April 2008 Archives
WASHINGTON -- On Monday, a combative Rev. Jeremiah Wright noted -- with some smugness -- at a press conference here that Sen. Barack Obama "did not denounce me. He distanced himself from some of my remarks." Following what Obama called Wright's "rants" at that session, Obama -- with some anger -- denounced his pastor "very clearly and unequivocally" on Tuesday.
(This Lynn Sweet column is from the April 30 print Sun-Times)
BY CHRIS FUSCO Staff Reporter
Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama is giving $2,300 in presidential campaign contributions to charity -- money he got from Aiham Alsammarae, a dual U.S.-Iraqi citizen who posted more than $2.7 million in property to help spring Tony Rezko from jail.
Barack Obama Press Conference
Winston-Salem, NC
4.29.08
OPENING REMARKS:
Before I start taking questions I want to open it up with a couple of comments about what we saw and heard yesterday. I have spent my entire adult life trying to bridge the gap between different kinds of people. That’s in my DNA, trying to promote mutual understanding to insist that we all share common hopes and common dreams as Americans and as human beings. That’s who I am. That’s what I believe. That’s what this campaign has been about.
Yesterday we saw a very different vision of America. I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened over the spectacle that we saw yesterday. You know, I have been a member of Trinity United Church of Christ since 1992. I have known Reverend Wright for almost 20 years. The person I saw yesterday was not the person that I met 20 years ago.
WASHINGTON--Sen. Barack Obama finally cut the cord on Tuesday with his minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, after Wright conducted a press conference Monday at the National Press Club here Obama called a "spectacle" and "appalling” that was a show of “disrespect” to him.
In an exercise of extreme damage control, Obama appeared at a hastily scheduled press conference in North Carolina to denounce the man who married him and baptized his daughters to say Wright’s comments were “divisive and destructive.”
WASHINGTON--The Rev. Jeremiah Wright was not, contrary to a report in some outlets, guarded at a speaking event on Tuesday at the National Press Club, by personnel who belong to the Nation of Islam. Security was provided by a local Baptist church, according to a spokesman for Wright's church, Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.
WASHINGTON--No matter the results in the May 6 contests in North Carolina and Indiana, the presidential campaign of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) will push on--at least for primary cash. Former President Bill Clinton will headline a fund-raiser for his wife on May 22 in Chicago at the Palmer House--the same hotel where he was based for a time during his 1992 first run for the White House. The event (collecting only primary money) costs $100 for a ticket to the reception; $1,000 for a photo with Bill Clinton.
This pool report from Jeff Zeleny, New York Times
It was shortly after 7 a.m. when Senator Barack Obama arrived at the hallowed ground of college basketball, home of the University of North Carolina Tar Heels. Before heading to the court for a quick morning game, he took a tour of the team’s facility. His guide? Coach Roy Williams.
Mr. Obama and Mr. Williams walked through the basement hallway of the UNC basketball center, passing black and white photographs from seasons gone by. The coach, dressed in a suit, and the senator, dressed in workout clothes, made small talk and smiled throughout the brief tour, which concluded in the locker room.
Big endorsement for Clinton in advance of the North Carolina primary a week from today
WASHINGTON -- In March, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) went to great lengths not to "disown" his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, after fiery videotaped comments from sermons surfaced. In return, an unapologetic Wright launched a speaking tour, ending Monday, drawing outsized coverage on the hot-button issues of God and race days before crucial votes in Indiana and North Carolina, threatening Obama's presidential bid.
As coverage swelled, the situation was so serious that Obama, late Monday at a hastily arranged availability on the tarmac at an airport in Wilmington, N.C., said of Wright, "I have said before and I will repeat again that what some of the comments that Rev. Wright had made offend me, and I understand why they have offended the American people."He does not speak for me. He does not speak for the campaign."
(this column appreared in the April 29 print Sun-Times)
WASHINGTON--Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) stands out among the congressional Illinois delegation for releasing current earmark requests. Click below for the latest.
WASHINGTON--With nonstop coverage Monday on his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright--day three of widely covered comments--Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) addressed the situation that threatens his presidential bid at a media availability hastily scheduled on the tarmac in Wilmington, North Carolina. Said Obama of Wright, "He does not speak for me."
"I have said before and I will repeat again that some of the comments Rev Wright offend me and I understand why they have offended the American people.
"He does not speak for me. He does not speak for the campaign. And, so, he may make statements in the future that don't reflect my values or my concerns."
WASHINGTON--Clinton communications chief Howard Wolfson says in a memo (click below) that the emphasis in the near future will be on the economy.
WASHINGTON--The Rev. Jeremiah Wright's full speech and questions and answer session at the National Press Club on April 28, 2008.
Another in an occasional series of blogs about the sky-high cost of campaign travel...
WASHINGTON--The cost of a day--March 15--on the Obama campaign bus...about $500. The experience? Priceless.
click below to see invoice.
BY ABDON M. PALLASCH Political Reporter/apallasch@suntimes.com
White House hopeful Barack Obama talks a lot on the campaign trail about how failing banks have used subprime loans to victimize customers.
"Part of the reason we got a current mortgage crisis has to do with the fact that people got suckered in to loans that they could not pay," he told a crowd in Reading, Pa., last week. "There were a lot of predatory loans that were given out, a lot of teaser rates. Banks and financial institutions making these loans were making money hand over fist."
At the helm of Superior Bank was Obama's national finance chairwoman, Penny Pritzker, an heiress to the Pritzker fortune.
WASHINGTON--A brash Rev. Jeremiah Wright--longtime pastor to Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) --on Monday said the controversy over his inflammatory comments--threatening Obama's presidential bid--were really "an attack on the black church."
"As I said, this was an attack on the black church. It was not about Obama, McCain, Hillary, Bill, Chelsea; this was about the black church. This was about Barbara Jordan. This was about Fannie Lou Hamer. This was about my grandmama," Wright said at the National Press Club.
WASHINGTON--The Rev. Jeremiah Wright will speak soon at the National Press Club. The ballroom is packed with people here for a black church conference, guests and reporters.
Here from Chicago: Wright's wife and two of his daughters; Dr. Conrad Worrill, the National Chairman of the National Black United Front and Father Michael Pfleger, from St. Sabrina Church on Chicago's South Side.