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Daily Archives: Aug. 28, 2008
Obama’s mile-high expectations
Aug. 28, 200810:41 a.m.
Barack Obama gives his much-anticipated acceptance speech tonight, and his biggest challenge might be meeting mile-high expectations.
Obama reportedly is modeling his speech on three previous ones: JFK’s in 1960, Ronald Reagan’s in 1980 and Bill Clinton’s in 1992.
He will have an oversized stage and oversized audience of 75,000. The stakes are high: If he rises to the occasion, it could cement his status as the new leader of the Democratic Party and give him fresh momentum heading out of the convention. If he fumbles, Republicans will be all over it.
Clinton endorsement should end political soap opera
Aug. 28, 200810:39 a.m.
Former President Bill Clinton’s full-throated endorsement of Barack Obama Wednesday night should finally end the political soap opera and speculation about whether the Clintons support Obama and want him to win. After calling on the 18 million people who voted for Hillary Clinton to vote for Obama in November, he laid out a case for why Obama was ready to be president and why America needs him to be president. “Everything I learned in my eight years as president and in the work I’ve done since, in America and across the globe, has convinced me that Barack Obama is the man for this job,” he said. And as for Obama’s first presidential decision, the selection of Joe Biden as his running mate, Clinton said that Obama “hit it out of the park.”
Is McCain overusing the ‘POW card’?
Aug. 28, 20086:05 a.m.
Talk about a touchy subject. Eyebrows are raising about John McCain’s use of the “POW card” to defend himself about not knowing how many houses he owns. On Monday, for example, he answered Jay Leno’s quip about it with “I spent 5½ years in a prison cell. I didn’t have a house. I didn’t have a kitchen table. I didn’t have a table. I didn’t have a chair.” The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Dick Polman suggested “McCain’s candidacy is basically a noun, a verb and POW.” Even before McCain’s latest “Tonight Show” appearance, the New York Times’ Maureen Dowd wrote: “His campaign is cheapening his greatest strength — and making a mockery of his already dubious claim that he’s reticent to talk about his POW experience — by flashing the POW card to rebut any criticism, no matter how unrelated.”
Another big aviation win for Wichita, state
Aug. 28, 20086:03 a.m.
Wichita scored another big win with Wednesday’s announcement that Spirit AeroSystems will build the fuselage of the Cessna Citation Columbus in a new 375,000-square-foot factory in Wichita. Spirit estimates that the project and other new programs will create about 700 jobs. The final assembly of the airplane will be done by Cessna at its planned new plant in Wichita.
These new plants could have been built almost anywhere, and other states offer generous incentives to lure the work away. Kudos to the aircraft companies and to city, county and state officials for keeping this work in Kansas.
Pondering Sebelius’ future
Aug. 28, 20086:01 a.m.
Time to place bets on which role Gov. Kathleen Sebelius might be asked to fill in an Obama-Biden administration. Christian Morgan, Kansas Republican Party executive director, guesses Environmental Protection Agency administrator, because of the Sebelius administration’s fight to keep new coal-fired plants out of western Kansas. The Roll Call newspaper notes that she and other governors with experience running their states’ Medicaid programs “could be strong candidates” to head the Department of Health and Human Services, also mentioning her as a possible education, agriculture or energy secretary. Sebelius’ eight years as Kansas insurance commissioner would favor her to lead HHS, too. Or Sebelius could serve out her second term in Topeka, then run in 2010 for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sam Brownback. Roll Call also raises the possibility that Kansas Health and Environment Secretary Rod Bremby might head Obama’s EPA.
Inside the convention
Aug. 28, 20086:00 a.m.
FYI: Eagle reporter Dion Lefler is at the Democratic National Convention. Click here to check out his blog postings.
