Thursday, June 19, 2008

Obama supporters boo Granholm for saying Clinton's name?

The story about what happened at the Gore endorsement has created a stir on the internet by many Clinton supporters with posts that report:

JustSayNoDeal.com, a coalition of voters, individual activists, blogs, PACs and grassroots organizations, reacts to the scene on Monday night in Detroit’s Joe Louis Arena when Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm received a deafening chorus of boos at her mention of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Moments later former Vice President Al Gore experienced similar jeering when he referred to Senator John McCain.

Just Say No Deal Coalition members will not tolerate such offensive and disrespectful conduct from supporters of Senator Obama aimed at any individual— whether they be an elected official or a member of the community at large, and the Just Say No Deal organization will not align itself with any candidate that permits this shameful behavior to be exhibited in any forum.

There is video out there and while like any event that's taped the person speaking is the loudest, you can hear booing and Granholm does tell the crowd "come on now" so the booing was enough that she felt she needed to respond to it.

While Obama is reported to have rebuked the crowd for their behavior, he still seems to not accept that some of his supporters are the problem...
He dismissed the speculation that Clinton backers would not support him, that his supporters would not welcome Clinton's, and said: "Let me tell you something. We're all Democrats."

Lou Dobbs pulls no punches:
CROWLEY: On a plane here to Washington to have some meetings, Obama was asked about the appointment of Patti Solis Doyle. He said that he had known her family for some time, back to the times when he was a community organizer. That again, no offense was intended to the Clinton camp by this appointment. He says Solis Doyle has a set of skills that they can use in the fall -- Lou.

DOBBS: Does anyone believe that blather when they spew it?

CROWLEY: Well, you know apparently not you. I mean look...

DOBBS: I certainly don't.

(CROSSTALK)

DOBBS: I mean...

(CROSSTALK)

DOBBS: That's a slap in the face. That's an absolutely ignorant insult, if I may say so, without any reservation. It's my opinion. I can't imagine it -- and to sit and listen to that crowd boo the governor of the state of Michigan, Jennifer Granholm, and to boo her and Senator Clinton at the same time, I mean this party, at least in Michigan I don't even understand what the Barack Obama campaign is doing.

They have already insulted and disenfranchised hundreds of thousands of Democratic voters in Michigan. Now, this -- I think extraordinarily embarrassing moment, the insult directly to -- and to put her in as chief of staff of whoever the vice presidential candidate is. Whoever that is, is going to be one weak-kneed person because they're not even getting their own chief of staff. I mean that's pretty pathetic all the way around.

5 comments:

mark skeldon said...

Lou Dobbs has jumped the shark. I used to enjoy his commentary, but he has become an angry, angry man. It seems to me that his show is now more about the renegade reporter Lou Dobbs than about reporting and commentating on the news.

Booing Hillary is wrong. I wonder though if some of the booing was directed at Granholm. The way that she handled the primary vote in Michigan was ineffective and counter - productive. In Florida I understand that the Republicans had a lot to do with moving the vote up, but Granholm had no one but herself to blame in Michigan, and she never took the blame for it.

When the primary ended I heard Clinton supporters say that they needed time and that they were still angry. I think the same is true for some Obama supporters. Though he won, some things were said and done during the primary by Clinton's campain that Obama supporters didn't like for a variety of reasons. They also may need some time to get over it. So again I'll say that while some Obama supporters may have been rude, the idea that as a whole they are a rude group I think is innaccurate.

Obama's appointment of Doyle seemed a little strange to me and is probably a sign that Clinton won't be the choice for VP, but it's not a slap in the face to Clinton. I expected that he would get some of Clinton's campaign workers once the primaries were over.

Unknown said...

Mark, if the booing was directed at Granholm you'd think it would have started when she was announced. It's pretty clear it started when she mentioned Clinton.

Having attended quite a few of these rallies there is a certain amount of emotional reaction from the crowd, it's actually encouraged. So, while I personally don't find the booing that unexpected given some of the emotionalness that's happened between some Obama supporters and some Clinton supporters? It's not realistic to continue to pretend that it's not a problem.

The bigger problem? There is really no way Obama can stop this, some of his supporters need to be a bit more sensitive and some of her supporters need to be a bit less sensitive...

mark skeldon said...

Problem is that for some the primary became more like American Idol than the election for the democratic nomination. You're right though that his supporters acting this way doesn't help him.

Unknown said...

I'm still not a fan, but the reality is now the choice comes down to him or McCain.

The election should come down to who is the best candidate to lead our country. It won't though, it will be just like the previous campaigns where it will come down to who does the better job in being negative about the other one or which one makes the most stupid mistakes and gets the most media focus for it.

I get the media releases directly from PR Newsire thanks to being a blogger and the volume of the attack releases both parties are throwing at each other in the media is huge. Each one trying to get the media to cover "their side" of it.

mark skeldon said...

I watched a show last week that was interesting. They asked a group of people what they thought about a few negative ads that they showed them, and all of them said that they were turned off by the negative ads. They also administered various tests on their brain functions during the ads which showed that the ads had actually worked in achieving the emotion they were trying to evoke.

So while most people don't think that exploiting fears about a candidate affects them, it probably does for most. In fact they said that people who don't think that emotion plays any role in their decision are the most likely to be affected by ads like the ones they played (the red phone ad, and an ad that made McCain look really old).

So you're right, the negative campaining works if it's done the right way and the candidates know it.