The LuLac Edition #552, August 28th, 2008

PHOTO INDEX: OBAMA BUTTON IN 2008, JFK POSTER IN 1960. BOTH MEN WENT OUTSIDE THEIR CONVENTION HALLS TO SAY "YES I WILL ACCEPT YOUR NOMINATION!" OBAMA'S APPEARANCE TONIGHT COMES ON THE 45TH ANNIVERSARY OF MARTIN LUTHER KING'S "I HAVE A DREAM" SPEECH.

CONVENTION CONFIDENTIAL

NUTS AND BOLTS

You see the funny hats, the partying and the hoopla at a national convention. But behind the scenes, there are policy meetings as well as strategic gatherings designed to make a party stronger in its goal to elect a new administration. There are also practical meetings dealing with everyday governing once the conventioneers leave town.
The Democratic Leadership Council in Colorado hosted a forum on Crumbling Infrastructure in America. Titled Rebuilding America: U.S. Infrastructure Needs and How to Pay for Them, this meeting was held yesterday. From the collapse of the bridge in Minnesota last summer to the dozens of levee breaks along the Mississippi River this summer, America's infrastructure is crumbling. This decline of a once-proud resource is a civic shame, a threat to public safety, and a drag on our economic growth. If we are to get America moving again, we need to make rebuilding America's infrastructure a national priority. This panel discussed the economic and policy rationale for a major new investment in infrastructure as well as innovative ways to finance America's infrastructure needs including our ports, roads, rail, electricity grid, and more. The meeting was chaired by former Congressman Harold Ford. “These type of meetings are the norm for a National Convention” says Colorado DLC member Jim Gibson. “It is an opportunity to hear diverse opinions on solutions that need to be implemented on an issue like this. And maybe one state might have more information than another in the way they are dealing with a particular problem” noted Gibson.
Since it is a political convention, many times politics takes center stage. There was an interesting forum Democratic strategist and CNN commentator Paul Begala took part in that I was privy to. At the screening of a film, “And So Goes the Nation: Ohio 2004” Begala revealed that he himself had donors lined up to raise 60 million dollars through a 527 to go after the candidacy of John McCain. He said the money was in place and they were waiting for approval from the Obama camp. It never came and the donors, knowing that a 527 didn’t need a nod from a candidate, walked because they were uncomfortable with not having the Obama people say yeah instead of nay. This brought up the debate as to whether the Obama camp didn’t have the stomach for the rough and tumble of a national campaign and might be chewed up by the GOP attack machine ala Dukakis and Kerry. On the other hand, some panelists said if Obama is preaching a new kind of politics, it would by hypocritical to use such a heavy hammer. This forum then lead to another one where Drew Weston, author of “The Political Brain” talked with Kerry campaign adviser Tad Devine. Weston’s book has a premise that voters will make a choice on emotion rather than logic 80 to 90% of the time. (Personally I’ve seen this first hand. In 2004, a young coworker of mine who had 2 children on the WIC program hated the Democrats and John Kerry even though President Bush cut subsidies for the very program that helped her children. She had an emotional upset at the very mention of Kerry’s name. Go figure. Voters not always vote in their own interest). Devine said that in 2004, polling suggested that the swing voters Kerry needed to win were turned off by negative advertising, thus the late response to the GOP attack machine. Devine said it was apparent that people told the pollsters once thing and intentionally or not, remembered the negative things they heard, making their decision on emotion. This issue also brings up the basic tenants of the Democratic party in terms of modern political campaigning. One wag suggested the Dems are more concerned about what the New York Times will say about them rather than the focusing on the actual voters they need. Gibson says the party has more of a tendency toward fairness. In a way, when you think about it, they have a point. I mean can the Democratic party dig up 12 veterans who would question the bravery of John McCain like the GOP did in 2004 questioning John Kerry’s military service? Begala, who made his bones with James Carville running Bob Casey’s Senor’s campaign against Bill Scranton Junior (who can forget the famous Transcendental Meditation ad with the guru) shared his 7 point plan of political strategy. The points were in numerical order:
1. Attack.
2. Attack.
3. Attack.
4. Attack.
5. Attack.
6. Attack.
7. Attack.
Meanwhile, Gibson occupied the catbird seat on Monday Night sitting in the media section with the various press luminaries. Gibson is a King’s graduate and Kingston native.

TED’S MEDICAL ADVENTURE

Ted Kennedy received many accolades for his speech to the convention on Monday Night but it almost didn’t happen. Kennedy had just left a hospital bed here when he delivered his speech after suffering a debilitating bout of kidney stones Sunday upon arriving in town. Now anyone who has ever had a kidney stone know full well it stops you dead in your tracks.
The New York Times picks up the story from here:
Mr. Kennedy’s aides described a harrowing 48-hour period in which it appeared that Mr. Kennedy would not be able to give the convention speech. In June, he had told family members when he left the Duke University Medical Center, where he was operated on for brain cancer, that he was intent on giving the speech.
And with less than two hours to go before he was to take the stage, Mr. Kennedy — sitting unnoticed in a room at the University of Colorado Hospital — told his wife, Victoria, and doctors that he wanted to go to the Pepsi Center and deliver the speech.
He was driven there, accompanied by a doctor and paramedics, perched on a golf cart that took him inside. Mr. Kennedy, with his wife and his niece Caroline at his side, walked gingerly onto the stage, where he delivered a highly acclaimed address. He then returned to the hospital, where he spent the night.
This sequence of events described by Kennedy associates added another dramatic layer to the appearance by Mr. Kennedy that riveted Democrats and produced a sustained and tearful reception among the delegates.
His aides said after Mr. Kennedy finally decided he was well enough to come to Denver over the weekend, they became alarmed when he arrived on Sunday after a long charter airplane flight, and reported being in excruciating pain.
Their first concern was that the pain was somehow related to his cancer, or the chemotherapy and radiology he had undergone, and that it had been complicated by the long flight or the high altitude of the city. A visit to a local hospital Sunday night revealed it was kidney stones and was unrelated to his cancer.
One close associate, who demanded anonymity to discuss any element of Mr. Kennedy’s medical condition, disclosed that the senator had suffered an unspecified but serious setback in July after he flew to Washington in the midst of treatment to cast a vote on a Medicare bill.
Mr. Kennedy’s aides said he did make one concession to the kidney stones: the speech he gave was about 10 minutes, roughly half the length of an earlier draft.
Kidney stones are notoriously painful, and typically treated with morphine or other painkillers. (Aides would not say whether Mr. Kennedy had been given painkillers, or whether any stones had passed.)
Mr. Kennedy’s longtime associate Bob Shrum said that as soon as the senator became ill, he sent an even shorter three-sentence statement that Mr. Kennedy could read at the Pepsi Center. He said Mr. Kennedy, in informing him that he wanted to speak, had rejected that option.
“He said, ‘I’m not getting up to go over there and give a three-sentence speech,’ ” Mr. Shrum said.
Mr. Kennedy’s advisers said he had begun working on the speech about three weeks ago and went through rehearsals every day when his health permitted. They said he made clear that he did not want to be represented at the convention only by a videotape tribute.
By all indications, Mr. Kennedy was in better health on Tuesday when he attended a small breakfast in his honor before flying home to Massachusetts.
“He looked tremendously healthy considering what he has been going through,” said Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and a longtime Kennedy friend.

SHORT SHOTS-TRIVIA

If Obama is elected, he will be the third president from Illinois, following Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.
Sen. Joe Biden will be the first Delawarean to serve on a major party's national ticket. And how often has a presidential candidate turned to someone he ran against for his running mate? Since 1900, the Democrats have done it seven times; the GOP, eight times.
In 1932, Franklin Roosevelt became the first presidential nominee to deliver an acceptance speech in person at a convention.
Frederick Douglass was the first African-American to receive a vote for president at a major party's convention. Douglass received one vote at the 1888 GOP convention. Washington minister Channing Phillips was the first African-American to receive a vote for president at a Democratic convention. Phillips received 67.5 votes at the Democrats' 1968 convention.
In 1896, 36-year-old Democrat William Jennings Bryan became the youngest person to win a major party's presidential nomination.

DEM VIDEO VIGNETTE

Senator Barack Obama is set to give his acceptance speech tonight at Invesco Field, formerly Mile High Stadium. It is not the first time a speech was given in an outdoor venue. John F. Kennedy gave his at the L. A. Coliseum in 1960. From YOU TUBE: JFK.