MSNBC cut into Clinton's speech to air Obama's. That's not too surprising, I suppose, but it forced me to realize something. For the first time since this election started, I looked at Obama, not as someone running for president, but as the president.
Ironically, this realization came to me as McCain and Clinton are hammering Obama for being all about words. Indeed, in his speech tonight, McCain said, "Americans are not deceived by an eloquent but empty call for change." But this is not "empty." It may have seemed that way at some points to some people, but it can't be written that way any more.
Obama is still talking, and nothing about what he is saying is "empty." He started his speech by telling the 20,000 people in the Houston arena that they need to vote early. He said they need to vote in November. But then he added that their job doesn't end there; that they will have to keep working to really change things in America. He has now gone on for 20 minutes about the war, about health care, about social security, about the free market, about trade, about the environment.
I don't know why MSNBC's decision to switch to Obama made me realize this for the first time, why a network's decision to flip a switch made me think about this, but it represented, to me, what is happening in this country. Tonight, for the first time, I saw Obama as someone who could be a president, who could deliver a State of the Union, who could sit down with the world's leader. And there is nothing "empty" about that.
3 comments:
Actually, they cut in to show Obama because he was the winner.
amen dieter, amen.
Every network cut to Obama, I think. I also thought winners usually wait for the concession speeches to end before beginning their speech, just out of respect for their opponent. Apparently that's lost here.
And Obama specifically adjusted his speech to combat the all-talk-no-substance argument. Yesterday's speech was a little unusual for him, thus far.
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