush way.

That is not the Obama way."

Disinformation

Ben — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:18:49 EST

To my fellow supporters of presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama,

The spin machine, the "Black Ops" unit of the opposition, be it Hillary Clinton, John McCain, or unsupervised surrogates, are attacking with more and more malicious disinformation and rhetoric. It was reported somewhere that Obama said he had no intention of altering NAFTA agreements although eh would speak out against it publicly. Please view the article about the comments allegedly to the Canadian Embassy (The Canadian Embassy has denied any such contact was made). Non the less the attack machine of the opposition seized on the discredited information as spreadit as if it were actual. John McCain himself actually spoke of the discreditied information. This is clearly a chapter from the KGB or other organizations which spred disinformation.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=4360446&page=1

That such tactics are, unfortunately inevitable is well known in the hidious world of Washington politics. That is one of the motivations for our support of Obama. These kinds of things undermind the social fabric of our country and let others see, or believe that we, as American people are deceitful and venomous.

Let us be ever vigilant and monitor and report any such disinformation and negative attacks so as to respond as quickly and informatively as possible.

Please pass this on to other groups and supporters. Thank you all.

A concerned supporter

Obama's got ground game

Ben — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 02:05:56 EST

AUSTIN, Texas -- Walk into Barack Obama's Texas headquarters down the street from the state Capitol, and you're immediately reminded of the complicated rules of the weird primary/caucus hybrid coming up here next week. "Ask us about the Texas Two-Step," says a huge sign painted to look like the state flag, with a giant Obama smiling down from the blue stripe on the left. Running phone banks, volunteers remind early voters to save the receipt showing they've already cast a ballot if they want to caucus on March 4 after the polls in the primary close. (Texas Democratic Party rules allow for participation in both.) Obama's staff here calls preparation for the Texas election "the Olympics" of field organizing, but they seem more than ready for it.

The emphasis on organizing -- which has helped the campaign harness enthusiasm about Obama and propel a nationwide political movement -- has been one of the keys to Obama's success so far. Beginning with the 23 caucuses and primaries on Feb. 5, Obama has steadily built a delegate lead by simply playing to win just about everywhere the calendar took the campaign. Hillary Clinton's wins have been blunted by Democratic Party rules that award delegates proportionately -- and Obama racked up blowout wins in states where Clinton never gave him a serious run.

Obama's winning streak left Clinton aides floating a line of spin that has flown about as well as the Hindenburg: "Well, of course he won there -- he tried to." Now, grass-roots organizing could wind up being the deciding factor in the campaign, unless Clinton surprises and pulls out big wins in Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island and Vermont next Tuesday.

From the start, Obama's campaign devoted more resources to field work in far more states than Clinton's did. One of the first advisors to sign up with Obama was deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand, one of the Democratic Party's top grass-roots organizers. Obama won the Iowa caucuses in part by drawing out new voters who hadn't shown up in previous elections. His campaign built subsequent wins in similar fashion in states that followed. Months before Super Tuesday, Obama had paid staffers operating in every state -- including nine employees working out of four offices in North Dakota, where a Democrat hasn't won the general election since 1964.

In the Super Tuesday states, by primary day, Obama had more than 500 paid campaign employees working on the ground. He even had two staffers in Alaska; Obama won the state's caucus 75 to 25, taking nine of the 13 delegates up for grabs. The Obama ground game rolled on. Throughout February, it deployed across Midwestern states -- some of which rarely vote Democratic in the fall -- with staff (18 in Kansas alone) and reaped big victories.

The day after Obama won the South Carolina primary by a bigger than expected margin, South Carolina field organizers headed to Virginia, Maryland and D.C., which voted Feb. 12. Clinton's strategy, meanwhile, was pegged to wins in big states on Feb. 5. But she was so unprepared for what came next that a week later, she lost Virginia -- where Clinton's national campaign is headquartered -- by 29 points. That loss said it all: Polls in January had her up big there.

Considering Obama's background as a neighborhood organizer in Chicago, his campaign's focus on the ground game isn't surprising. "The value [placed on] community organizing comes from the top down," said Buffy Wicks, the deputy field director in Texas, referring to her employer's paradigm. "For us, it's people talking to their neighbors; that's the premise of our program."

Indeed, the strategy is built on frequent, personal contact with voters. In the first few weeks working in Texas, for example, supporters called more than 15,000 voters. "We don't want people to get all stressed out about worrying about Social Security policy section 8.47," Wicks said. "We want them to say, 'This is why I'm concerned about this issue, because of my own experience,' and we really try to foster that with our activists," she said. "We believe politics is personal, and the things that happen to you in your life shape your views." At a session in Austin for precinct captains last week, organizers told more than 20 volunteers to tell voters why they like Obama: "Remember, it's not kumbaya-ish, it's really powerful."

In Texas, Obama is relying on a network of precinct captains that has been growing daily. The campaign trained more than 4,000 of them (Texas has about 8,300 precincts) in statewide sessions last week that sometimes drew overflow crowds. The campaign is also shrewdly leveraging technology: Its 29-page info packet takes volunteers through the Texas Obama Precinct Captains Web site, which the campaign set up to give activists direct access to a massive database on voters. They can print out address lists that help them walk their neighborhood looking for Obama voters, or read from scripts while doing outreach by telephone from home. Whatever they find then gets uploaded to the Obama database through their own computers, which frees up field staffers who, in previous campaigns, might have spent hours typing in the same information. "The campaign should be there as a space to invite people to become involved in it, as opposed to giving people busywork," Wicks said.

At Obama rallies with overflow crowds, the campaign collects e-mail addresses and invites people to join the precinct captain network. All the online tools also tell volunteers how to quickly get in touch with organizers offline, and they let the campaign keep track of what its activists are up to without having to check in on them constantly. By the time aides opened their 10 regional headquarters around Texas last week (which, in turn, will supervise smaller satellite offices), there were already volunteers on the ground working all over the state.

Obama touches the faithful

Ben — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:20:53 EST

There is an Obama art exhibition, an Obama tattoo artist and a blog asking "Is Obama the Messiah?"

"Obamamania" is sweeping the United States and it is reaching fever pitch in Texas. The turbo-charged atmosphere at Barack Obama's rallies is part pop-festival and part revivalist meeting.

Before he made his entrance in Dallas last week, hundreds in the crowd of 17,000 were on their feet.

After he was introduced, the candidate, as always, waited before entering, allowing the din to reach a deafening crescendo.

The cheers and chants of "Yes We Can!" took two minutes to subside before he could speak.

The same rapturous welcome greeted him all week, from Wisconsin to sunny Texas, which holds its primary on March 4.

Senator Obama is dealing with the frustrations of the Bush years by making people feel better about themselves.

The country has seen nothing like it for a generation. Veteran MSNBC presenter Chris Matthews said recently: "I've been following politics since I was about five. I've never seen anything like this. This is bigger than Kennedy. Obama comes along and he seems to have the answers. This is New Testament."

At a rally in Houston, fan Janice Ware said: "He spoke to my heart. This isn't politics, this is a movement."

Superdelegates Are Flocking to Obama

Ben — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:18:51 EST

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Democratic superdelegates are starting to follow the voters — straight to Barack Obama.

In just the past two weeks, more than two dozen of them have climbed aboard his presidential campaign, according to a survey by The Associated Press. At the same time, Hillary Rodham Clinton's are beginning to jump ship, abandoning her for Obama or deciding they now are undecided.

The result: He's narrowing her once-commanding lead among these "superdelegates," the Democratic office holders and party officials who automatically attend the national convention and can vote for whomever they choose.

As Obama has reeled off 11 straight primary victories, some of the superdelegates are having second — or third — thoughts about their public commitments.

Take John Perez, a Californian who first endorsed John Edwards and then backed Clinton. Now, he says, he is undecided.

"Given where the race is at right now, I think it's very important for us to play a role around bringing the party together around the candidate that people have chosen, as opposed to advocating for our own choice," he said in an interview.

Clinton still leads among superdelegates — 241 to 181, according to the AP survey. But her total is down two in the past two weeks, while Obama's is up 25. Since the primaries started, at least three Clinton superdelegates have switched to Obama, including Rep. David Scott of Georgia, who changed his endorsement after Obama won 80 percent of the primary vote in Scott's district. At least two other Clinton backers have switched to undecided.

None of Obama's have publicly strayed, according to the AP tally.

There are nearly 800 Democratic superdelegates, making them an important force in a nomination race as close as this one. Both campaigns are furiously lobbying them.

"Holy buckets!" exclaimed Audra Ostergard of Nebraska. "Michelle Obama and I are playing phone tag."

Billi Gosh, a Vermont superdelegate who backs Clinton, got a phone call from the candidate herself this week.

"As superdelegates, we have the opportunity to change our mind, so she's just connecting with me," Gosh said. "I couldn't believe she was able to fit in calls like that to her incredibly busy schedule."

In Utah, two Clinton superdelegates said they continue to support the New York senator — for now.

"We'll see what happens," said Karen Hale. Likewise, fellow superdelegate Helen Langan said, "We'll see."

Other supporters are more steadfast.

"She's still in the race, isn't she? So I'm still supporting her," said Belinda Biafore, a superdelegate from West Virginia.

Obama has piled up the most victories in primaries and caucuses, giving him the overall lead in delegates, 1,362 to 1,266.5. Clinton's half delegate came from the global primary sponsored by the Democrats Abroad.

It will take 2,025 delegates to secure the nomination at this summer's national convention in Denver. If Clinton and Obama continue to split delegates in elections, neither will reach the mark without support from the superdelegates.

That has the campaigns fighting over the proper role for superdelegates, who can support any candidate they want. Obama argues it would be unfair for them to go against the outcome of the primaries and caucuses.

"I think it is important, given how hard Senator Clinton and I have been working, that these primaries and caucuses count for something," Obama said during Thursday night's debate in Austin, Texas.

Clinton argues that superdelegates should exercise independent judgment.

"These are the rules that are followed, and you know, I think that it will sort itself out," she said during the debate. "We will have a nominee, and we will have a unified Democratic Party, and we will go on to victory in November."

Behind the scenes, things can get sticky.

David Cicilline, the mayor of Providence, R.I., indicated this week that his support for Clinton might be wavering after — he contended — members of her campaign urged him to cave to the demands of a local firefighters union ahead of her weekend appearance there. The firefighters, in a long-running contract dispute with Cicilline, have said they would disrupt any Clinton event the mayor attends. A Clinton spokeswoman said the campaign would never interfere in the mayor's city decisions.

Obama has been helped by recent endorsements from several labor unions, including the Teamsters on Wednesday.

"He's our guy," said Sonny Nardi, an Ohio superdelegate and the president of Teamsters Local 416 in Cleveland.

The Democratic Party has named about 720 of its 795 superdelegates. The remainder will be chosen at state party conventions in the spring. AP reporters have interviewed 95 percent of the named delegates, with the most recent round of interviews taking place this week.

The superdelegates make up about a fifth of the overall delegates. As Democratic senators, both Clinton and Obama are superdelegates.

So is Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory, which is one reason his phone rings often.

He is a black mayor, and Obama has been winning about 90 percent of black votes. His state has a March 4 primary with 141 delegates at stake. The Democratic governor, Ted Strickland, is stumping hard for Clinton — and perhaps a spot on the national ticket.

A phone call from former President Clinton interrupted Mallory's dinner on a recent Saturday.

"I continue to get calls from mayors, congresspeople, governors, urging me one way or another," said Mallory, who is still mulling his decision. "The celebrities will be next. I guess Oprah will call me."

Obama Rolls On In the Texas debate

Ben — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:57:42 EST

By John Dickerson:

How do you stop the progress of a stratospheric object filled with rocket fuel? This was the Navy's task Wednesday and Hillary Clinton's task at Thursday night's debate in Austin, Texas. The Navy hit its mark. Hillary Clinton didn't. She didn't really even take a shot.

Clinton was occasionally aggressive, but not enough to shake up the dynamic that has her nearly tied in polls in the crucial March 4 primary states of Ohio and Texas. Clinton's game plan was to connect with voters, not to tear down Barack Obama. She took pains to show that she understood the concerns of regular folks and that she had plans to address them. She did this well at times, particularly in her final answer of the debate, but Obama turned in one of his strongest performances so far of this campaign. In an even match, the tie goes to the front-runner.

For weeks, Clinton campaign aides have been saying that when voters got a chance to see the two Democratic candidates side by side, it would stop Obama's momentum. Voters would see that Clinton is the more competent and durable candidate. The debates have often helped Clinton. Exit polls after the New Hampshire and Nevada contests asked voters if the debates had been important in helping them determine their vote. Many said yes, and the majority of those voters went with Clinton.

It's easy to see why Hillary likes debates. They match her natural rhythms the way the theater hall matches Obama's speech and body language. Clinton looks more at ease in the setting where she can knock out facts and offer specific details about her programs, like creating a trade prosecutor to monitor international agreements, or her plan to freeze foreclosures. Her performance in Austin no doubt bucked up her troops by reminding them why they liked her, and it gave anyone sitting on the fence more to think about.

Obama was strong, too, however, and that's a problem for Clinton. She and her campaign aides have been arguing for weeks that Obama is essentially a phony—a mere dispenser of hollow words—and yet he matched her on policy. For the first 45 minutes of the debate, the two were so close on the issues they could have been running mates. When Obama and Clinton got into a spat over their health-care plans, Clinton looked passionate and in command of the facts as she always does, but Obama did, too. Clinton essentially charged that Obama's plan was a fraud born of political cowardice, but Obama came back at her, repeatedly asserting that he merely had a different approach to achieving the same goal of universal coverage. He may or may not be right on the merits, but for the viewing audience, there was nothing in the exchange that suggested he was her junior on the issue.

In the end, the attack on Obama as a substance-free orator may backfire. It lowers the bar for him, so that when he offers detailed plans and speaks of his accomplishments, he sounds commanding. The attack also gives him an opening to take umbrage on behalf of his supporters, one of the easiest and most effective political postures to take. Obama flamboyantly exploited this opportunity. Noting that Clinton lately had been urging voters to turn from him by saying, "Let's get real," Obama said, "The implication is that the people who've been voting for me or are involved in my campaign are somehow delusional."

Clinton was the only one who had a bad moment. As she pressed her campaign's overheated charges about Obama's plagiarism, she tried to turn one of his phrases against him. "It's not change you can believe in," she said, "it's change you can Xerox." There were groans from the audience in the hall and perhaps across the land. (I think even my kids stirred in their beds.) As prepared quips go, it wasn't clever and had the air of something cooked up by committee. (I asked the campaign if Clinton was the author of the line, but they have not responded. Perhaps no one wants to claim authorship for the clunker.) The plagiarism debate is silly—politicians borrow (particularly from their supporters), and Obama's sin wasn't egregious. By insisting on the point, Clinton looked small.

At the end of the debate, moderator Campbell Brown asked both candidates when they had been tested in their lives. This was a different question than the one about experience we've been discussing throughout this campaign. It sought to look into the background of each candidate for a crucible that may have seasoned them for the string of crises they'll face as president and find the moment they'll draw on for guidance and strength when they're in the Situation Room. John McCain has had several such moments in his life, and he is certain to raise the issue of testing repeatedly and relentlessly against either Obama or Clinton.

Obama didn't give much of an answer perhaps, because he may have no single moment. He talked about his troubled time as a young man and then mentioned his period as a community organizer. It wasn't a very nourishing answer. Clinton said, "I think everyone knows I've lived through some crisis and challenges in my life" and was immediately applauded. Her husband's infidelity is so close to the surface, she need only flick at it to access the warm feelings people still have about her endurance. It wasn't much of an answer to the question, but Clinton then pivoted to talk about the tests the American people have to face and the suffering she has seen on the campaign trail. The answer may have been her best of the night—it showed her heart and a little humanity—which is why her campaign rushed a YouTube clip of it to supporters. It also won her the dubious achievement of being the night's best plagiarist. Clinton's answer contained a passage that matched one of John Edwards' well-known riffs and another that matched one of her husband's.

as his campaign smells victory....

Ben — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:55:21 EST

The morning after his landslide victories over Hillary Clinton in Wisconsin and Hawaii this week, Barack Obama’s campaign jet touched down at Love Field airport in Dallas, Texas, on time at 11.15am, and pulled to within 10ft of a waiting mo-torcade.

Inside the plane’s business section, the Illinois senator – sniffing with a heavy head cold – donned his dark suit jacket, checked his BlackBerry for the final time and prepared to descend the front steps. A Secret Service detail of six muscular agents, handguns on their left hips, radio transmitters in chest holsters, earpieces activated, exited on to the warm tarmac before him.

With a door held open, he ducked into a black Chevrolet Suburban, alongside his “bodyman” Reggie Love, 25, the former Duke University football star who is responsible for everything from fielding the candidate’s calls to keeping his bags in order. As they do every day, at 8am the two had spent an hour in a hotel gym – this time the Hyatt Regency in Austin – running and lifting weights.

Four police motorcycle outriders revved their engines, sirens began wailing and, with lights flashing, they began moving swiftly across the tarmac. In front of Mr Obama’s car was a giant white police station wagon; behind it a vehicle containing four Secret Servicemen, sunglasses on, windows open. Dallas police, who 45 years ago escorted a young, white, charismatic Democratic president from Love Field to his death in Dealey Plaza, had this Wednesday morning shut down the entire five-lane Interstate 35 highway for the half-hour journey to the Reunion Arena, a former sports stadium.

As the motorcade cruised at 50mph through traffic lights and past waiting cars, onlookers cheered and took pictures. Children lined up in playgrounds to wave; pedestrians held up “Texas Loves Obama” signs as the man trying to become America’s first black commander-in-chief sped by.

Mr Obama was driven into the bowels of the stadium and ushered into a back room, where he looked over an addition to his stump speech that he was about to deliver: a rebuttal of Mrs Clinton’s claim that morning that he was untested and unready to be president. From the arena above him came a familiar sound: the euphoric roars and screams of his waiting audience, this day a vast, largely African-American crowd of 19,000.

Men and women were dancing and clapping to Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, blaring from giant speakers. Thousands were waving signs: “Dallas 4 Obama”; “Latinos 4 Obama”; “Obama: Hope, Vision, Change”; even “Librarians For Obama”. Women wore T-shirts with pictures of John F Kennedy, Mr Obama and Martin Luther King, emblazoned with “The Dream Comes True”.

Mary Tyszko, a white, 50-year-old health worker, clutched her hands. “He has given me hope. I really believe in him. And I just trust him.” Then Mr Obama took to the stage. The noise was deafening, a long, exultant roar with all the force and overwhelming power of a jet engine before take-off. “Obama! Obama! Obama! Obamaaaaaaaaa!” they chanted. From four giant screens hanging from the ceiling, Mr Obama’s image could be seen from the farthest reaches of the stadium, waving, clapping at this adoring crowd, as they stared up at him with an almost mesmeric fervour. At one point in his speech, delivered in the religious cadence of Dr King, Mr Obama had to blow his nose. “Obama!” they chanted and clapped again, as their idol wiped his face.

This is a daily ritual for Mr Obama. Only 24 hours earlier, he appeared in a Mexican-American enclave of western San Antonio and drew a crowd as big as that which greeted Pope John Paul II when he visited the same area in September 1987. Three, sometimes four times a day, his Secret Service detail surrounding him, he is greeted by massive crowds, never before seen during a presidential primary campaign, filled with young and old, black and white, men and women, steelworkers and fund managers, nurses and accountants. No wonder he believes the White House is now within his reach.

And yet the growing belief that he could become the next president, after ten straight wins over Mrs Clinton since Super Tuesday, the ever-greater crowds, the zealous intensity Mr Obama provokes as he fills arenas with his message of change and empowerment, has begun to fuel a nascent but competing narrative in recent days: that there is something cultish, disturbing, and faintly Messianic about this political movement.

Critics say his rallies are more like religious revivals, that voters are being deluded into following this freshman senator with dazzling oratorical gifts and the power to sell hope without asking if he is remotely ready to be president. It is the beginning of a backlash actively encouraged by the former First Lady’s aides, dismayed by a phenomenon threatening to destroy what only four months ago looked like an inevitable Clinton restoration.

“Obamaphilia has gotten creepy,” said the Los Angeles Times columnist Joel Stein; Joe Klein of Time wrote: “There was something just a wee bit creepy about the mass Messianism”; Paul Krugman, a liberal columnist in The New York Times, complained: “The campaign seems dangerously close to becoming a cult of personality.”

On board Mr Obama’s faintly careworn campaign plane, a charter jet carrying the senator, his Secret Service detail, a press pack that has been travelling with him for months, some with hacking coughs, and often his chief strategist and closest aide David Axelrod, Mr Obama is acutely aware of the danger that Mrs Clinton still poses, and the way her surrogates are trying to turn his extraordinary appeal against him. In the past 48 hours, the former First Lady has been telling audiences that it is time to “get real” about Mr Obama and his rhetoric. She is promising “sound solutions” to “soundbites”. When the lights are off and the speech has been made, she asks: what’s left?

“Senator Clinton of late has said ‘let’s get real’. And the implication is that the people who have been voting for me or involved in my campaign are somehow delusional,” Mr Obama said on Thursday night, “that somehow they’re being duped and that eventually they are going to see the reality of things. Well, I think they perceive the reality of what’s going on in Washing-ton very clearly.”

In their Austin debate on Thursday night, some analysts believed that there was a valedictory note in Mrs Clinton’s voice when she said: “You know, no matter what happens in this contest, I am honoured to be here with Barack Obama. I am absolutely honoured” as she reached over to shake his hand. “You know, whatever happens, we are going to be fine.”

Mr Obama was once wary of the press, but seems willing to engage us more now. On a brief walk to the back of the plane, he shakes hands, address-es reporters by their first names and asks how families are. When I first met him in Iowa last September, he responded to my introduction with his trademark hand on shoulder and a laconic: “Hello, London Times.” He is a man clearly comfortable in his own skin – there is a hint of cockiness – with an easy charm that has been one of the reasons for his success.Mr Obama has always had a high level of self-belief, but his plane – filled with caricatures of the candidate above his slogan “Fired Up! Ready to Go!” (including one in the rear lavatory that includes the instruction “Don’t Miss”) – is a far different place than it was just a few months ago. Few of his junior staff believed then, when Mrs Clinton’s lead looked formidable, that they would still be on board today.

The candidate, fuelled on a diet of grilled chicken, salmon and a love of pistachio nuts, is even carrying himself differently. After his victory in Iowa, he physically changed, walking with his shoulders back and with a swagger that had been missing before.

Unusually, he was granted Secret Service protection a year ago after receiving death threats. A candidate does not normally get such treatment until becoming the nominee. It was a trapping that annoyed John Edwards, his rival, who dropped out of the race in January. Looking presidential can be vital to success.

Mr Obama insists that he remains grounded and is taking nothing for granted. Mrs Clinton’s stunning victory in New Hampshire on January 8, five days after his win in Iowa and against every poll and prediction, was a searing moment for the Illinois senator and his staff. Her aides’ ability to keep a flimsy allegation that he had plagiarised another speech in the media for two days this week was the latest reminder of how capable his rival’s camp is in the art of generating negative publicity.

A travelling aide said: “You would have to be inhuman not to feel great seeing 20,000 people at a rally day after day or winning ten primary contests in a row – but he knows you have to fight every day.

“But if our biggest problem is that we have thousands of people supporting us – we will take that.”

Hoffa Statement On Teamsters Obama Endorsement

Ben — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:51:33 EST

“Senator Obama understands the challenges working people face every day,” Hoffa said. “He is the candidate in the best position to lead our movement to restore the American dream for working people in this country. Senator Obama will fight for better wages, real health care reform, stronger retirement security, fair trade and an end to the outsourcing of good jobs. He understands the importance of giving workers a voice at work and will fight for strong unions to help rebuild America’s middle class.”

Fundraising

Ben — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:47:02 EST

Even though our caucus is over Barack still needs our help. All i'm asking is for you to send an invitation to 5 of your friends or family and ask them to contribute. It only takes a few seconds and you can import contacts right from your email account. If we all chip in just a minute of our lives we can make a stand and show all of the nay-sayers that we are here to stay and this movement won't stop until Barack changes his address to 1600 Pensylvania Ave. Thanks for reading.

All Texas Newspapers Emails- Write some letters!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 09:27:54 EST

I realize the list below is similar to another list just sent to
TexasforObama, but the following list of emails represents EVERY Texas
newspaper which makes itself available to opinion letters via regular
email. Note: College newspapers come at the end. Note also, if you
see on a given line something like x, y@z.com, that means you can
address the email to x@z.com, y@z.com. Third note: Only submit to
emails labelled SPANISH if your email is in SPANISH :)

letter@reporternews.com,
nicole.perez@aliceechonews.com,
rmann@acnpapers.com,
editor@alpineavalanche.com,
alvinsun@swbell.net,
joanne.gosselin@amarillo.com,
sam@basinbroadband.com,
john@mybulletinnewspaper.com,
editor@aransaspassprogress.com,
news2@athensreview.com,
austin@bizjournals.com,
la-voz@sbcglobal.net, --SPANISH
bccourier@sbcglobal.net,
news@banderabulletin.com,
ttaschinger@hearstnp.com,
beepic@sbcglobal.net,
editor@bigspringherald.com,
editor@blancocountynews.com,
blueridgetribune@verizon.net,
news@boernestar.com,
joyce.kepley@fcspecial.com,
editor@borgernewsherald.com,
bsh@centex.net,
editor@breckenridgeamerican.com,
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Some helpfull information to fight allegations about Baracks stance on Jews

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:19:37 EST

As we know, the Internet has become a powerful tool for obtaining information. Unfortunately, it has also become a tool for spreading misinformation and hate. Often this misinformation comes to us from trusted friends, family and colleagues who've fallen victim to the well-worded and convincing prose. When we receive something like this from someone we trust, sometimes we don't take the time and effort to ensure its validity and accuracy. All too quick to react to our greatest fears, we accept at face value, things that really deserve to be viewed with skepticism.

Everyone needs to come to their own opinion as to who will make the best President of the United States. The intent here is not to endorse Senator Obama, but to ensure that the decision to support him or not, is not made based on malicious lies and outright falsehoods. As victims of this type of campaign ourselves, those of us in the Jewish community have a duty to debunk and destroy these smear pieces, and not fall into their trap, regardless of who they're waged against and whether or not we agree with their politics.

In an unprecedented move, Nine Jewish organizational leaders signed on to a letter that spoke out against rumors about Barack Obama. The signatories were the top executives of the United Jewish Communities, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America , the American Jewish Committee, the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Congress, the National Council of Jewish Women, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. From that letter, "These tactics attempt to drive a wedge between our community and a presidential candidate based on despicable and false attacks and innuendo based on religion. We reject these efforts to manipulate members of our community into supporting or opposing candidates."

They were joined by seven Jewish United States Senators who wrote a letter of their own. "Over the past several weeks, many in the Jewish community have received hateful emails that use falsehood and innuendo about Senator Barack Obama's religion and attack him personally. As Jewish United States Senators who have not endorsed a candidate for the Democratic nomination, we condemn these scurrilous attacks. We find it particularly abhorrent that these attacks are apparently being sent specifically to the Jewish Community. Jews, who have historically been the target of such attacks, should be the first to reject these tactics."

For the full text and names of signatories to both letters, see here: http://www.pjvoice.com/v32/32101obama.aspx

Please also see, "Behind the letter on Obama: Why the Jews entered the fray" on the website of the JTA, http://jta.org/cgi-bin/iowa/news/article/20080122obamaletter20080118.html

Barack Obama is PRO-Israel. From his website: Barack Obama strongly supports the U.S.-Israel relationship, a mutually beneficial bond strengthened by common values, histories, and dedication to democracy. Obama believes that our first and incontrovertible commitment in the Middle East must be to the security of Israel, America’s strongest ally in the Middle East. "Our job is to renew the United States' efforts to help Israel achieve peace with its neighbors while remaining vigilant against those who do not share this vision. . . That effort begins with a clear and strong commitment to the security of Israel: our strongest ally in the region and its only established democracy. That will always be my starting point."

For Senator Obama's position on Israel and his plans for helping Israel attain peace inside her borders, see here: http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/IsraelFactSheet.pdf

From an article published in the Jewish Journal, Mel Levine, a former Member of Congress from California and a former member of the board of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee writes: "As a state legislator, a Congressman, and a private citizen, I have been politically active in Jewish causes, including pro-Israel causes, for over forty years, and have observed many presidential candidates. But Barack Obama is the first to so thoroughly capture the imagination of Jewish Americans. . . Obama's vision of unity makes him a natural ally to the Jewish community. Likewise, he has been a strong ally to Israel. . . In his speeches and public statements, his legislation and his voting record, he has proven himself to be a stalwart friend of Israel, committed to helping Israel in its search for peace with its neighbors, while standing strong with Israel against those who do not share this vision."

Read the entire article here: http://www.jewishjournal.com/home/preview.php?id=18832

You can also read the complete text of his March 2007 speech to AIPAC, at this link: http://obama.senate.gov/speech/070302-aipac_policy_fo/

Barack Obama rebuffs George Soros, the billionaire Democratic contributor who called for the U.S. to pressure Israel to negotiate with Hamas, even without recognition of Israel's right to exist. From an article published in the New York Sun, "Yesterday, Mr. Obama's presidential campaign issued a dissent from the Hungarian-born billionaire's assessment. "Mr. Soros is entitled to his opinions," a campaign spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said. "But on this issue he and Senator Obama disagree. The U.S. and our allies are right to insist that Hamas - a terrorist organization dedicated to Israel's destruction - meet very basic conditions before being treated as a legitimate actor."

. . .Rep. Robert Wexler, a Democrat of Florida who sent out an e-mail to Jewish supporters in his home state last week vouching for Mr. Obama's pro-Israel bona fides, said he too rejected Mr. Soros's comments. "Senator Obama says until the Palestinian government fulfills all three of the quartet requirements, the United States should not and would not recognize the Palestinian government. Senator Obama is clear, Mr. Soros appears to have a different position," Mr. Wexler said.

See the full article here: http://www.nysun.com/article/50846

Barack Obama decries anti-Semitism. In an speech at Ebenezer Baptist Church on the eve of Martin Luther King Day, Barack Obama excoriated anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry. "We have scorned our gay brothers and sisters instead of embracing them. The scourge of anti-Semitism has, at times, revealed itself in our community. . . Every day, our politics fuels and exploits this kind of division across all races and regions; across gender and party. . . So let us say that on this day of all days, each of us carries with us the task of changing our hearts and minds. . ." The full text can be read here: http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/2008/01/barack_obamas_s.html

Barack Obama denounced Louis Farrakhan, contrary to the opinions of the minister of his church. "I decry racism and anti-Semitism in every form and strongly condemn the anti-Semitic statements made by Minister Farrakhan," Obama said in the statement. "I assume that Trumpet Magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders, but it is not a decision with which I agree." http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/01/15/obama_decries_farrakhan_statem_1.html?hpid=topnews

Barack Obama is a Christian, NOT a Muslim. There's not really a need to expound on this, other than to direct those still not convinced to the Urban Legends Reference Pages, which roundly debunks this myth. http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/muslim.asp

Thank you for helping spread the truth.

"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." -- Anne Frank

"Your voice can change the world" -- Barack Obama http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmUUYo9o9eg

In memory of Congressman Tom Lantos (February 1, 1928 – February 11, 2008), the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, and Democratic Delegate Mitch Van Yahres, whose dying request was for people to make significant contributions to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama, please help Senator Obama by donating through 'Jews for Barack' -- http://my.barackobama.com/page/outreach/view/main/Fernmin

Barack only needs about 53.3% of NM Provisionals to take the state

James (Jamie) J., Mantorville - S.E. MN — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 17:02:14 EST

Barack only needs 53.2531% of NM Provisionals to take the state. There is a big chance that late deciders favored Barack as we have seen from many exit polls and surveys across the country and region. My bet is Barack will pull it out. I just hope we know before Ohio and Texas.

It bugs me when they include popular vote comparisons and don't at least put an astrist next to the Clintons deducting the third of a million she earned from Michigan when their "clerical error" left only them on the ballot. With out those votes both are virtually tied.

Barack wins 8 States by over 60% grabbing extras from 443 delegates

James (Jamie) J., Mantorville - S.E. MN — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:51:37 EST

Barack wins 8 States by over 60% grabbing extras from 443 delegates.

Eight of the Sunami States flew over 60% for for Obama while only one state of Arkensas went for the Clintons. When you exceed 60%, often you get most the marginal deligates that might normally break evenly among both sides. This means Barack will be getting a larger slice of the 443 deligates from those 8 states while Hillary can expect a few extra out of the 35 deligates from Arkansas. WOW. The deeper I look behind the results, the more I can see the Obama campaign staff is miles ahead of the pundits in running a true 50 state plan from the grass roots organizing level. I wouldn't be supprised if they're holding off a few super-delegates to announce at a most strategic time.

Hope Warrior!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 11:34:49 EST

NOW is the only time. How we relate to it creates the future. If we're going to be more cheerful in the future, it's because of our aspiration to be cheerful in the present. The future is the result of what we do right now.

"if we learn to open our hearts, anyone, including the people who drive us crazy, can be our teacher."

"We think the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. The healing comes from letting there be room for it all to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy"

"Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over again to annihilation can that which is indestructible be found in us"

"Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us"

"We work on ourselves in orger to help others, but also we help others in order to work on ourselves"

"The truth you cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new"

"A sign of health is that we don't become undone by fear and trembling, but take it as a message that it's TIME TO STOP STRUGGLING AND LOOK DIRECTLY AT WHAT TREATENS US."

"Rejoicing in ordinary things takes guts. Each time we drop our complaints and allow everyday good fortune to inspire us, we enter the warrior's world"

Lets be totally positive today on this site. Lets fill those who would look on here to get a last look before they go caucus and make up thier mind that we are a good group of people, People they would like to be a part of.

NO POLLS, NO FIGHTING, Let them make fun of us because we are inspired by a MAN NAMED OBAMA. That names do not scare us, that the MSM does not scare us, that being behind in the polls does not sway our support of BARRACK OBAMA.

There are days I have my gut wrentching, and feelings of dispair. But coming here reminds me I AM NOT ALONE! WE ARE RIGHT. I HAVE LOOKED INTO THE FACE OF OUR COMPETITOR, I HAVE SHAKEN HER HAND, I HAVE HEARD HER SPEAK.

I AM NOT AFRAID. I AM AN OBAMA HOPE WARRIOR!

Delegate Explainer

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 20:21:28 EST

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/01/02/delegate.explainer/index.html

Fundraising!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 20:05:27 EST

YES WE CAN ~~ HOPE LIVES!

I became involved with this campaign not knowing how much this experience would touch me so personally. I have been so taken, not only with Barack Obama and his family but the extended family I have found at each and every event I have attended and on this site.

I met my first goal of 1000 dollars with great support from others. As the days passed and the fight got harder, I decided that 1000 dollars was not enough of an effort. I see people donating 5,10,15 or more dollars regularly on this site. I thought to myself. Why not set a BIG goal and make some noise about it! So here I go.

All these politicians have many millions of dollars just "floating" around in space it seems, ready to "fall" into thier laps as needed. I dont need a politican that doesnt need us! We each can have a real say in what happens in this country if we can get this genuine and wonderful man in the White House. We all know how it happens, it is not magic. A lot of us dont like the idea that we have to "give" money, but every candidate is getting donations from all over the place in this country. Sone of them are getting MILLIONS! from low places. I want to be a big piece of the REAL PEOPLE that give for him.

I am asking you to DIG DEEP in those pockets because the real race is just starting. We had two tests and he is ready to go the distance, he is ready if we give him the funds on which he can make it to the END!

I want to hear YES WE CAN! YES WE CAN! YES WE CAN.

SO, go to my page and help me make history!

Primarys- dates and info on early voting and absentee ballots

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:52:22 EST

Overseas, Absentee, and Early Voting Dates

Michigan Primary: Tuesday 15 January 2008
Absentee ballots available Saturday 1 December 2007.

Florida Primary: Tuesday 29 January 2008
Early voting begins on Monday 14 January 2007, 15 days before the primary.
Absentee ballots available Wednesday 26 December 2007.
Reference: Early Voting

Arizona Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Early voting begins 31 January 2008.
Reference: Link

California Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Military and overseas ballots are made available 7 December 2007.
Absentee ballots are made available 7 January 2008.
Reference: Link
Connecticut Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Tuesday 15 January 2008: Absentee ballots become available.
Reference: Link

Illinois Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Thursday 27 December 2007: Absentee ballots become available.

Missouri Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Wednesday 26 December 2007: Absentee ballots become available.

Tennessee Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Early Voting Period: 16 January through 31 January 2008
Reference: Link

Utah Primary: Tuesday 5 February 2008
Early Voting Dates: 22 January thru 1 February 2008
Reference: Link

Louisiana Primary: Saturday 9 February 2008
Early voting begins 28 January 2008 and ends 2 February 2008.
Reference: Link

superdelegate story

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 14:28:44 EST

Superdelegates are delegates to a presidential nominating convention in the United States who are not bound by the decisions of party primaries or caucuses. Superdelegates are elected officeholders and party officials.

Superdelegates were first appointed in the 1970s, after control of the nomination process in the Democratic Party effectively moved out of the hands of party officials into the primary and caucus process. The aim was to accord some say in the process to people who had been playing roles in the party before the election year.

As of the 2008 nominating cycle, the Republican Party does not have superdelegates. It does, however, have 463 unpledged delegates, 123 of whom are Republican National Committee members.[1]

In the Democratic primary phase of the 2004 U.S. Presidential election, Howard Dean acquired an early lead in delegate counts by obtaining the support of a number of superdelegates before even the first primaries were held.

[edit] The Democratic National Convention

The Democratic National Convention, where the Democratic presidential ticket is formally agreed upon, has 796 superdelegates. Superdelegates to the Democratic Convention include all Democratic members of the United States Congress, various additional elected officials, as well as members of the Democratic National Committee.

A candidate needs a simple majority of the combined delegate and superdelegate votes to secure the nomination. Democratic delegates from state caucuses and primaries number 3,253. This means that the total number of votes is 4,049. The total number of delegate votes needed to win the nomination is 2,025. Superdelegates account for approximately one fifth (19.7%) of all votes at the convention. Delegates chosen in the Democratic caucuses and primaries account for about four fifths (80.3%) of the Democratic convention delegates.[2]

[edit] References

This is a good one to follow, it should update regularly:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/scorecard/#D

A caucus experience: Standing with Barack

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 15:47:45 EST

Its 10 AM. I am wandering around my house, checking and double checking my supplies for tonight. Yup, they are still in my BIG purse. NO problems. 12AM I go out to get the brownie mix for this evening, some how I let myself run out. I have my car completly covered with Obama signs, I have my shirt on, buttons on my jacket and my scarf. I am by all accounts a polictical buttetin board. I am full of nerves, but really not bad. I keep a big smile on my face everywhere I go. I am happy, I am confident.

I call my field director Million and I pick up some last minute supplies for another precinct caption. I go to drop them off in his store and only his wife is there, she says with out looking at me, oh he cant make it tonight. I start to freak a little. But I now of another great supporter in the area and tell million I will give it to her. She is not home, so I ask in town where it is she works, they say she runs her own business fixing computers out of her home, but does things at peoples homes too. I give up and decided I will catch her just before the caucus! OH MY wont she be surprised! poor thing.

I look through the stuff in the OBAMA TUBE, there are signs with UNITY and a little piece of paper with the call in numbers on it and a string attached to hang around your neck, I decide I WILL NOT WEAR this. ha ha.

I leave my house at 5 PM, stop by the other supporters house and give her the information. I tell her that I will help her when we get there. She is shocked but OK with it. Basically just hanginig up the signs and standing there to welcome supporters.

I told my people to get there at 645, Some of them needed extra time because of milking cows and work. I figured this would be a great strategy anyway. I was still praying.

I got there and set up my signs by 615 and there was a room filled with Edwards and Hillary supporters looking at me with pittiful looks. Asking me if I was ok. yeah I was ok! I smiled, no one seemed to be greating anyone, so I took over and spread the signin sheets out, helped people find thier names, gave them voter registration sheets if they needed them., still no one was there by 640. just me and my kids... Then suddenly here they came, I smiled helped them sign in and one by one stuck my stickers on them. I am not being mean here, but one Hillary supporter was staring me down so hard, but I kept smiling.

We counted the room 2 times and came up with different numbers. I decided that we should just count off, which worked well. We had 47 people. In a caucus that usually gets 1-5 particpants this was amazing! Then we seperated into prefrence groups and I was amazed at my number I had 16, Hillary 16 and Edwards 14 and Richrdson 1. The Richardson guy left. But we still had to count him as a participant. so out of 5 delegates OBAMA got 2 Hillary 2 and Edwards 1.

I cried, I was shaking and I gave every single person standing with me a hug, thinking of Auntie B and all the others on BarackObama.com that have inspired me. I thought of Barack and his wonderful family. I felt like I was a big winner. I kept my promise. I was asked to get 10 to stand up I got 16. One less phone call, one less door knock...would have made a difference. People showed up for Barack that have never ever caucused before. Out of the 16 people I had 12 NEW voters and caucus goers. I was shaking and shaking and the people that were there for me were smiling. I looked every single one of them in the eye and thanked them over and over, I told them that without them Barack would not have ever gotten close in this tiny precinct. I felt like a good friend to them. And I feel like I am.

The kids and I took down our signs. I shook the hands of the Edwards caption (it was my husbands cousin and his Aunt and Uncle were on the other side of the room) I just kept smiling! The Hillary caption came over and said, what is your name? I said Laura Hubka, he said ahhh yes you called me before. and I said, "not too much" We had you pegged as the Hillary caption about 3 months ago" and he said "oh yeah?" Yeah, so I left you alone. " He just laughed and said, you did really good. I am pretty impressed!" I think he thought that by the end of the night Hillary would be the winner. I'd like to talk to him today. ...well maybe not.

There was a little other business, I ended up getting voted in as delegate (I wanted it anyway) and then signed on for the platform committee (taking things to the county and state for the county...i.e. road work, hog confinments..ect)

We left and drove for an hour to get to the Decorah field office. I called into the Sirius channel 146 LEFT. I told them of our win and our energy. Someone called in from Des Moines saying that there is usually 100 people there, but there was 380 people there and 181 stood up for Barack 101 for Hillary and 75 for Edwards! In Decorah People were walking by, driving by honking and screaming! I parked and got in the office. I met Pete and his son from Michigan and Hugh again! We all hugged. We had the TV on and 2 computers with constant updates. WE were eating cake and talking laughing, telling our stories. It was like the blog would be if were all together on caucus or primary night! The energy was high.

We stuck around for the final numbers and all hugged Victoria for her hard work. I cried knowing they were leaving. I called Million who was in New Hampton he was all caught up in the evening and could not talk long.

I havent seen them since. I miss them already.

I am ready to be a delegate! Especially at the national convention. I have to talk to get my way to that, but I think I have the words! Especially if Barack is the nominee!

I Love you all!!

The Difference is clear

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 08:19:37 EST

Paul B. Hertneky: Let's compare the public accomplishments of Clinton and Obama

By PAUL B. HERTNEKY

Monday, Dec. 24, 2007

INSTEAD OF COMPARING Hillary Clinton's and Barack Obama's experience -- a vague set of claims -- I turned my attention toward accomplishments. Not what they've accomplished for themselves, but what they've accomplished for others.

In doing so, I excluded purely personal gains. I also eliminated all distinctions or honors. For similar reasons, I ignored the elections they've won. These credentials are well-known.

Also, like any alert prospective employer, I am informed by what they support, worked on, worked toward and fought for, but I am more interested in what they have accomplished for their constituents.

After graduating from Columbia, Obama went to work with churches that organized job training and other programs for residents of a massive housing project in Chicago. He persuaded the city to provide summer jobs, remove asbestos, repair toilets, pipes and ceilings. He went door to door, offering help for three years, then went to Harvard Law School.

Upon graduating from Wellesley, Hillary Rodham made a commencement speech that moved her audience. She went immediately to Yale Law School.

Obama returned to Chicago to lead Project Vote, which signed up about 150,000 new African-American voters. He also joined a big law firm.

Following Yale, and a year in Washington, Rodham moved to Arkansas and married Bill Clinton. She taught at the University of Arkansas and joined a big law firm.

Clinton established a legal aid clinic at the university, where she taught for two years. Obama began teaching at the University of Chicago, where he would continue to lecture for 11 years. I mention teaching because I consider it an accomplishment in the service of others.

During her time as an attorney in Arkansas, Clinton gave birth to Chelsea. Her husband ran unsuccessfully for Congress, successfully for attorney general, and governor. During Obama's time as an attorney in Chicago, he became a husband and father of two daughters. He entered the Illinois Senate in 1994.

As a member of the minority party of the Senate for six of his eight years there, Obama wrote a health insurance law that covered an additional 20,000 children, a welfare reform law, an earned-income-tax-credit law for working-poor families, and death penalty reform that passed unanimously. During his last two years in the majority, he sponsored 780 bills, 280 of which became law.

As first lady of Arkansas, and of the United States, Clinton served on many boards. She chaired only one: the Task Force on National Health Care Reform, which failed, accomplishing only political traction for Republicans and a setback for her husband.

She fended off prosecution involving the White House Travel Office and her investments with Whitewater. Although these are personal accomplishments, they also served constituents by protecting her husband.

A year after Clinton became a senator, she secured $20 billion for New York City in the wake of 9/11. Among other funding measures she directed toward her state, she prevented the closing of a military base there. Although she is considered to be one of the most influential Democrats in the Senate, most of her sponsored legislation has been symbolic -- naming two post offices, two courthouses, honoring and congratulating sports teams and historic figures from New York.

Since Obama entered the U.S. Senate in 2004, he has joined Republican Richard Lugar in writing a law that funds the destruction or securing of loose nuclear and conventional weapons (shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles, for example) throughout the world. He also introduced the first bill, that soon became law, to fund and address pandemic flu preparedness.

In one inspiring discovery, Obama and Clinton teamed up to pass a law that helps hospitals disclose medical errors. It goes a long way toward serving patients while reducing malpractice claims.

There is no way to assess the value of each candidate's participation in collective efforts to serve our country. Clinton has given time to many efforts and lived approximately 5,000 more days than Obama, amassing supporters, money and fame. But time spent achieving such goals can hardly be seen as accomplishments for the good of the people.

Obama's accomplishments show greater efficiency and clarity of purpose, forming productive alliances, making the most of his comparatively short career.

People talk about his charisma, but give me that skill and focus, trained on a four-year term, and we could see unprecedented results.

I had to repost this from the blog. A "snapshot" from Iowa

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 10:45:09 EST

I repost this from the blog. Great impression of some Iowa people and how they work.

So I’ve had a few glasses of wine so forgive me if I’m a little less diplomatic and circumspect than usual. I am naturally a fairly reserved person, though you might not know it since I am so FIRED UP! And Des Moines is such a small town. This really came home to me at the JJ, when the state chair came out and I thought, wow, his wife looks a lot like my son’s preschool teacher. And then I put the last name with her last name, and sure enough, it’s Mrs Brennan! Anyway, I was just at my husband’s organization’s holiday party. His organization focuses on a very progressive cause, so the sample might be a bit skewed. And being a spouse, I didn’t necessarily want to make my politics the center of the evening. I loved Aunt Becky’s video welcome, where she talks about how she Barack-ifies Jehovah’s Witnesses, wrong numbers, et al. I know others of you do the same, and I am so grateful to you for it. But that isn’t me. Once somebody makes a move, then I am all in, but generally speaking I am a bit more reserved. But I didn’t have to make the first move. I had given a fair number of them tickets to the Obama-Oprah rally. And they were eager to tell me not just how grateful they were to have gone, but how much it had affected them, how Obama had touched them, how they had realized the power of possibility, how FIRED UP they were by him. I had faith this would happen. I got on board as soon as I heard him speak, back in 2003. Many of you have gotten on board after hearing him speak. It isn’t just what he says, it’s the way he says it, and the fact that he has honored his words with action throughout his whole life. You aren’t just impressed, you’re inspired, and you want to get involved. Not just by caucusing for him, although that’s huge enough. You want to tell everyone you know about him, to give them the opportunity to believe and to act, too. And this happened with pretty much everyone I had given tickets to. (more to come, sorry this is so long) Re: Holiday party | Report to Admin Reply By IA for Obama Today at 1:44 am EST There was one holdout, a woman for whom I have all the respect in the world. She is exceptionally intelligent, and her field is political science. She is very involved with the caucus, in a non-partisan way. She, however, is personally for Edwards. This isn’t something she discusses publicly, due to the nature of her position. And it isn’t something she talks about much at work, given office politics. But I really like and respect her as a person. And I have to say, I am genuinely puzzled by Edwards support. And, as I said, I had a few glasses of wine. So I started to ask her questions about why she’s for JE and not BHO. This is a woman who could argue circles around pretty much anyone, but her arguments completely fell apart. First she said that she hasn’t heard anything substantial from BHO. I challenged her on his foreign policy forum from yesterday, his call to serve, and other examples. She basically said she didn’t know enough about them (and she knows more than 99.9% of the populace about everything that has to do with the caucus), or that there wasn’t anything terribly innovative about them. Trust me, I challenged her on that too, and she couldn’t really respond. Then she said that Edwards’ health care proposal was superior. Oh, how I took her to task for that, pointing out just a few of the problems with mandates and why BHO’s was not only more responsive to the needs of the people but was far more likely to get enacted. She agreed that that might be true, but then copped out by saying that there really wasn’t much difference between any of the democratic proposals. Then we discussed the Iraq war. She said BHO’s objection to the war didn’t really count because he wasn’t a US Senator at the time, and that senators need to honor the wishes of their constituents. I pointed out that JE did more than merely ride the tide (which would’ve been bad enough) but he was a co-sponsor of the resolution. She said that was due to public sentiment. I said that BHO spoke out forcefully and eloquently in the face of such public sentiment, and that that clearly pointed to sound judgment, solid understanding and a willingness to speak the truth when it was unpopular. (more to come) Re: Holiday party | Report to Admin Reply By IA for Obama Today at 1:47 am EST She again tried to dismiss it as irrelevant as he was not in a position to actually vote on the war. She said Barack has not shown how he would lead on any of the issues. I pointed to a number of laws and reforms he has helped enact as an IL Sen and as US Sen, such as health care, judicial issues, ethics, education, providing specific examples of how this affected his constituents. She copped out by saying that since I was from IL I had followed his career for much longer. After I had taken her to task for pretty much everything (in a reasonably polite, diplomatic way, as she is my husband’s co-worker and someone I respect), I challenged her on something that has long bothered me about Edwards, something extremely obvious, the huge gap between his rhetoric and his record. I have raised this issue in pro-Edwards forums before, and basically gotten no response. She responded that it was an unfair characterization, as he has fought consistently for health care reform and education reform, among other things. I pointed out that No Child Left Behind was yet another of his mistakes that he has apologized for, then asked for other specific examples of his reforms, but she provided none. As it was clear I think to both of us that she really wasn’t on solid ground as to why she supports JE and not BHO, I asked what was the single most important issue to her. She said electability, and that she couldn’t support someone who was not willing to go negative because they could not win. This is not a nasty person. But it is someone who is too immersed in politics as usual to appreciate politics as it can be, as it should be, as it is with Barack Obama. This person is probably not indicative of the vast majority of Iowans. But at the end of the discussion I had the feeling that she is probably fairly indicative of a lot of Edwards voters. Basically, he won her vote in 2004 and she just loves what he has to say. She is so jaded by politics as it has been that she is not bothered by what I see as blatant hypocrisy, the gap between Edwards’ record and his current rhetoric. (more) Re: Holiday party | Report to Admin Reply By IA for Obama Today at 1:50 am EST Realizing this, I excused myself from the conversation but others kept it up, even those whom I had not given O-O-O tickets to. The support Edwards already has might be his to keep, but other Iowans aren’t buying it. A couple of other things. The only way HRC was spoken of was as an agent of negativity, someone trying to claw a victory out of the corpses of her fellow Democrats, and how nasty and un-American that was. And I wasn’t even the one saying that! Also, I raised the issue of whether IA would be or should be first in the future. On the pro side, I am impressed by how seriously Iowans take the process, how thoroughly they vet the candidates before making up their minds, how solid their priorities are, and how genuinely decent and solid Iowans are, how less prone to negativity and partisanship they are (as I’ve said, I moved here from Chicago, and I’ve also lived in CA, CT, WY and UT). But on the con side, I think other states just might take it as seriously if they went first, as there is no inherent superiority in Iowans, and I find it somewhat disingenuous to argue that Iowans really take it all that seriously if only 6% of them caucus (though the numbers may well be higher this time around, though the highest number suggested by the gathering was 12%). The group, the vast majority of them lifelong Iowans, felt that Iowa should go first, basically because Iowa has handled the responsibility well, and was prepared to do so again. They said that pretty much come January 4 it would all be about 2012, to which I replied that we can then start planning Barack’s re-election. They laughed, but I told them I am so there, baby! Sorry for rambling on a bit (a lot!), but I thought that others might appreciate this snapshot from Iowa, especially as so many posters keep asking for updates from Iowa. This maybe should be filed under too much information, but I think it is useful for gauging the mood here, HRC has her supporters, but I hear from them less and less. Edwards has some pretty sincere commitment, but he’s not really winning over new supporters. Barack, however, inspires peoples imaginations and their confidence.

O O O OH MY~~~~~Obama, Oprah, Obama Cedar Rapids

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 12:10:02 EST

I was at the Cedar Rapids event last night with 9,575 people. I got there early and volunteered. What an event.

The most striking thing to me was as I stood there watching Oprah "stump" for Obamam was that is was really not like stumping at all. Oprah and Obama are really so much alike (besides the funny names) They bring thier message and you dont feel like they made it up or have some sort of alterior motive. They are real down to the core. As Oprah sat there in her chair along side Michelle, it was as if she were litterally star struck by Barack. At one time she was almost out of her chair she was leaning so much. I know that feeling as tears streamed down my face for the 100th time this year as I listened to the greatest man I have ever witnessed speak in my lifetime. There have been other great men, but I have not been afforded the opportunity to see them live.

I stood there with my Obama 08 sign over my head, I could not put it down. This speech was like his JJ speech. There were so many people there and the air was full of hope and inspriation. What a wonderful opportunity we have as a nation to make a REAL impact on the world.

As I left the area, I still had my "volunteer" tag on and some people were leaving and asking for signs and whatever else they could get thier hands on! I gave them my signs and dug thru my purse for whatever buttons I still had buried down there. They could not get enough. People were singing and dancing there way out of the sadium and I wanted to cry again! (I am a big baby)

THE HOPE, THE HOPE, THE HOPE! is all I could think. I sit here still with goosebumps and tears streaming down my face.

Thank you Ms. Winfrey. Thank you from my very core, from my very being. (even though the wait in the car garage was over an hour to get out! LOL)

I love my country and I love the idea that I was able to meet MARYTNURSE and give her a hug, and I saw my man Hugh from NC and several of the people who live in my town there.

BARACK 08=REALITY!!

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Message from Cook County Posting

Shauen — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:17:04 EST

Dear Obama supporters, This will be the next to last major communication I will send out before the February 5th "Super Tuesday" primaries...I know that many of you belong to multiple groups on My.BO.com so you will receive this same e-mail several times...this message is so very important that I ask you to please not be angry or upset over this...I want this message to get out to all of the different supporters! Back in February, Sen. Barack Obama stood in front of a large crowd in Springfield, IL in freezing weather to announce his bid for President of the United States. Nine months later, we stand in a position to bring the Obama presidency one major step closer to reality! On January 3rd, 2008, Iowa voters will go out into the cold weather and attend their precinct caucuses. The latest polls show that Sen. Barack Obama ahead of Sen. Hillary Clinton by 4 percentage points and ahead of John Edwards by 8 percentage points. This is good, but we need to remember that these are the same polls we told everyone to not be concerned about when Sen. Clinton was ahead! Much work has been done to bring the Obama campaign to this point, but the fact is that many Iowa voters have not yet decided which candidate they will support on January 3rd and that much hard work needs to be done! I am personally asking each and every one of you, to please find a way to spend a Saturday in Iowa between today and December 15th! Think of this as the best present you can give Barack and Michelle Obama! I went on such a trip on October 20th and I have committed my time to another trip on December 8th! Many of these trips will be leaving from the states surrounding Iowa the next 3 Saturdays! You will have the opportunity to meet other Obama supporters and also be talking to Iowa voters about why you support Barack Obama for President and encouraging them to get out on January 3rd and stand in Barack's corner so we can bring the change we so desperately need in Washington, D.C. !!! I would be willing to go so far as to say that you can be the difference in these caucuses! Each supporter who helps Iowa makes a difference(even if it serves to bring 5 more Obama supporters out to the caucuses!) If you are willing to go, please call me at (618)397-5027 or write me at the e-mail address below! If you are in the St. Louis area as I am, I will get you in contact with a staffer at the St. Louis office who will give more details and sign you up...If you live outside of the greater St. Louis area, I will work to find info on who to contact in your area about meetup locations for the trips each Saturday. Thank you so much for all of your support so far and I wish I could talk personally to each and every one of you! Let's get out in the cold like Barack did and declare our support to any and all! Take care and LET'S BA-RACK THE IOWA CAUCUSES!!!
Kurt Neumann

Angela Davis mentions Barack Obama in Guardian article

Shauen — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 15:38:49 EST

Here is an article that I read in the Guardian. If you know Angela Davis you will be familiar with her through and inclusive analysis of various subjects. This article article provides the same critical analysis that I hope that we are all considering.

Here is the link to the article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2207188,00.html

Oprah Winfrey joins Obama

Shauen — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 10:54:38 EST

CHICAGO, IL – The Obama for America campaign today announced that Oprah Winfrey will join Barack Obama for a tour through three early voting states on December 8th and 9th. Winfrey and Obama will hold two events in Iowa, one in South Carolina, and one in New Hampshire. All events will be free and open to the public.

TOUR SCHEDULE:

SATURDAY DECEMBER 8TH
DES MOINES, IA
CEDAR RAPIDS, IA

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 9TH
COLUMBIA, SC
MANCHESTER, NH

Locations and times for the events will be announced in the coming days. Those interested in attending can sign up online today to ensure that they receive the event details when they are announced.

Links below:

http://iowa.barackobama.com/oprah_dm
http://iowa.barackobama.com/oprah_cr
http://sc.barackobama.com/oprah_sc
http://nh.barackobama.com/oprah_nh

If you don't know

Shauen — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 10:18:10 EST

Two weekends ago we sent 768 volunteers from MN to IOWA & we meet by 789 from other states

we knocked over 45,000 doors and gained almost 2,000 NEW supporters

AT the JJ dinner we filled 4,000 of 9,000 seats!!!!!!!

now you know

::FIERCE URGENCY ::

Shauen — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 12:17:57 EST

Full text of Barack's speech at J.J. If you did not see it -!WOW! -it was amazing! You can read it here. This is what a speech is like when someone really cares, when compassion, truth, and vision are not just rhetoric.

Check out his speech and make a donation of $25 if you can. We are in it for change and so is he.

In solidarity,

Shauen

FIRED UP! READY TO GO! FIRED UP! READY TO GO! FIRED UP! READY TO GO!

The next PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. . . BARACK OBAMA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Honoring the sacrifice of America's veterans

Shauen — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 11:56:22 EST

Barack Obama Honors Sacrifice of America’s Veterans by Addressing Homelessness

As Nation Observes Veterans Day, Obama Visits Veterans’ Transitional Housing Facility

Barack is on soon! Watch the J.J. Session LIVE!

Shauen — Sat, 10 Nov 2007 22:23:55 EST

Copy and paste this link in your address bar to watch the J.J. Rally in IOWA.

http://www.c-span.org/watch/cs_cspan_rm.asp?Cat=TV&Code=CS

Clintons flip flop

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 22:25:08 EST

Clinton's answer is below, but note she didn't say I oppose Spitzers plan, or the NH editorial board reported wrong, she said:

CLINTON: Well, what Governor Spitzer is trying to do is fill the vacuum left by the failure of this administration to bring about comprehensive immigration reform. We know in New York we have several million at any one time who are in New York illegally. They are undocumented workers. They are driving on our roads. The possibility of them having an accident that harms themselves or others is just a matter of the odds. It’s probability.

So what Governor Spitzer is trying to do is to fill the vacuum. I believe we need to get back to comprehensive immigration reform because no state, no matter how well intentioned, can fill this gap. There needs to be federal action on immigration reform.

Then Russert asked the other candidates the following:

RUSSERT: Does anyone here believe an illegal immigrant should not have a driver’s license?

DODD: This is a privilege. * * * The idea that we’re going to extend this privilege here of a driver’s license I think is troublesome, and I think the American people are reacting to it. * * *

We need to deal with security on our borders. * * *

But a license is a privilege, and that ought not to be extended, in my view.

CLINTON: Well, I just want to add, I did not say that it should be done, but I certainly recognize why Governor Spitzer is trying to do...

Read her first answer she was asked about her statement to the editorial board where she said "it makes a lot of sense to give an illegal immigrant a driver’s license."

(UNKNOWN): Wait a minute...

CLINTON: And we have failed. We have failed.

DODD: No, no, no. You said—you said yes...

CLINTON: No.

DODD: ... you thought it made sense to do it.

CLINTON: No, I didn’t, Chris. * * *

She did say that it made sense, and then she lied, yes LIED. Apparently she thinks voters are so stupid or deaf, that she could get away with this.

Then Dodd and Clinton argue the merits of the issue.

* * *

DODD: That’s a bureaucratic nightmare.

CLINTON: ... it’s not the full privilege.

RUSSERT: Senator Clinton, I just want to make sure of what I heard. Do you, the New York senator, Hillary Clinton, support the New York governor’s plan to give illegal immigrants a driver’s license?

You told the New Hampshire paper that it made a lot of sense. Do you support his plan?

CLINTON: You know, Tim, this is where everybody plays “gotcha.” It makes a lot of sense. What is the governor supposed to do? He is dealing with a serious problems. We have failed. And George Bush has failed. Do I think this is the best thing for any governor to do? No. But do I understand the sense of real desperation, trying to get a handle on this? Remember, in New York, we want to know who’s in New York. We want people to come out of the shadows.

He’s making an honest effort to do it. We should have passed immigration reform.

Tim Russert didn't play gotcha. He asked a question about a statement Clinton made, she didn't dispute her earlier statement, she even elaborated, but when another Democratic candidate said I disagree she's wrong on this she Lied and said she didn't say what the transcript and my ears heard her say.

Hillary was not swift boated, that is reserved for an unfair attack on a war hero. Hillary got caught trying to have it both ways. To defend Hillary on this, or attack those who say no we aren't going to stand by and put up with this, is evidence of blind faith. Blind faith is rarely wise, and it certainly isn't here

Invitation to a Very Special Fundraising Event for Barack Obama!

Kurt Neumann--Victory Bound to DC — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 06:42:38 EDT

Dear Obama supporters,

I would like to invite you to a one-of-a-kind special fundraising event for the Barack Obama campaign:

Event Name: World's Longest Conga Line for Barack Obama
Date: Sunday, December 2, 2007
Time: 11:00AM-5:00PM
Location: Saint Louis, MO(exact location To Be Announced)
Cost: asking for a minimum donation of $10 to the Obama campaign plus a small dish of food
(this can be a salad, casserole, or dessert--please bring this on a disposal dish or in a disposable container)
Drinks will be provided

This event will be a part of a 3-day National Fundraising Event called BA-RACK AMERICA/BA-RACK THE MEDIA!!

The purpose will be to enlist the support of my.barackobama.com groups across the country to hold their own fundraising event during the period from 6PM on Thursday, November 30th to 6PM on Sunday, December 2nd.
The goals will be $3 million for the campaign War Chest and (probably just as important) 300,000 new donors to the Obama campaign! This will help show the media that WE ARE STRONG and their bashing of our candidate will not stop us in helping with Barack Obama's inevitable march to the White House!

Our event in St. Louis(besides raising money and gaining new donors) will have the extra twist of being an ACTUAL ATTEMPT to break a record in the GUINNESS BOOK OF WORLD RECORDS! The record for the Longest Dance Line is 1681 people...we are hoping to get 10,000 people to participate and shatter the record! Plans are already underway
to get the OK from the Guinness representatives to attempt the record try and hope to have this just in time for the event!

We will be video-taping this event and working to get this on YouTube and other outlets and work to getting this video shown by the media to show that messing with us ONLY MAKES US STRONGER AND MORE DETERMINED TO HELP OBAMA WIN!

Now, in order to get the number of participants we need, I am asking that you do the following:

1.) Keep your plans open for December 2nd and plan to attend! The link to sign up for the event and make your pledge is:
http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/fundraising/4vhcj (please keep checking this link for the exact location of the event which will be posted by November 15th!)

2.) In the next week or so, please encourage AT LEAST 3 of your friends and/or family members to sign up and come to participate! Then encourage each of those people in the week after that to talk to 3 other people about signing up, and so on...

3.) Please, if you can, donate more than the minimum of $10! This helps the Obama campaign so much!

4.) If you notice, I have posted this event on the sites of My.BarackObama.com groups as far away as 200 miles from St. Louis...if you are a member of one of these groups, please consider lining up transportation so you can have several people come! This will be a REALLY FUN event and a great experience for ALL(especially college students!)
Just think, when you look at the Guinness Book of World Records and look up the world record for Longest Dance Line and it shows 10,000 participants, you will know that you were a part of this history making event!

Now, if you are unable to attend, please consider organizing your own fundraising event near to you during the National 3-Day Event! If you are willing to do this, please let me know and send me the info on the nature of the event and I will send to you a donation link to send all the money that you raise!

I do hope that if you are unable to attend the event in St. Louis, that you will take part in a fundraiser near to you and let's show this country how we feel about SENATOR BARACK OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!

Take care and LET'S CONGA FOR BA-RACK!

Kurt Neumann

A guy named Hugh

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 20:20:47 EDT

Hi there. This is my blog about Hugh the guy from North Carolina (he is a transplant there from the NE) He is a retired faculty member from a college.

Hugh saw my plea for help here in NE Iowa, and being the avid supporter (and retired) he decided to DRIVE up here some 1,300 miles! He will be here a total of 10 days!

Hugh has found out first hand just how hard it is to get those Iowa voters to break their shell and tell you who they stand for. Everyone seems enthusiastic, but to get that soft gooey center of the Iowa voter it takes some real skill and persistance!

Hugh has been canvassing and tonight making his first phone calls. I can not say enough about this kind of help that is SO DEARLY needed in rural Iowa.

My hats off to Hugh and all those of you who travel outside your own states and away from your comfortable home to help us get the job done

The office

HUGH

Hugh's car

Million on a 45 min call to get a precinct capiton! HE DID IT WOOOOOOO

Hillary is the Default Incumbent Candidate

Barack Daily Buzz - Victory2008.net — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 16:36:31 EDT

Obama Conference Call 10-20-07

I am more likely to bring the country together

Hillary is the default incumbent candidate

In the chatter of newsrooms and CNN

We are by definition the underdog

Hope you understood

Standing up for what's right

Is a measure of strength

You can tinker around the edges

Or transform the country with real change

HI from the Ankle injury zone

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 12:30:23 EDT

I have begun to realize the reality of what I have done to myself. Day 9 is better than day 8 by just a tiny itty bit. So I have decided to sit up a bit. I was stupid to spend so much time in the upright position last week. But I had to see Barack and I am glad I did. Although being home and watching TV as been discouraging for me. EVERY MSM is all about Hillary being crowned queen. I really am sick of it. But I also have found that this is why we have to work so hard. VERY hard to get the word out. MSM NEver puts out the things that I see on here! I have to print them and bring those articles with me. I do it everytime something comes out about her that is negitive. And NO ONE knows about it...anywhere. I am glad that you continue to keep me updated. And I hope that eveyone is doing the same, print out those articles and show them to everyone. Leave them on coffee tables, leave them in McDonalds, or other coffee shops or morning stops you go to. People will read them! Make sure it has the name of the paper shown on the top so that people do not think these are planted there falsely.

Finally some of the newspapers are starting to put out some positive stuff about our guy. Lets make sure EVERYONE sees it.

Barack is coming to my area!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 15:54:21 EDT

Yeah! Barack will be in Decorah IA on Thursday Oct 4th at 7pm- Luther College! I am so excited. Wait for pictures!

Barack Top Ten - 9-22-07 - Victory2008.net

Barack Daily Buzz - Victory2008.net — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 18:01:45 EDT

1) Obama Condemns Jena Charges during Iowa State University Speech
9-22-07
Lisa Rossi - Des Moines Register
http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070922/NEWS09/709220328/-1/NEWS04

2) Obama and Edwards Step Up Criticism of Clinton
9-22-07
Beth Fouhy - Associated Press
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jPDo-NMvpVY4UgXpm2c296R0i3Jw

3) Obama Leads Both Giuliani and Thompson in Recent Poll
9-22-07
Rasmussen Reports
http://news.yahoo.com/s/rasmussen/20070921/pl_rasmussen/obamamatchup20070921_1

4) Obama's Mother Featured in New TV Ad Airing in Iowa
9-22-07
John McCormick - Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/obama/chi-obama_adsep21,0,7546153.story?coll=chi-news-col

5) JFK Advisor, Counsel and Speechwriter Ted Sorensen Backs Obama
9-22-07
Jennifer Feals - Seacoast Online
http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070921/NEWS/709210402/-1/NEWS11&sfad=1

6) Students Like Obama in Iowa But Will They Caucus?
9-22-07
Dan Gearino - Sioux City Journal
http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/09/22/news/iowa/3d06824cc7f1e10c8625735e000ce490.txt

7) Obama Wants to Expand Senior Volunteer Programs
9-22-07
Mike Glover - Associated Press
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jDkaLoCLlGNuKVxZbfOhsUW7F7Dg

8) Democrats 2008 - Clinton - 36% - Obama - 23% - John Edwards - 18%
9-22-07
Angus Reid Global Monitor
http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/28315/democrats_2008_hillary_36_obama_at_23/

9) Ben & Jerry's Co-Founder Ben Cohen Accuses Obama and Clinton of Timidity over Pentagon Cuts
9-22-07
Teddy Davis and Mike Chesney
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=3632367&page=1

10) In Polls Obama Lurks - Analysts Say Barack Needs to Soar
9-22-07
Jason Clayworth - Des Moines Register
http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070922/NEWS/709220332/1001/ENT

Reposting -to send to more groups- Late night thinking

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 00:08:48 EDT

Some things from "12 Simple Secrets of Happiness"--

"our lives are shaped by those who love us--by those who refuse to love us" John Powell.s.j

The next time you find yourself in the path of critical bricks hurled you way,learn to desensitize the impact of accusations rather than stand defenseless

1. consider the source. Normally it is the person who can't dance who complains about the unevenness of the floor. Likewise, people who criticize other people are frequently hurting themselves. Out of thier frustration with life, they find someone else to blame. Dont take it personally.

2. Smile. Have you ever tried arguing with someone who is smiling at you? If you want to disarm an attacker,take a deep breath,smile and say "Thank You" One of the surest marks of good character is a person's ability to accept criticism without malice to the one who gives it.

3.Expect it but don't accept it. Epicteus said "If someone criticizes you, agree at once. Mention that if only the other person knew you well, there would be more to criticize than that"! He also believed that the best way to silence your critics and not waste energy is to agree with them and get on with life.

I think Barack may have read this. It goes on but I knew when I was reading this that Barack was a wise man and follows this wonderful way of living. Even when the sparks fly and the bad press comes. I know he believes. In US!!

I can just see him standing at the podium on inaugural day. Hands on each side of the podium with that smile from ear to ear. Michelle in the back ground the girls at her side. A single tear in her eye and Sasha asking "whats wrong Mommy daddy is president now, isnt that a happy thing"? And Michelle telling her girls that it is just the most happy thing.

Soon his smile fades and his voice rings out to us all. " Thank you AMerica, Thank you for having the trust and faith in a man like me" Thank you for believing in America, and giving me the daunting mission to bring this country back to where it used to be" I promise that I will keep my word until my dying day, even long after I am done being your president" I will keep your hearts close to mine and together we will succeed" My plan to bring us up and out of dispair, up and out of the darkness, out into the light of day will be a hard mission and I will need your help" "I will work day and night and will surround myself with the best of the best and they will advise me in the things I have yet to learn" "I will keep my eye on the prize of a better America" A Stonger America" and a United America" Where we can all say the Pledge of Allegence and know that we are "THe United States of AMerica"

of course it would go on..but I know he will cry. He will be so awe struck with the idea that he, just a normal man. Won the love and adoration of us all.

finally my pictures from Waverly Iowa with Obama

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 20:38:47 EDT

I got to see him!!! YEah!!

I listened to him talk about energy at Waverly Power. Then saw him in the debate in Des Moines. But they would not let us bring cameras in there...darn!

not a bad showing for a town of 5,890

Our "little Rally" of visability today

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 20:08:58 EDT

Today in a small rural town in NE Iowa I had a "little rally" for Barack Obama! I made cookies...

I made signs with a friend...

We lined up and caused a stir in Howard Co. No one has ever seen anything like it in my town! We got plenty of honks from our sign saying "honk for Obama in 08"

AND WE GOT SUPPORTERS!!!! IN IOWA>>>>IN RURAL America and everyone was so excited and ready to go again SOON!!!

I can t wait!!

Guess what I am doing tonight

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 22:43:55 EDT

making Barack cookies! I am having an event tomarrow. Yummy!

people I have met

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 23:30:53 EDT

Thanks to a blog written by someone else, I added this comment and then thought I would like to share it with you all incase you never see it there.

I have met all sorts of people since I started volunteering for Barack Obama. First I met the wonderful people who are field organizers in the Decorah, IA office= Million, Victoria, Shannon and the other guy...awwww what was his name, he left to go back to college. Ill think of it in a minute. Then the people that I have seen around town but never really talked to. I walked up to thier doors and talked about Barack and generally got a good response, never a bad one. I talked to them about thier houses and the work they were doing or had done on them, thier dogs,cats, children. It gave me a chance to meet my town face to face. Something I had no reason to do otherwise. I get smiles from people I do not know just by wearing my OBama '08 shirt, and it makes me smile just wearing it because I know if they see me wearing this shirt and having a big smile on my face, they think.. happy people like Barack and I want to be happy so I should check out Obama...(in my mind this is what I like to think they are thinking anyway)

I have found that politics and religon run on paralell roads seperated by just a few steps. They have very much in common when it comes to talking to people about them. People are scared of what they can not see. We can only trust in our own choices and the outcome of the road we choose. Hoping always that we took the right crook in the road. The sun comes up every morning and we trust that it will. Barack is my sun in the morning and I trust that if he is president he will be up and working for us everyday, because the crook in the road that I choose is the road to the caucus and the primarys and the general election that all have Barack Obamas name written all over it!

A rambling Thank You!

Laura Hubka ~From Iowa Where It Started and Will Continue~~~ — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 23:08:04 EDT

I have found myself spending a lot of time reposting things I see on other sites. Which I have no problem with. But felt that a post written just by me was in order.

I have really started to feel the crunch of the political process in the last few weeks. It seems like I have been involved for sooooo long. But my original "seek and find" mission for more information about Barack was only about 5 weeks ago. I registerd, they found me, I got involved and have canvassed, talked, gone to meetings, gotten my share of supporter cards, I have seen Barack twice, went to a debate in Des Moines Iowa, set up a table at a motorcycle show and I have only become a registerd voter 3 weeks ago!

I never voted before, I never paid attention before.... I Never, I never....now I find myself thinking WOW! this is going to take longer than I think it will to get to the end..and then flipping back to, WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME what can I do? What should I be doing? My field organizer has been great in keeping me more than informed and trying to rein in my OVER enthusiasm with the whole process and letting me know to be patient we WILL be running wild soon.

So I wait. very impatiently. Looking on the internet daily, every site, every news program. But this has been somewhat uninspiring at times because the press mostly is for the "woman" I dont hate her, she just makes me uncomfortable. I worry that she will make it into office and then what will I do? Will I lose my motivation to get Barack into office in 2012 after she makes all those who voted for her eat crow as she demoralizes this country for yet another 4 years? I pray for her to show her true colors and SOON!

I just want everyone to feel the way I do. SO WHY CANT THEY? yeah I know. THey are not me.

Then I come here. I read the blogs, I go to the links, I feel the love. I really know in my heart that Barack can win. From what I see and hear in Iowa, I have not met but ONE person that has said they are voting for Hillary, NOT ONE! lots of Obama and Edwards and a whole lot of leaners for OBama and Edwards. So where do they get these numbers for the polls? well my suspisions were confirmed by my own poll of people who had been called and who had not been. All the people who were on my canvassing list that were on the list as Hillary supporters HAD been called, those others.......ahhhhhh no call. Hmmmmm yeah. There is a Clinton office down the street from the Obama office in Decorah(IA) but no one has ever been in there, very strange. Just signs on the windows. So do they think if people see her name then she has some mysterious "prescence"? I am not sure.

If you have made it this far. Thank you! I believe this goes beyond what a blog is supposed to be. But again Thank YOU! for helping me believe that there is room for change in politics and that I can be a part of it.

Laura

Volunteer with Minnesotans for Obama at the Minnesota State Fair!

Mandy in Mpls — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 17:17:45 EDT

Barack Obama Volunteers Needed for the Minnesota State Fair!
Join Us for Twelve Days of Fun Ending Labor Day!
Thursday, August 23rd - Monday, September 3rd

Sign Up for 1 of 4 Daily Shifts at:
www.minnesotansforobama.org/forms/volunteer_statefair.asp

WE HAVE GREAT NEWS!
Minnesotans for Obama is now officially part of the Minnesota State Fair with space inside the DFL building! And we want YOU to join in the fun!

WE NEED LOTS OF VOLUNTEERS -- LIKE YOU!
To show the strength of our grassroots movement, we need to be visible, talk with voters and sign them up for Barack Obama. Our table inside the DFL building also will be staffed every day from 9am-9pm with volunteer shifts from 9-12, 12-3, 3-6, and 6-9. And here's where we need your! help.

WE'VE MADE VOLUNTEERING EASY!
Click here to sign up by day for one or several shifts during the fair. Obama State Fair Team Captains will be in contact with you to confirm your schedule, cover your volunteer assignment and other detail.

MINNESOTA STATE FAIR INFORMATION.

Our Obama table is located inside the DFL building, at the corner of DanPatch Avenue and Cooper Street.
Since we're a grassroots movement, volunteers will need to pay for their admission into the Fair, parking, food, and beverages.
2007 ADMISSION PRICES - Regular admission at the gate: adults (13-64) $11; seniors (65 & over) $9; kids (5-12) $8. Children under 5 are always free! Discount admission tickets: $8 (more discount ticket information).
Discount admission tickets are available prior to the fair until Wednesday,Aug. 22, 2007.
Parking: $9 or one additional pre-fair discount admission ticket ($8).
For information about the fair, visit the official MN State Fair website, www.mnstatefair.org.

IT'S A MINNESOTA TRADITION!
During the State Fair over 1.7 million people from 87 Minnesota counties will come to the State Fair, go on rides, visit the animal barns, eat food on a stick and talk politics. It's a Minnesota tradition and so is grassroots politics!

So join us at the State Fair. Talk with Minnesota voters about Senator Obama's message of hope and change. Volunteer! (www.minnesotansforobama.org/forms/volunteer_statefair.asp)

If you have any questions, please e-mail us at volunteer@minnesotansforobama.org or call us at 763-588-7545.

Sincerely,

Minnesotans for Obama State Organizers

PS: Don't have time to volunteer but are planning on attending the fair? You can still participate in the MN Obama movement by wearing your Obama gear for visibility and direct interested parties to the DFL Booth!