Ohio residents were treated to a free Bruce Springsteen concert at the Ohio State University yesterday afternoon. Over 10,000 people attended the concert as Bruce urged the crowd to register to vote before today's deadline. Bruce has been visiting cities to hold Vote for Change rallies and encourage supporters to get involved and take action this November.Along with using his time to make sure everyone was registered, he reminded everyone that early voting started last week and today is the last day to One-Stop Early Vote.Ohio is a crucial state and the campaign has been working hard all week to make sure that people are registered before the deadline. According to the Franklin County Board of Elections over 6,800 people voted during the first six days of early voting. Early voting continues in Ohio until November 3. The Columbus Dispatch interviewed two voters at the rally who had already taken part in the new early voting opportunity.
It took Nathan Laney, 19, of the East Side, 90 minutes to register and vote at Veterans Memorial today. "I like the convenience of it - to do both at the same time," Laney said.Margie Davis voted early today because she'll be working the polls on Election Day. It took her 90 minutes to vote, which was a refreshing change from 2004 when long lines forced her to take the day off work.
Here are some pictures from yesterday's event...
Even though voting early in Ohio continues from now until Election day, today is the last possible day to register. Those who register today will have the opportunity to vote today, tomorrow, or any day of their choice.
Hip-hop mogul Russel Simmons and Cleveland Cavaliers basketball star Lebron James talk about the importance of voting in the video below...
Vote today -- and take along your friends and family to make sure they are registered and vote for Barack.
As the financial crisis unfolds, more and more Americans are concerned about the economy.
Barack Obama has a plan to restore America’s economy by creating new jobs and providing much-needed relief for ordinary Americans. The Obama-Biden plan will turn the economy around by providing a $1000 emergency energy rebate to help middle class Americans pay the costs of their rising bills, and give a sizeable tax cut to working families. The Obama-Biden plan also includes a $1000 tax cut for working families.
At JohnMcCainRecord.com, you can learn more about John McCain’s record on the economy, including McCain’s plan to give a $4 billion tax cut to big oil companies, while leaving more than 100 million hardworking Americans without relief. Visit JohnMcCainRecord.com, and let the facts speak for themselves.
Getting the economy back on track is critically important. Read the Obama-Biden plan for America and see Barack’s plan to put working Americans first.
Do you live in Michigan, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania or Virginia? If so, today is your last opportunity to register to vote.If you don't register today you cannot vote on November 4.This election is critical, and close, which means we need all the support we can get. Every vote can make the difference in who wins on election day. No one can afford to sit this out.Sign up to register today. Then call all of your friends, family members, neighbors and co-works to make sure everyone you know is registered to vote. It only takes a minute to use our invite form to email people you know to make sure they are registered. They can even check their registration status in case they've moved recently or don't know if they are registered. For those in the eight battleground states listed above there is no second chance. This is it. Register today.
Tim from Noblesville, Indiana is excited to be casting his first vote ever for Barack Obama. The 20-year-old junior political science major at Purdue University is excited that his vote is going to count in this election.
It means a lot to be casting my first presidential vote for Obama. And I’m excited that Indiana is a swing state. My vote’s going to make a difference. I want to say that I voted for him. He’s a historic candidate and the right candidate. I support Obama because the politics of the past eight years – the politics I few up with -- have been a nightmare, but he restored my hope in American politics. He believes that we can rise above and accomplish something bigger and better than ourselves.
As a college student, tuition is a big issue for Tim.
College tuition is out of control. I want to go to law school, but there’s no way my family can afford that. My sister has $70,000 in loans, and she just wanted to be a teacher. Now she’s teaching and making $35,000 per year. How is she supposed to pay that off?
Barack Obama has a plan to help every American student afford college. Obama’s plan will give a $4,000 refundable tax credit to every American student, which will cover two-thirds the cost of tuition at the average public college or university and make community college tuition completely free for most students. Read more about the Obama-Biden education plan.The economy also concerns Tim, since he and his classmates will be joining the workforce soon.
My classmates are terrified about going out into the economy. That’s a clear indicator that something is very wrong.
Tim says his whole family is voting for Obama.
My sister is voting for Obama, my mom is voting for Obama… even my dad, who used to be a Republican. I can guarantee seven votes in my family for Obama. And now I’m trying to convince my Republican roommates. I think I can do it!
Though he’s struggling on a student budget, Tim donated to the campaign a few weeks ago, and says he plan to donate again.
I don’t know how much I can afford, but I believe in his campaign and believe he will do great things, so I’ll do what I can. This is important.
Make sure you’re registered to vote by visiting VoteForChange.com.
And if you can find a little to spare in your budget this month, join Tim and contribute to our movement for change. Because Tim’s right – this is important.
Late last night, Campaign Manager David Plouffe sent out the following email...
Over the weekend, John McCain's top adviser announced their plan to stop engaging in a debate over the economy and "turn the page" to more direct, personal attacks on Barack Obama. In the middle of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, they want to change the subject from the central question of this election. Perhaps because the policies McCain supported these past eight years and wants to continue are pretty hard to defend. But it's not just McCain's role in the current crisis that they're avoiding. The backward economic philosophy and culture of corruption that helped create the current crisis are looking more and more like the other major financial crisis of our time. During the savings and loan crisis of the late '80s and early '90s, McCain's political favors and aggressive support for deregulation put him at the center of the fall of Lincoln Savings and Loan, one of the largest in the country. More than 23,000 investors lost their savings. Overall, the savings and loan crisis required the federal government to bail out the savings of hundreds of thousands of families and ultimately cost American taxpayers $124 billion. Sound familiar? In that crisis, John McCain and his political patron, Charles Keating, played central roles that ultimately landed Keating in jail for fraud and McCain in front of the Senate Ethics Committee. The McCain campaign has tried to avoid talking about the scandal, but with so many parallels to the current crisis, McCain's Keating history is relevant and voters deserve to know the facts -- and see for themselves the pattern of poor judgment by John McCain. So at noon Eastern on Monday, October 6th, we're releasing a 13-minute documentary about the scandal called "Keating Economics: John McCain and the Making of a Financial Crisis" -- it will be available at KeatingEconomics.com, along with background information that every voter should know. Watch a preview right now and share it with your friends. The point of the film and the web site is that John McCain still hasn't learned his lesson. And this time, McCain's bankrupt economic philosophy has put our economy at the brink of collapse and put millions of Americans at risk of losing their homes. Watch the video to see why John McCain's failed philosophy and poor judgment is a recipe for deepening the crisis: http://my.barackobama.com/keatingvideo It's no wonder John McCain would rather spend the last month of this election smearing Barack's character instead of talking about the top priority issue for voters. But if we work together, we can make sure the focus stays on the economy -- and how to fix it. Please forward this email to everyone you know. Thanks, David David Plouffe Campaign Manager Obama for America
Below is a special preview of the 13-minute documentary will be live at noon Eastern today at www.KeatingEconomics.com:
From the Los Angeles Times:
Speaking to thousands of voters Sunday afternoon at Asheville High School, the Democratic nominee argued that McCain shares President Bush's economic philosophy. "Sen. McCain and his operatives are gambling that they can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance," Obama said. "They'd rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up. That's what you do when you're out of touch, out of ideas and running out of time." ... In North Carolina, Obama warned that his opponents wanted to change the subject. "His campaign has announced that they plan to, and I quote, turn the page on the discussion about our economy and spend the final weeks of this campaign launching Swift Boat-style attacks on me," he said, referring to a group known as the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. ..."The American people are too smart for that," Obama said Sunday. "On Nov. 4 you and I are going to turn the page, not on talking about the economy; we're going to the turn the page on the disastrous economic policies of George W. Bush and John McCain." ...Obama arrived in this town Saturday night to prepare for his debate with McCain in Nashville on Tuesday night.
Speaking to thousands of voters Sunday afternoon at Asheville High School, the Democratic nominee argued that McCain shares President Bush's economic philosophy. "Sen. McCain and his operatives are gambling that they can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance," Obama said. "They'd rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up. That's what you do when you're out of touch, out of ideas and running out of time."
... In North Carolina, Obama warned that his opponents wanted to change the subject. "His campaign has announced that they plan to, and I quote, turn the page on the discussion about our economy and spend the final weeks of this campaign launching Swift Boat-style attacks on me," he said, referring to a group known as the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. ..."The American people are too smart for that," Obama said Sunday. "On Nov. 4 you and I are going to turn the page, not on talking about the economy; we're going to the turn the page on the disastrous economic policies of George W. Bush and John McCain." ...Obama arrived in this town Saturday night to prepare for his debate with McCain in Nashville on Tuesday night.
From the Blude Ridge Times-News:
A roar went up from the overflow crowd as Obama came down the steps leading into the stadium, greeting people as he made his way up to the stage. “I can tell this is God’s country as I look at this day that the Lord has made,” he said. “What a spectacular place to be in Asheville, North Carolina.” North Carolina is a battleground state for Obama as he took the opportunity at the rally to give support to another Democratic candidate, State Sen. Kay Hagan, who is running for the U.S. Senate against Sen. Elizabeth Dole. The economy was a focus of Obama’s remarks to the crowd as he noted the issue and its effect on everyday people. “We are facing the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression,” he said. “You’ve seen your incomes go down as the price of just about everything has gone up.” He added that everyday Americans don’t have to be told through ads or newspaper articles about the current economic problems because “you’re living them.” ...“We don’t need another president who doesn’t get it,” Obama said. ...Obama outlined his plan for making health care more accessible to Americans by reducing prescription drug prices; focusing on preventative programs such as smoking cessation and weight loss programs; reducing waste and inefficiency by using technology to reduce paperwork; and having the government pick up the tab for some of the more catastrophic illnesses. Under his plan, Obama said people can still use the health care plan they have, still visit the doctor they wish to see, or if they want to change their health care plan, they can do that as well. He said “the only difference is, costs will go down.” He added that he would cover the costs of the $65 billion per year program by “ending George Bush’s tax breaks on those making a quarter of a million dollars a year.” Obama said that under his plan, people would not be turned away if they had a pre-existing condition and promised that health care would be accessible for all by the end of his first term in office. “This is one of the great moral crises of our time,” Obama said. “It’s not who we are.” ...Canton resident Josh Batenhorst, a teacher at ArtSpace, a charter school in Swannanoa, said he was glad to see the “groundswell of support” for Obama in North Carolina. “His stance on education and his plan to cut taxes for the middle class are what I like about him,” Batenhorst said, adding that Obama is the “first person I’ve ever donated money to before. I used to think there was no difference between a Democrat and a Republican, but this year, I do.”
From the Richmond Times Dispatch:
Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., told a Henrico County audience yesterday that Sen. Barack Obama is best equipped to correct the abuses that led to the $700 billion Wall Street bailout. "Who do you think is going to do a better job of protecting the taxpayer, putting into place the reforms, the regulation, the oversight to make sure this never happens again?" Bayh asked a crowd of 150 in an outdoor plaza at J.R. Tucker High School. Bayh said Sen. John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, "wants to deregulate health care so the same thing can happen to health care that happened to the financial markets." Bayh filled in for Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic vice presidential nominee. Early in his 15-minute stump speech, Bayh said he had just learned that Bonny Jean Jacobs, the mother of Biden's wife, Jill, had died. "I know them well enough . . . to know that what they would want to say is that they appreciate your thoughts and prayers, but they want us to stay focused on doing right by our state and [by] this country," he said...
From the Washington Post:
As the deadline for voter registration arrives today in many states, Sen. Barack Obama's campaign is poised to benefit from a wave of newcomers to the rolls in key states in numbers that far outweigh any gains made by Republicans. In the past year, the rolls have expanded by about 4 million voters in a dozen key states -- 11 Obama targets that were carried by George W. Bush in 2004 (Ohio, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Indiana, Missouri, Colorado, Iowa, Nevada and New Mexico) plus Pennsylvania, the largest state carried by Sen. John F. Kerry that Sen. John McCain is targeting. In Florida, Democratic registration gains this year are more than double those made by Republicans; in Colorado and Nevada the ratio is 4 to 1, and in North Carolina it is 6 to 1. Even in states with nonpartisan registration, the trend is clear -- of the 310,000 new voters in Virginia, a disproportionate share live in Democratic strongholds. ...The Obama campaign says it expects the numbers of new voters in swing states to swell even more later this month as elections offices process the tens of thousands of registrations still pouring in. And it exudes confidence about its ability to turn the new voters out with a vigorous follow-up operation. "This a lesson we learned. The old-fashioned way of registering voters was to stand on the corner of the street, stand on the campus quad and register one by one, which we still do," said Jon Carson, the campaign's national field director. "But another important component is getting people the information they need to participate." Obama, who led a major voter drive in Chicago in 1992, has stressed voter registration from the outset of his campaign, seeing younger or disaffected Americans as a crucial pool of support. The campaign intensified its outreach over the summer, dispatching hundreds of staff members and volunteers to states with large percentages of unregistered voters.
Most of you are already registered to vote. Many of you voted for Barack in the primaries, and some of you have already early voted for Barack Obama for president. But all of you know someone who isn't registered.
The deadline to register in many states is midnight tomorrow (Monday) night. Deadlines in the remaining states follow shortly after. This will be an historic election, one of the most important of our lives. It will also be a incredibly close election.
Tonight there is nothing more important that you can do than reach out to that friend our family member who isn't registered to let them know that this is their last chance to be part of this election.
It only takes a minute.
You can use our invite form to email friends and family to let them know about VoteForChange.com, where they can find all the information they'll need to register before the deadline.
If you have a Facebook profile, you can use our Obama Facebook application to send voter registration reminders to your friends in just seconds.
If you have an iPhone, you can download our free Obama 08 iPhone application, which organizes the numbers in your phonebook by state and helps you keep track of who you've contacted.
Or you can just pick up a phone, or send an email on your own. It doesn't matter how you do it; what matters is that you do it.
As Greg in Herriman, New York explained earlier this evening in the comments:
TRUE STORY. Close friend of mine, very intelligent, after 4 years of marriage, discovered that her thoughtful news-watching husband was NOT registered to vote.TRUE STORY. Political activist friend of mine, always talking intelligently about political maneuvers and the mechanics of government, DOESN'T ever bother to vote.I know you don't think you need to consider this, but there are people you know that you'd bet a paycheck are registered to vote, that are not! Trust me on this.Ask!Ask tonight!Be kind & humble, but ask.
Be humble, be kind, but ask tonight.
You've been busy this week -- knocking on doors, calling battleground states, and registering voters before the voter registration deadlines close.
Ginny from Merritt Island, Florida tells us why she's volunteering for Obama:
I am a 62-year-old grandmother of eight and have not felt so hopeful about our country since JFK. I spent yesterday manning our local campaign office phone banks and feel that I have contributed to the change that we need. I want change for the sake of my children and grandchildren.
Send your own Obama photos and stories to blog@barackobama.com and let us know what you're doing in your community to bring change.
Last week Missouri political leaders, energy experts and local advocates of energy independence toured Missouri for four days as part of Missouri Energy Independence Tour. Members of the tour spoke about alternative energies that can be implemented in America and how Barack will work to break our dependence on foreign oil.
Dan Kammen, a policy advisor for Barack, joined Tom Carnahan, the president of Wind Capital group, to visit Rock Port. Rock Port is the first community in the US to become completely energy independent. Both men focused on the turbines and the wind power that generates electricity throughout the community.
Tom told Dan the achievement the turbines have made...
If you look at the meters, you'll often see something remarkable in this business: they're running backwards. On many days, we actually generate more energy than we can use. That means we get to sell the surplus back to the power companies, saving the community even more.
Dan remarked about the importance of implementing these strategies...
We haven't had a real progressive energy policy in this country for over twenty years... Making America energy independent is going to require more than just new energy sources, it's going to take new energy in Washington to make it a reality. We have that in Barack.
After Rock Port, Dan took the tour to Conception to show the members of the tour the Conception Abbey, one of Dan's favorite projects.
The Abbey itself is a beautiful structure that stands out atop the northwestern Missouri landscape. Late last year, the Capital Wind Group completed the construction of a small wind farm in the area surrounding the Abbey. He gestured at the turbines in the background and explained how this had provided not only a wellspring of jobs and interest in the area, but also has become a new source of tax revenue for the area. Those taxes have gone towards improving schools and infrastructure in the surrounding community.As Ken continued to outline the benefits to the community, one of the monks came out to greet the group. After some brief introductions he joined the discussion and extolled the values of this environmentally friendly form of energy. The members of the Abbey had blessed the wind farm earlier in the year, and according to the friar, they've really taken to it. "I haven't heard any complaints. Everyone loves it."
The next day the tour traveled to Missouri Western State University in St. Joseph. Students, undecided voters and local residents gathered at an informal town hall discussion on energy independence.
After some brief opening remarks and reflections from the panel, the audience began to ask questions and offer their own thoughts. One man sitting near the back indicated that upon being informed of this discussion, he got off his tractor and came straight to the auditorium."I was out in the field when I got word, and I just had to come be a part of this. I'm a proud investor in Lifeline foods, one of the few production outlets totally owned by independent farmers. Our idea was, you put in your share, and you get something back for it. We took our time, and we did ethanol right. We produce food from corn, for numerous manufacturers like Frito Lay and then use the by products, which would normally be tossed, to create ethanol. It's a method that benefits the farmer directly and doesn't run up the price of food."The panel applauded the methods employed by Lifeline, indicating that it set an example for the rest of the industry. Still, Dan Kammen noted, there is no one clear path to energy independence. Everything must be explored. He stood up and took a piece of chalk in his hand, writing the "$700 Billion" on the blackboard. "What does this number mean to you?" As members of the audience shot back with various things, including bail out, Dan nodded and underlined the number."700 Billion dollars is not only the proposed amount for the bail out, but it's also the amount of money we spend EVERY YEAR on energy in this country. That's by far the single biggest industry in the world, yet energy companies only invest less than one half of one perfect of their revenues into research. By comparison, the three biggest bio tech companies invest around 15 percent of their earnings back into research.To do this right, you have to explore all the possibilities. We can't simple pick one standard and run with it, that's the wrong path. In order to really achieve energy independence, we need to look at all forms of bio-fuels. Corn and cellulosic based ethanol, solar, wind and many others."Tom Carnahan nodded in agreement and later built on that sentiment."I heard Sarah Palin on the radio today saying that Obama and Biden are fools for wanting to invest in alternative energies because they're unproven. Well, my mom always tells me the story of how she held me up to the television when they showed the first man setting foot on the moon. We didn't know for sure that we could put on the moon when we started, but we had a leader with the vision to challenge our industry and our industry to help make that a reality. We can have that moment again. Barack is challenging this nation to become energy independent, and to believes by investing 150 billion dollars over the next ten years, we can make great strides towards achieving yet another American dream."
On the last day of the tour, the team traveled to Centerville to visit the Show-Me-Energy Cooperative. The Director, Steve Flick, told the team that when he started the cooperative no bank in town would loan him money or invest in the project. He explained the project as they walked by an assembly line of plastic bags.
These bags escalated towards a spout that would soon fill them with fuel pellets. These tiny pellets, about the size of an apple stem, might look unremarkable at first glance but the energy they possess could be a huge step towards energy independence.“We took our time with this, made sure we did it right… All of our pellets are produced from things that would normally be tossed away and considered waste.” The biomass fuel pellets are made from non-grain bearing crops of cellulose like switch grass, cornstalks, cereal straws, fescue straw and other agricultural residues or energy crops that have no food value. This allows the farmers involved to generate additional revenue from the crops and plants they were already growing. The pellets themselves can be used in furnaces to heat homes, and have also been utilized to generate electricity. That’s an exciting development that with the proper funding and research could have large applications moving forward.Dan Kammen was impressed by the operation. “It seems you really took the whole picture into account here. ‘Cradle to Grave’ carbon output especially, which is something that Senator Obama wants to make standard.” He marveled at some of their practices, such as avoiding the use of water in adhesion and asked what Steve felt the government could do to help advance these sorts of technologies. Steve looked up at the whirring machinery and harkened back to his earlier statement about financial backing."Not only did we work alongside University of Missouri in Rolla to develop this technology… We were also lucky enough to get some government grants and subsidies to make this a reality. Without that, this never may have happened. So we need a president and a government body that sees the long term value in what we’re doing, and is willing to make those investments."
Barack has a detailed plan for energy independence in America. Visit our environmentalist page for more information and to see a side-by-side comparison with John McCain's energy policies.
"When we are unified and not divided there is nothing that we cannot achieve." -- Barack Obama
Liz Allen is a registered nurse in the Cardiovascular Unit at Mission Hospital, here in Asheville. What Liz hates most is the waste. So many people who end up in the intensive care unit she works in are there because they don't have insurance. When people don't have health insurance they usually develop conditions that are far more dangerous -- and far more expensive to treat. It just doesn't make sense, especially at a time when Americans are suffering under the rising cost of everything in their lives, not just health care, but food and gas as well.
In her introduction at Asheville High School, home of the fighting Cougars, Liz made clear why she supports Barack. He is the only candidate looking out for needs the middle class.
She declared her support in from of about 28,000 folks (according to Captain Sarah Benson of the Asheville Fire Deptartment) and could not have been a better prelude to Barack himself.
So many people, like Liz Allen, are working hard to help others, even as they themselves are just scraping by. It's the only way this country can regain it's strength. More than that, as Barack says, it's who we are. Find out how you can help this movement for change across America.
Here is a clip from today's speech in Asheville, in which Barack pledged to keep on talking about the issues that matter and to continue fighting for the middle class.
Arun ChaudharyOctober 5th , 2008Asheville, North Carolina
Tomorrow is the last day for One-Stop Early Voting in Ohio. If you are an Ohio resident and you are not registered to vote, go to Ohio.VoteforChange.com right now to register before tomorrow's deadline. At Ohio.VoteforChange.com you will also find your early vote location.
Campaign Manager David Plouffe recorded a special video for Ohio residents on the importance of voting early in the Buckeye State.
One-Stop Early Voting is the easiest way to register and vote - helping the campaign start our Get Out The Vote program between now and November 4.
Vote today. And make sure everyone you know is registered by tomorrow.
Hip hop artist Jay-Z and rock legend Bruce Springsteen played shows in Michigan and Pennsylvania last night to help bring attention to voter registration deadlines. As part of their shows, they encouraged the crowds to register to vote and to help over the next 30 days.
Here are some news clips of the concerts...
From the Detroit Free Press:
The Obama army was charging ahead Saturday with its latest get-out-the-vote effort, giving free concert tickets to see Grammy Award-winning MC and music mogul Jay-Z at Cobo Center on Saturday night to those who registered to vote. Since Wednesday, the campaign has given out about 12,000 tickets. The final 500 tickets were given out Saturday at registration rallies in Detroit and Pontiac. Obama volunteers were so busy Saturday at his Michigan campaign headquarters in Detroit's New Center that there wasn't even time to change the campaign's countdown to the election sign, which still read "34" days to go. There were 31 days to go as of Saturday. "Every person we bring in to the process increases our chances," said Brent Colburn, Obama's Michigan campaign spokesman. ...Campaign staff said volunteers will continue to knock on doors and reach out to voters in high-traffic areas until the Monday deadline. Until then, Jay-Z will be the Michigan campaign's biggest booster.
From the Detroit News:
It didn't take long for Jay-Z to bring his own brand of politics to his free, Obama for America-sponsored "Operation Registration" concert at Cobo Arena Saturday night. "This is the most important election in your lifetime," the superstar rapper told the crowd of around 10,000, two songs into his kinetic 75-minute set. ...I'm not here to tell you who to vote for. I'm voting for Barack Obama, but that's just me." ...Saturday's concert was pegged to Monday's Michigan voter registration deadline. Those who don't register to vote by Monday will not be eligible to vote in November's presidential election. ...Brent Colburn, a spokesman with Obama's Michigan campaign, said Saturday's event was successful in registering thousands of voters, though he said specific figures were not available. He said around one in three people who received tickets to the concert registered to vote, as volunteers were armed with voter registration forms both at the ticket giveaways and in line at Saturday's concert. ..."I'm so proud to be an American tonight," Jay said near the close of the show, telling the crowd this election was the first time he'd felt like a part of the political process, and that he now believes the cliche that people can grow up to be whatever they want. "It's hard to say it's much bigger than the presidency, but it is... the promise and the hope are bigger than anything, so everyone please go out and vote." Chants of "O-bam-a! O-bam-a!" broke out during the show, and Jay shouted out "O!" several times during lyrics where he normally says "Hov," one of his nicknames. "Remember, Oct. 6 is the deadline, Nov. 4 is the day we make history," he said before exiting the stage at 10:45 p.m. "I'm not telling you what to do, I'm just telling you what I'm gonna do."
From the Philadelphia Inquirer:
Bruce Springsteen had pounded through his second song as though his acoustic guitar were a pickax, then handed it off to an assistant. The rocker in rolled-up plaid sleeves slung another guitar over his shoulder and tossed out a raspy line that made clear to the thousands on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway how he feels about Barack Obama. "We tried this four years ago," said Springsteen, who held concerts for then-Democratic nominee John Kerry and headlined yesterday's get-out-the-vote rally for Obama in Center City. "This time, we're winning." Though organized by the Obama campaign in just a few days, the concert, at 20th and the Parkway, drew an estimated 50,000 people. According to Obama staff, it also added 21,000 new ground troops to the Illinois senator's campaign effort in must-win Pennsylvania. The Democratic presidential candidate's potent ground operation was on display up and down the Parkway, with volunteers at almost every turn collecting personal information about concertgoers and doling out voter-registration forms. The goal was to increase registration in the state by tomorrow's deadline while luring new volunteers as the campaign enters what Gov. Rendell said yesterday would be a "meaner," "tougher" and "dirtier" final few weeks against Republican John McCain.
From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
Bruce Springsteen played a seven-song acoustic set at a rally in Philadelphia yesterday to help the campaign of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama register voters and recruit volunteers. The rally, planned by the Obama campaign a week ago, drew tens of thousands of people to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Springsteen said that America remains a house of dreams for some, but that too many people have given up on the promise of fairness and equality. "I've spent 35 years writing about America and its people and the meaning of the American promise -- a promise handed down right here in this city," said Springsteen, whose songs often depict down-on-their-luck, working-class dreamers. "Our everyday citizens ... have justifiably lost faith in its meaning." Springsteen approached the Obama campaign and asked to help out, an Obama aide said. Springsteen cited the Iraq war, the recent economic turmoil and Hurricane Katrina as examples of the Bush administration's failures.
Donna, 61, from Columbia, South Carolina, is proud that she could have an impact on this election.
She stared out slow, making some calls in the spring and getting more involved right before the South Carolina primary.
Since then she’s become a dedicated volunteer – volunteering as precinct captain, canvassing, phonebanking, and even hosting out-of-state volunteers at her home.
Hosting volunteers is really neat because even times when I didn’t have time to volunteer, I still felt connected and felt like I was doing something for the movement.
“At this point, I’m pretty much caught up in Obama fever,” she says. A registered nurse with two sons in their 30s, Donna had never volunteered on a presidential campaign before, and had only donated once to a gubernatorial candidate.
Until the Obama campaign, I didn’t know that people really gave small amounts to campaigns. I thought you had to give thousands. I didn’t realize people like me could just give a little. But in the Obama campaign, every little bit helps!To ask people to give what they can, when they can, is so reasonable. I contribute because, to me, it’s almost like a vote. It demonstrates to other people just how much your little part of the effort makes a difference. That’s why I’ve continued to donate when I could – I can see how much a difference my effort is making.
Until the Obama campaign, I didn’t know that people really gave small amounts to campaigns. I thought you had to give thousands. I didn’t realize people like me could just give a little. But in the Obama campaign, every little bit helps!
Donna contributes because she sees how much the economy and the healthcare crisis are affecting her community. “Being a nurse, I see a lot of patients who don’t have insurance or are underinsured. I’ve seen a lot of the issues that come up with Medicaid and the problems people face getting the help they need.”It’s even affecting her own family.
One of my sons owns a small construction business and he has to pay for his own insurance with a huge deductible. I see his family not going to the doctor when they should. And my other son bought his first home a few years ago and had a sub-prime loan. He lost his job recently and has been struggling to keep his head above water and keep his home. But I think this is all something we can fix with President Obama in office.
Donna’s sons weren’t going to vote, but on primary day they called her to tell her they went to the polls for Obama. “I was so proud,” she says. Her two Republican siblings are voting to Obama too. Donna is excited to bring more people into the Obama movement.
Obama tells people they need to have hope, faith, in America. He asks us to have faith in ourselves and that we have the power to work together and make things happen. With him, it’s not about him – it’s all about us.
Join the movement. Team up with other supporters and help make things happen in Washington.
Barack spoke to residents of Asheville, North Carolina this afternoon about the need to continue focusing on the issues over the next 30 days. One issue that Barack wants to continue talking about is health care. He specifically told the crowd about the dangers of John McCain's out of touch health care plan.
Now I know that at this moment, when we stand in the midst of a serious economic crisis, some might ask how we can afford to focus on health care. Major financial institutions have collapsed. Families across America are struggling. And it’s clear that the rescue package we just passed in Congress isn’t the end of what we need to do to fix our economy – it’s just the beginning. Because contrary to what Senator McCain says, the fundamentals of our economy are still not strong. And we’ve got to address those fundamentals right now. In other words, the question isn’t how we can afford to focus on health care – but how we can afford not to. Because in order to fix our economic crisis, we need to fix our health care system too. Let’s not forget, it’s not just small businesses and families who are suffering. Some of the largest corporations in America – including major American car makers – are fighting to compete because of high health care costs. They’re watching their foreign competitors prosper – unburdened by these costs – as they struggle to create the good jobs we need to get our economy back on track. ...And you’d think that anyone running for president would understand this. You’d think any candidate for the highest office in the land would have a plan to achieve these critically important goals. Well, if you think that, you haven’t met my opponent, Senator John McCain. Now, it’s not that he doesn’t care about what people are going through. I just think he doesn’t know. That’s the only reason I can think of that he’d propose a health care plan that is so radical, so out of touch with what you’re facing, and so out of line with our basic values....Right now, different states have different rules about what insurance companies have to cover. Senator McCain will let companies avoid these rules. He’ll let them cherry pick the state where they’re based – and sell plans anywhere in America. It’s the starting gun for a race to the bottom. Insurance companies will rush to set up shop in states with the fewest protections for patients – states where they don’t have to cover things like mammograms, vaccinations and maternity care. Now what does this mean for folks here in North Carolina? Well, this state requires insurance companies to cover mental health care, cancer screening, contraception, treatment for alcoholism and more. And here in North Carolina, you have the right to appeal when your HMO refuses to cover the treatment you need. Under John McCain’s plan, insurance companies wouldn’t have to follow any of these rules. These are commonsense protections to make sure that you and your doctor – not insurance company bureaucrats – are making decisions about your health. And John McCain wants to let insurance companies go around them. So while Senator McCain talks a lot about preserving states’ rights – when it comes down to it, his plan is all about protecting insurance companies’ rights. Well, I think it’s time we started putting the health of our families before the profits of our insurance companies – and that’s what I’m going to do as President.
Read Barack's full remarks, as prepared for delivery...
Barack is currently holding a Change We Need rally in Asheville, North Carolina. You can watch the event live below...
[UPDATE] This event has ended. Check back for more coverage from our road team.
Barack Obama will be in Asheville, North Carolina this afternoon for a rally (which you can watch live on BarackObama.com/live) where he will directly address John McCain's plan to "turn the page" on the economic crisis and instead focus on negative campaign tactics. Earlier today, the Obama-Biden campaign released an excerpt from Senator Obama's prepared remarks:
With just a month to go until election day, I know you’ve all been hearing a lot about politics out here in North Carolina. I know you’ve been seeing a lot of ads, and getting a lot of calls, and reading a lot about this election in the newspaper. But none of you need the papers, or ads on TV, or folks like me to tell you what this election is all about. You know what’s at stake. You’re living it. Here in Asheville, and across America, you’ve seen your incomes go down as the price of just about everything has gone way up. It’s harder to pay the bills. Harder to send your kids to college. Harder to save enough to retire.And on Friday, we learned that we’d lost another 159,000 American jobs in September. It was the ninth straight month of job losses – more than three quarters of a million this year, including 24,000 here in North Carolina. And it came just as we finished a week in which our financial markets teetered on the brink of disaster.Yet instead of addressing these crises, Senator McCain’s campaign has announced that they plan to turn the page on the discussion about our economy and spend the final weeks of this campaign launching Swiftboat-style attacks on me.Think about that for a second. Turn the page on the economy? We’re facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and John McCain wants us to “turn the page?” Well, I know the policies he’s supported these past eight years and wants to continue are pretty hard to defend. I can understand why Senator McCain would want to “turn the page” and ignore this economy. But I also know this:You’re trying to pay your bills every week and stay above the water – you can’t ignore it.You’re worrying about whether your job will be there a month from now – you can’t ignore it. You’re worrying about whether you can pay your mortgage and stay in your house – you can’t turn the page.In 30 days you are going to elect the next president, and you need and deserve a president who is going to wake up every day and fight for you, and fight for the middle class, and fight to create jobs and grow our economy again -- not another president who doesn’t get it. Not another President who ignores our problems. Not more of the same.Senator McCain and his operatives are gambling that he can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance. They’d rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up. It’s what you do when you’re out of touch, out of ideas, and running out of time. I want you to know that I’m going to keep on talking about the issues that matter – about the economy and health care and education and energy. I’m going to keep on standing up for hard working families. We’re not going to let John McCain distract us from what we need to do to move this country forward. Because November 4th, you and I are going to turn the page on the disastrous economic policies of George W. Bush and John McCain.
With just a month to go until election day, I know you’ve all been hearing a lot about politics out here in North Carolina. I know you’ve been seeing a lot of ads, and getting a lot of calls, and reading a lot about this election in the newspaper.
But none of you need the papers, or ads on TV, or folks like me to tell you what this election is all about. You know what’s at stake. You’re living it.
Here in Asheville, and across America, you’ve seen your incomes go down as the price of just about everything has gone way up. It’s harder to pay the bills. Harder to send your kids to college. Harder to save enough to retire.
And on Friday, we learned that we’d lost another 159,000 American jobs in September. It was the ninth straight month of job losses – more than three quarters of a million this year, including 24,000 here in North Carolina. And it came just as we finished a week in which our financial markets teetered on the brink of disaster.
Yet instead of addressing these crises, Senator McCain’s campaign has announced that they plan to turn the page on the discussion about our economy and spend the final weeks of this campaign launching Swiftboat-style attacks on me.
Think about that for a second. Turn the page on the economy? We’re facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and John McCain wants us to “turn the page?” Well, I know the policies he’s supported these past eight years and wants to continue are pretty hard to defend. I can understand why Senator McCain would want to “turn the page” and ignore this economy.
But I also know this:
You’re trying to pay your bills every week and stay above the water – you can’t ignore it.
You’re worrying about whether your job will be there a month from now – you can’t ignore it.
You’re worrying about whether you can pay your mortgage and stay in your house – you can’t turn the page.
In 30 days you are going to elect the next president, and you need and deserve a president who is going to wake up every day and fight for you, and fight for the middle class, and fight to create jobs and grow our economy again -- not another president who doesn’t get it. Not another President who ignores our problems. Not more of the same.
Senator McCain and his operatives are gambling that he can distract you with smears rather than talk to you about substance. They’d rather try to tear our campaign down than lift this country up. It’s what you do when you’re out of touch, out of ideas, and running out of time.
I want you to know that I’m going to keep on talking about the issues that matter – about the economy and health care and education and energy. I’m going to keep on standing up for hard working families. We’re not going to let John McCain distract us from what we need to do to move this country forward.
Because November 4th, you and I are going to turn the page on the disastrous economic policies of George W. Bush and John McCain.
Today the Obama-Biden campaign announced an integrated effort to highlight the dangers of John McCain's healthcare proposals across the country. In addition to Senator Obama’s speech in North Carolina, the campaign released a fourth 30-second TV ad, "Coin", and is holding a conference call with Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius (former Kansas Insurance Commissioner), Ohio and Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioners.
Finally, the campaign is holding nearly two dozen events in conjunction with the DNC and Democratic state parties across nine battelground states to highlight John McCain’s plan to tax and deregulate health care instead of fix it.
You can read the memo detailing the five pitfalls of the McCain Health Plan.
You can also read how John McCain is putting the interests of insurance companies ahead of American families.
The ad, "Coin", begins airing on Monday in key states across the country.
Today, the Obama-Biden campaign released a new 30-second TV ad, “This Year”, which responds to John McCain’s plan to “turn the page” on the economic crisis and instead launch dishonorable, dishonest “assaults” against Barack Obama.
However, America’s struggling families can’t simply turn the page on this economy and they can’t afford another President who is this out of touch.
Learn the three things that everyone should know about John McCain's record on the economy.
An estimated 18,000 people crammed into a riverfront park yesterday to hear Sen. Barack Obama say he would fix an American health-care system that tends to work against those who need it most. Obama, placing a new focus on health care amid the nation's economic turmoil, dismissed Sen. John McCain's plan as narrow, financially burdensome and more helpful to insurance companies than to the insured. "I'm not saying [McCain] doesn't care what people are going through," Obama told an enthusiastic crowd at Victory Landing Park. "I'm saying he doesn't know." Obama devoted more than 10 minutes of his speech to criticizing McCain's health-care plan, which would provide each family with a $5,000 tax credit and deregulate the insurance market in an effort to drive costs down through competition. Obama said McCain's plan would take back its tax savings by taxing health-care benefits -- "an old Washington bait-and-switch." ...On Tuesday, Elizabeth Edwards, wife of former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, will headline a news conference at the state Capitol to talk about how McCain's health-care plan would affect Virginia. In Newport News yesterday, Obama said his mother died of ovarian cancer in a hospital bed while fighting with an insurance company that refused to pay for her treatments, saying she had a pre-existing condition. Health-care reform, he said, "isn't political to me -- it's personal." ...Hundreds of people queued up before dawn for the midday event. Volunteers moved through the crowd registering new voters ahead of Monday's 5 p.m. deadline. ...Obama promised to confront drug companies about unfairly high prices and insurance companies about "discriminating" against people with cancer and other catastrophic illnesses. He said his health-care plan would help small businesses pay for costly treatments. He said he would finance his plan by modernizing an old and ineffective health-records system and by ending some of the tax cuts for wealthy people that were pushed by President Bush. Obama said deregulating the insurance market is as bad an idea as bank deregulation, which led to the current economic crisis.
From the Wall Street Journal:
Sen. Obama painted his opponent's health-care plan as "radical" and said the free-market approach would lead to at least 20 million Americans losing the insurance they rely on from their employer. ... Sen. Obama spent Saturday ripping apart his opponent's health-care plan. Sen. McCain's plan would provide a $2,500 per person or $5,000 per family refundable tax credit to find coverage. In exchange, employees would pay income taxes on the value of health insurance as part of their compensation. "He tells you that he'll give you a tax credit of $2,500 per person – $5,000 per family – to help you pay for your insurance and health care costs," Sen. Obama said at a waterfront rally of 18,000 here on Saturday. "But like those ads for prescription drugs, you have to read the fine print to learn the rest of the story." ... "You see, Senator McCain would pay for his plan, in part, by taxing your health care benefits for the first time in history," Sen. Obama said. "I reject the radical idea that government has no role to play in protecting ordinary Americans. ... The deadline to register to vote in many battleground states including Virginia is Monday, a crucial deadline for Sen. Obama who is largely staking his campaign on its ability to bring in new voters.
From the Associated Press:
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday called Republican presidential candidate John McCain not a maverick but a "mimic" of President Bush. Clinton made the remarks at a Human Rights Campaign dinner, where she was filling in for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's running mate, Joe Biden. Biden canceled his weekend campaign events because his wife's mother is ill. Clinton spoke by satellite from Los Angeles to a few thousand people who attended the national gay rights group event. Clinton said Biden called and asked her to fill in for him because of the family emergency. Rather than sharing her thoughts, she said, "I want to share with you the eloquent remarks that Joe had prepared." Clinton sought to tie McCain to Bush, saying the Arizona senator offered voters "more of the same." "He's not a maverick. He's a mimic," she said. She noted that McCain doesn't support extending job discrimination and hate-crimes laws to cover sexual orientation and supports the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. ...She said Saturday that Americans can choose in the November election whether the nation takes steps toward "securing equality and dignity for all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity." "Or we can choose four more years of the same failed policies, four more years of the same small-minded governance, four more years that look just like the last eight," she added.
From the Boston Globe:
Last week, as the economy slipped further toward recession, the momentum seemed to be shifting in places such as Nevada, a swing state that went for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004 and has been seen as promising turf for Senator John McCain for months. With the highest foreclosure rate in the nation, a tourism industry damaged by rising food and energy prices, and an unemployment rate at a 23-year high, Nevada is, according to polls, edging Obama's way. The Real Clear Politics average of national polls showed the Illinois senator up by 1.8 percent. In interviews around the Reno area last week ...voter after voter said that in this economy, they were willing to give [Senator Obama] the benefit of the doubt. "He's younger, he's more in tune with what's going on in America, he's got young kids," said Darcie Arnold, a 53-year-old lifelong Republican who recently switched her party registration to Democrat. The race in Nevada seems destined to be close. Thanks to exponential population growth, this land of desert, mountains, and blinking casino strips has become politically unpredictable in the last generation. Bill Clinton won here twice, before the two narrow Bush wins this decade. ... A combination of rapid growth and aggressive voter registration efforts has resulted in Democrats turning a disadvantage of 3,000 registered voters in 2004 to an advantage of 80,000 voters this year. Obama has been campaigning here aggressively since the January caucuses. ... The pain is being felt across the economy. At her pet-grooming shop in Sparks, Kari Williams, 33, has helped find homes for some 30 dogs belonging to clients who could no longer afford to care for their animals. Business has slowed, and after five prosperous years, she has fallen behind on her commercial rent. ... Williams, an undeclared voter, is leaning in favor of Obama, partly because she considers Palin unqualified, and partly because she thinks McCain is too friendly to big business. "Obama at least knows what it's like to be a normal person - he grew up that way," she said. "I don't think McCain knows how the rest of us live." ... Ron Berry, a 62-year-old retired health inspector, cashed out on his home in Northern California a few years ago and bought a large home east of Reno. But his fledgling concession business isn't prospering in Nevada. He wants to go back, but he cannot sell his house. Berry despises the "culture of greed" in the mortgage and banking industry that led to the suffering around him. He worries that "the fat cats" will emerge unscathed, while "the common person gets the bill." "Yeah, I'm scared," he said. Berry is a Democrat, but he voted for Ronald Reagan twice, and he says he would be tempted to back McCain this time. A Vietnam veteran, he feels a deep kinship with other veterans. He was actually serving on the USS Oriskany on the day McCain took off from the vessel on his last, near-fatal mission. But he plans to vote for Obama. "I love McCain, but I can't take a chance," he said. "I want change."
?uestlove and Black Thought of the Roots, in Newport News, Virginia earlier today:
Polls open in 30 days . . .
