Obama’s The One
Democrat Barack Obama, fresh from making history as the first black American to win a major party’s backing for president, is reaching out to mend fences with his defeated rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Clinton, who would have made history as the first woman to be a major-party presidential nominee, was angling to become Obama’s running mate, and her aides ramped up the speculation on that matter today.
I think a lot of her supporters would like to see her on the ticket, Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said.
But Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs cautioned that there is no deal in the works.
On Tuesday night, with an eye on the general-election campaign, Obama, in declaring victory, chose to mark the night not in a racially historic spot but in the hall in St. Paul, Minn., where John McCain will address the Republican National Convention in September as that party’s nominee.
America, this is our moment, the 46-year-old senator and one- time community organizer said in his first appearance as the Democratic nominee-in-waiting. This is our time. Our time to turn the page on the policies of the past.
He said running against Clinton had been an honor and also praised former President Bill Clinton.
Hillary Clinton has yet to acknowledge Obama’s historic victory in the bruising Democratic race and her aides – also dodging that conclusion – said on the morning talk shows that she would take a few days to decide what comes next for her.
A lot of people are asking, What does Hillary want?’ Clinton told supporters at a rally in New York. I want what I have always fought for: I want the nearly 18 million people who voted for me to be respected and heard.
Clinton praised Obama warmly, although she neither acknowledged his victory in their grueling marathon nor offered a concession of any sort.
Obama spoke by phone with her Tuesday night, and both sides predicted he and Clinton would sit down together before long.
When the dust settles and it makes sense for her, he’ll meet whenever she wants to, Gibbs said. She’s accumulated a lot of votes throughout this country. We want to make sure that we’re appealing to her voters.
Tuesday, on the final night of the primary season, Clinton won South Dakota, 55 percent to 45 percent, while Obama took Montana, 56 percent to 41 percent – plus a slew of party superdelegates who declared their support to help him clinch the nomination.
He clinched it, according to The Associated Press tally, based on primary elections, state Democratic caucuses and support from superdelegates. It took 2,118 delegates to secure the nomination at the convention in Denver this summer, and Obama had 2,154 by the AP count.
The South Dakota victory, which was unexpected, gave Clinton an excuse to buy more time to consider options, her advisers said.
Still, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a dogged Clinton supporter, recognized the brutality of the arithmetic.
I am the last of the Mohicans, but it is over, he said.
Yet because of Obama’s struggles to win over white blue-collar workers and older voters who flocked to Clinton, Rendell said he remained a little wary about the Illinois senator’s prospects.
Senator Obama is an exciting candidate, he’s smart as a whip, he’s got the backbone, he said on CNN, but he’s got some work to do, no question about it.
Obama’s Republican opponent, John McCain, meanwhile, tried to frame the fall campaign on his terms, saying, I think he has exercised very bad judgment on national security issues and others.
Obama and Clinton were both back in Washington today to address the national conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, who ran twice for the Democratic nomination in the 1980s and made what was then historic progress for a black candidate, praised Obama’s achievement in a phone interview from Serengeti National Park in northeastern Tanzania, where he is attending a meeting.
Obama’s nomination reflects phenomenal growth in America, he told The Associated Press. The dream of a promised land is being fulfilled.
He said Clinton should accept the defeat graciously and the two longtime rivals should strive for a quick reconciliation so that the party is united in the fall.
Four Democratic leaders, also eager for unity, said in a joint statement today that the voters have spoken and the remaining uncommitted superdelegates should declare their support for a candidate by Friday. They were Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean and West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin, head of the Democratic Governors Association.
Former Vice President Walter Mondale, a superdelegate who had been a Clinton support and the 1984 Democratic presidential nominee, endorsed Obama today.
The primaries behind them, Obama and McCain were drawing the battle line for a fall fight that will make history with the election of either the oldest first-term president in McCain or the first black commander in chief in Obama. In speeches marking the start of the general election, both maneuvered for the advantage with voters sour on the status quo. Both were competing beyond their party’s base, too.
The key to winning the election is independent voters and Democrats as well, McCain said in an interview on ABC’s Good Morning America today. Even so, he said I don’t think so when asked on CBS whether he’d pick a Democrat as his running mate.
Obama’s racial groundbreaking was noted everywhere from the White House to the house of his Kenyan relatives from his father’s side of the family.
White House press secretary Dana Perino said on behalf of President Bush: Senator Obama came a long way in becoming his party’s nominee. And his historic achievement reflects the fact that our country has come along way, too.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Obama’s victory an extraordinary development for the United States.
Tonight, I can stand here and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for president of the United States, Obama, 46, declared before thousands of cheering supporters at the Xcel Energy Center. His wife, Michelle, was by his side.
He spoke of having the courage and conviction to lead the free world in the footsteps of presidents Roosevelt, and Truman, and Kennedy.
He also pledged to heal partisan divisions.
What you won’t hear from this campaign or this party is the kind of politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon. … We may call ourselves Democrats and Republicans, but we are Americans first. We are always Americans first.
I face this challenge with profound humility, Obama said, and knowledge of my own limitations.
Obama also ceded no ground on the reformer mantle and cast McCain as a continuation of the unpopular Bush’s eight-year tenure.
My differences with him are not personal; they are with the policies he has proposed in this campaign, he said Tuesday. Because while John McCain can legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past, such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential campaign.
For his part, McCain welcomed Obama to the fall campaign for the White House on Tuesday with a blistering attack on his judgment and a charge that he voted to deny funds to the soldiers who have done a brilliant and brave job in Iraq.
At a prime-time event in Kenner, La., McCain shared the stage with Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who is frequently mentioned as a potential running mate. Jindal and several others spent the Memorial Day holiday at McCain’s compound in Sedona, Ariz.
A lot of people have been speculating about that, Jindal said as he warmed up a crowd of about 600 people. I can tell you the secret now: John is a great cook.
The Arizona senator mocked Obama’s promise of change for a country weary of the status quo, uttering the word change no fewer than 33 times.
He is an impressive man who makes a great first impression, McCain said. But he hasn’t been willing to make the tough calls, to challenge his party, to risk criticism from his supporters, to bring real change to Washington. I have.
In a speech intended to mark the start of the general election, the Republican defended himself against Obama’s frequent claim that McCain is running for President Bush’s third term because McCain supports the Iraq war and wants to extend the president’s tax cuts.
Voters don’t buy it, McCain said.
The American people didn’t get to know me yesterday, as they are just getting to know Senator Obama, McCain said. They know I have a long record of bipartisan problem-solving. They’ve seen me put our country before any president, before any party, before any special interest, before my own interest.
The campaign is the first in half a century in which neither a sitting president nor a vice president is running for the highest office, and the first since 1960 in which a senator will assume the White House. A fragile economy and an ongoing Iraq war, as well as matters of age and race, serve as a backdrop.
Originally published by New Era Wire Services.
(c) 2008 Intelligencer Journal. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.