Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Obama Kickin Some Clinton Butt



by Bill Schechner

(CBS 5) OAKLAND Illinois Senator Barack Obama is closing in on Senator Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. One poll shows Obama trailing Clinton by just five points.With a tight eight-piece funk band establishing the mood, national and local press covering the event, the Senator from Illinois got set to deliver his speech at an appearance in Oakland on Saturday."All right…

This is a good looking crowd, too," Obama said to the crowd.When the history of the campaign is written, March 2007 will be the month Barack Obama undid, at least for the moment, the inevitability of the Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee despite her organization."She has the support of the most popular president in modern history, and it's still not enough at this point to make Obama be three paragraph's down in the news story instead of being right next to her in the same paragraph," said CBS 5 Political Analyst Joe Tuman.

Obama has overcome several obstacles. He is of mixed race, which some say therefore not a genuinely African-American candidate.The appearance of old-line national black political leader and now Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums at the Obama rally helped quiet that discussion, so does 10,000 people."His appearance in Oakland was one of the kinds of things he needs to do to shore up African-American voters as a block for him," Tuman said.The creepy and nasty attack ad now on YouTube, using an old apple ad, to portray Clinton as a controlling politician, while disavowed by Obama could have backfired.

Instead, it has brought nearly half-a-million showings.People in Oakland brightened a bit when asked about Obama. They said they thought he understood, and it was time for him. Outside a church on 14th Street, CBS 5 talked to Roshawna Tibbs, a 22-year-old registered voter."We need a black president. There are black secretaries. Black people working in the white house. Why not have a black president?" Tibbs said. "Is it a pride thing? I wouldn't call it that. I'd call it a fair thing." But Tibbs also said many people in her neighborhood said the system would never let it happen.