Barack Obama speaks at the Columbia Convention Center
Yesterday, Barack Obama spoke at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center in South Carolina. Me being the political junky that I am, had to go see him speak, not because I agree with him, but because he’s a presidential candidate. The event was planned to start at 5 with doors opening at 4:30 however, since the lines wrapped around the block, the event didn’t really start until 5:30.
While we waited in line outside, there were the typical protesters for organizations such as PETA, 1Sky.org, and HeatsOn.org. The 1Sky.org and HeatsOn.org were protesting global warming and handing out stickers pleading the candidates to make global warming a central issue. The ironic thing was that yesterday was one of the coldest days of the year so far. I even heard one of these protester say as they were handing out stickers that she was having trouble getting the stickers off the roll because her “fingers were freezing.” One more thing I can say about waiting in line is thank goodness for our capitalist society. I mean, without capitalism, there would have been at least five to ten Obama paraphernalia sellers out of a job. Honestly, these people had everything from pins to shirts and were more prevalent than those peanut sellers at baseball games.
When I finally got into the event around 5:15, the convention room was filling up very quickly and I must say, this event was by far the biggest political rally I have been to yet. While we waited for Obama to arrive, a choir sang several gospel songs. Now, with the media always up in arms about how they are worried about Huckabee mixing religion and politics, doesn’t this seem just a little like that? Just to remind you, this isn’t a rally at some church or a “Christians for Obama” rally; This is an public event. I, for one, find this a little ironic but hey, maybe you don’t.
At about 6:30, Obama finally comes onto stage and spoke for about 40 minutes. The funny thing was that at the beginning of his speech, he told the audience that he will probably speak for only 20 minutes or so. In the first ten minutes of his speech, he mainly just thanked the organizers and said several jokes. In one instance, he took at a jab at Hillary by stating that contrary to what his kindergarten papers might imply, he hasn’t held a long seated desire to become president.
The next ten minutes, he talked about change and how the people of this country are ready for change. He started off by saying that if nothing else changes in the next election, at least George W. Bush’s name wouldn’t appear on the ballot. This led the topic of Dick Cheney and how he was disappointed that he was related to him. Obama said that he wished he was instead related to someone “cool.” For someone who is for uniting the people of this country, both republican and democrat, I found it ironic that he would use something as petty as the outgoing president and vice president to do so. I mean, they are essentially irrelevant since Bush can’t run for office and Cheney isn’t entering this election. I have to give him some credit though, he doid talk about the effect lobbyists have in Washington and blamed both republicans and democrats equally for the problems that they have caused.
The next ten minutes of his speech, he talked a lot about foreign policy. He started off by saying that he would be a strong leader that wouldn’t be afraid of getting the bad guys. He also promised that he would “bring our troops home by 2009,” however he never clarified if that meant it would be a gradual or complete withdrawal. I have a feeling a lot of people there thought he meant a complete withdrawal when in fact his website says he is for a gradual withdrawal that may or may not last indefinitely.
The last fifteen minutes of his speech he talked again about how he wants to unite republicans and democrats but after the way he bashed Bush and Cheney for a few cheap laughs, I had begun to not believe anything he said on that issue. He also brought up the rumor about him being a Muslim and how it was completely false. I believe him on this issue and I feel that this shouldn’t be used as a way to scare people into not voting for him (don’t worry, there are plenty of other things that should scare people into not voting for him). The last thing he brought up was the idea of hope, and how his campaign is all about hope.
Well, enough of my commentary on this speech. I have posted all forty some minutes of it on the YouTube so feel free to use it and post your own commentary.
Sorry about having to split it up in such a way. YouTube only lets you post 10 minute long clips and Part four was 11 minutes long so I had to split it up into two roughly five and a half minute long clips.
[...] would be the one that you have to really worry about mixing religion and politics. For example, when I saw him speak in Columbia, South Carolina, he had a choir sing gospel songs before he came out. Also, when Michelle Obama came to speak at the University of South Carolina, a [...]
[...] I attended in South Carolina both opened up with choirs singing gospel songs (read my stories here and [...]