Today’s the big day, the coda on the Democratic primary season. If you want to watch it online, here are some links to sites where it will be streamed live:
NPR (audio only) — You must click on the link for either media player or one of the alternate formats they offer)
Supposedly, Senator Clinton will officially “endorse Obama” and request her supporters to unite behind the presumptive candidate.
“She’ll say the stakes are high in this election and it’s imperative that the party come together behind Obama and to put a Democrat in the White House,” said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to candidly discuss the speech. […]
A CNN poll released Friday shows that the party is divided after a primary season that stretched over nearly 18 months and 57 contests.
Sixty percent of Clinton supporters said they would vote for Obama, but 17 percent said they would vote for Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee and Obama’s rival in the general election. Nearly one-quarter, 22 percent, said they would not vote at all if Clinton were not the Democrats’ nominee.
A troubling poll, even with a margin of error of + or – 7.5%. What Senator Clinton say, and even more importantly the tone in which she says it, may be critical to easing these anti-Obama Clinton supporters to rally behind him, rather than sit out the election or vote for McCain.
This will be an open thread for discussion of all the pre-speech foofahrah, the speech itself and whatever stupid shit detailed analysis the media presents regarding the speech and it’s impact after the event concludes.
Is she ever going to leave her house? It’s one thing if you’re late because you have a lot going on in a day, but I think this is about all she’s got going on today? At least this morning? Get there already and make with the media event! I don’t think fashionably late is appropriate for this.
People who are habitually late are narcissists.
Exactly. No surprise there. More time for the media to talk about her! Too bad they can’t just cut away to something totally unrelated…
Speech finally starting at 12:48 pm.
Still talking about those 18 million who voted for her.
Suspends campaign, endorses him and throws full support to him.
People booing when she asks them work as hard for him as they worked for her.
Now doing the Obama bio. Reading faster than before.
that’s an interesting endorsement sandwich description.
I think her speech was scheduled to begin at 1:00 PM
Troubling poll? too early to be meaningful before even the conventions. McSame has had a free run…People will soon get to know his flip flops and gaffes; like saying in reference to slow response to Katrina “we should be able to give bottled hot water to dehydrated babies.”
Guy speaks without thinking.
You can just feel her gritting her teeth when she’s saying something positive about Obama. Not exactly a world-class politician. IMO.
Now making the unity pitch. Still reading very quickly, much quicker than I’ve heard from her before.
Tying herself to Health care issue.
Steven D, HELP please.
What’s an easy way to transport a cartoon as this in WSJ, Noonan’s essay?
It’s too funny not to share.
Recoil Election
Go to “files” on the right hand side of the page
Copy the image of the cartoon to your desktop, than upload it to files section.
Copy the link location from the files and then use the img src=”” html code (surrounded by a < and a >) when you are ready to post.
“files” will appear in your own named box on the right side of the page.
Make that SAVE image to your desktop.
When uploading to “files” use the browse function there to find it.
thank you.
4 points for figuring that out. But for Hillary supporters I’m going to post my favorite photo of Hillary. Somebody find Obama wearing that cowboy hat!
as per Ben Smith: the rarely seen Matt Drudge in the company of Clinton consultant Tracy Sefl, is here for the end.
“Clinton’s aides blame him, as much as anyone else, for her loss.”
Bill probably hurt her chances as much as he helped. Ultimately, however, I think it was her decisions, her record, and her comments that led to her defeat.
Don’t forget that she was working with entrenched people who not only neglected to read the psyche of the American public, but didn’t know how use available technology. Worse yet, they were running as if it was the 90s.
Shout out to Bill.
She seems to be trying to not choke up more than anything else.
Not a bad speech, and she hasn’t done anything to make me angry, so I’ll take it.
NOONAN raised a toast to the Democratic Party.
it would be really something if the crowd did YES WE CAN.
Yes We Can first heard from her lips.
Still mentioning universal health care — a signal?
We Must help elect Barack Obama our President!
Must be the tag line they chose.
Is she lobbying for the VP slot with her mention of female CIC?
Thought she was cutting the edge there a little into VEEP territory.
It’s finally over.
Good unity plug there. Well done.
Speech ends on God Bless America
Did what she had to do today.
Now comes the follow through.
Olbie says there were four speeches there: she mentions Obama 6:26 minutes in. Tweety says coldest steel in speech about voting Democrat. Good balance, not too flowery. There were boos (taunting), but she eventually led the crowd there.
I liked the analysis of Olbermann and Matthews.
The speech had a good balance and she was able to move the crowd towards Obama as it went along.
photo by Melanie Burford/Dallas Morning News, via Associated Press, from here
my favorite photo of Hillary Clinton. Hendoku Iyaku means changing poison into medicine. Godspeed.
She should have taken care to make more photos like this and get them in the papers. Instead she got caught out a lot when heading toward the cameras.
I was a little worried she wouldn’t deliver today. But her speech was excellent and gracious. She said what had to be said to help unite the Democratic party and endorse Obama. It’s time to move on now and unite against McCain.