Obama: Organizers fight back
Posted: Friday, September 05, 2008 9:28 AM by Mark Murray
"Angry community organizers defended their work, and that of former colleague Barack Obama, as they fought back yesterday against a series of gibes by speakers at the Republican convention. Organizers described themselves as an antidote to the influence of big-money lobbyists. They cited helping the powerless join forces to demand better schools and safer streets, often by working through churches.
"If people in office were doing their jobs, perhaps we wouldn't need community organizers," said John Baumann, executive director of PICO National Network. Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, said, "I don't like seeing the really hard work that goes on in really poor communities being demeaned by cheap politicians. "Community organizing is as American as democracy."
“In a much-anticipated interview with conservative nemesis Bill O'Reilly, Senator Barack Obama said yesterday the troop surge in Iraq had 'succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated' and 'beyond our wildest dreams.' But despite expressing his most positive assessment of a military buildup he opposed, the Democratic presidential candidate made no concession on what he said is the more critical issue of Iraq's political stability. 'The Iraqis still haven't taken responsibility,' Obama said during the seven-minute segment on Fox News Channel's 'The O'Reilly Factor,' an interview the talk-show host had sought for months. 'And we still don't have that kind of political reconciliation.'"
The New York Times’ Stanley reviews the interview. “The topic was national security, and their tone was civil, but thankfully not too civil: Mr. O’Reilly, as is his wont, spoke brusquely, interrupted, argued and didn’t let his guest off the hook. He told Mr. Obama he had ‘bloviated’ in parts of his convention speech, but congratulated him on his early opposition to the war, saying he had been ‘perspicacious.’ … Mr. Obama gave no hint of rancor and remained pleasant, respectful and good-humored, but he did adjust his pace and wording to suit his speed-talking host.”
