Barack Obama 2008 presidential primary campaign

Obama for America
File:Obama 08.svg
Campaign	U.S. presidential election, 2008
Candidate	Barack Obama
Affiliation	Democratic Party
Headquarters	Chicago, Illinois
Key people	David Plouffe (Manager) Penny Pritzker (Finance) David Axelrod (Media) Robert Gibbs (Communications)
Receipts	US$193.6 (2008-02-29)
Slogan	Change We Can Believe In Yes We Can Stand For Change
Website
www.barackobama.com

Barack Obama, the junior United States Senator from Illinois, announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States in Springfield, Illinois, on February 10, 2007. He is seeking the nomination of the Democratic Party for the 2008 presidential election. Obama announced at the Old State Capitol building where Abraham Lincoln delivered his "House Divided" speech in 1858. Obama's initial victory in the Iowa caucus brought him to national prominence out of the crowded field of Democratic challengers, and his campaign began to trade a series of hard-fought state wins with expected Democratic Party frontrunner Hillary Clinton in January, a trend which continued through Super Tuesday, where Obama had great success in large rural states, and Clinton was nearly as dominant in high-population coastal areas. Obama continued to have remarkable fundraising and electoral success in February, winning all 11 state and territorial-level contests following Super Tuesday, and "chipping away" at Clinton's core supporters in key states. Obama split the contests of March 4, winning Vermont and Texas, losing Ohio and Rhode Island, and losing six delegates of his lead. After then winning the Wyoming caucus and Mississippi primary, Obama is estimated to have 1,414 elected and pledged delegates, leading his opponent by 171; his count of unelected and unpledged superdelegates continues to trail Hillary Clinton by 31. This leads to an overall 140-delegate Obama lead, with 1,626 to Clinton's 1,486, towards the 2,025 total (pledged and unpledged) delegates needed to win the nomination.

Pre-announcement

Obama's keynote speech to the 2004 Democratic National Convention sparked expectations that he would run for the presidency. Speculation on a 2008 presidential run intensified after Obama's decisive U.S. Senate election win in November 2004. At that time he told reporters: "I can unequivocally say I will not be running for national office in four years."

However, in an October 2006 interview on the television program Meet the Press, Obama appeared to open the possibility of a 2008 presidential bid. Illinois Senator Richard Durbin and Illinois State Comptroller Daniel Hynes were early advocates for a 2008 Obama presidential run. Many people in the entertainment community have also expressed readiness to campaign for an Obama presidency, including celebrity television show host Oprah Winfrey, singer Macy Gray, and film actors George Clooney, Halle Berry and Will Smith.

In September 2006, Obama was the featured speaker at Iowa Senator Tom Harkin's annual steak fry, a political event traditionally attended by presidential hopefuls in the lead-up to the Iowa caucuses. In December 2006, Obama spoke at a New Hampshire event celebrating Democratic Party midterm election victories in the first-in-the-nation U.S. presidential primary state, drawing 1,500 people.

Speaking at a Democratic National Committee meeting one week before the February announcement, Obama called for putting an end to negative campaigning. "This can't be about who digs up more skeletons on who, who makes the fewest slip-ups on the campaign trail," he said. "We owe it to the American people to do more than that."

Announcement of candidacy

Obama on stage with his wife and two daughters just before announcing his presidential campaign on February 10, 2007.

On January 16, 2007, Obama announced via a video on his website that he had formed a presidential exploratory committee. On February 10, he formally announced his candidacy for the presidency. In his announcement speech, Obama evoked the legacy of Abraham Lincoln, saying:

"It was here, in Springfield, where North, South, East and West come together that I was reminded of the essential decency of the American people - where I came to believe that through this decency, we can build a more hopeful America. And that is why, in the shadow of the Old State Capitol, where Lincoln once called on a divided house to stand together, where common hopes and common dreams still live, I stand before you today to announce my candidacy for President of the United States."

Campaign staff and policy team

On January 14 2007, the Chicago Tribune reported that Obama had begun assembling his team for a 2008 presidential campaign to be headquartered in Chicago. His team includes David Plouffe, who is serving as campaign manager and David Axelrod, who is serving as a media consultant. Plouffe and Axelrod are partners at AKP&D Message and Media, a Chicago-based political consulting firm. Robert Gibbs, who is serving as communications director, was previously press secretary for John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. A number of Obama's top aides have backgrounds with former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who left the Senate due to re-election defeat at the same time Obama was entering it.

In June 2007, investigative reporter Robert Parry reported that Obama had sought foreign policy advice from former Bush Secretary of State Colin Powell. Parry suggested that this was a move toward the political center in preparation for the general election.

Campaign developments

First half 2007

Barack Obama at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Presidential Health Care Forum, March 2007.

In March 2007, Obama posted a question on Yahoo! Answers, entitled: "How can we engage more people in the democratic process?" which ultimately drew in over 17,000 responses.

On May 3, 2007, citing no specific threat but motivated by the large volume of hate mail directed at the Senator, Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff announced that the United States Secret Service would provide protection for the campaign. This protection will include bodyguards for Obama, advance teams of agents to secure event sites, armored vehicles, and other services/resources similar to those employed for the safety of the President of the United States, albeit on a proportionally smaller level. Normally, presidential candidates are not offered Secret Service protection until early February of election year; this was the earliest protection had ever been granted.

Second half 2007

Obama speaking at a rally in Conway, South Carolina on August 23 2007.

On August 1 when making his foreign policy speech Obama created controversy by declaring that the United States must be willing to strike al Qaeda targets inside Pakistan, with or without the consent of the Pakistani government. He stated that if elected, "If we have actionable intelligence about high value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will". ABC News described the policy speech as "counterintuitive", and commented on how "one of the more liberal candidates in the race, is proposing a geopolitical posture that is more aggressive than that of President Bush"

After weeks of discourse surrounding the policy, Obama said there was "misreporting" of his comments, claiming that, "I never called for an invasion of Pakistan or Afghanistan." He clarified that rather than a surge in the number of troops in Iraq, there needs to be a "diplomatic surge" and that if there were "actionable intelligence reports" showing al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, the U.S. troops as a last resort should enter and try to capture terrorists. That would happen, he added, only if "the Pakistani government was unable or unwilling" to go after the terrorists.

As Democratic debates took place during the summer, Obama received at best mixed notices for his efforts. Democratic strategist Bob Shrum said, "He slips into this tendency, which he probably learned as president of the Harvard Law Review, to overstate his premises before he states his position. In politics, you do the opposite of what you do in the Law Review—you state your position, then say your premises—if you ever get to them." Commentator Eleanor Clift said that, "Obama is almost too cerebral for the sound-bite world of modern politics, but that's part of his appeal."

During a campaign stop in October 2007, a reporter inquired as to why Obama had stopped wearing a lapel pin of the American flag, which he had started wearing after the September 11, 2001 attacks, and his response was that it had come to feel like "a substitute for true patriotism". This led to discussion on the cable news channels and was covered by satirists such as Stephen Colbert, who had an ongoing disagreement with the Fox & Friends assertion that "this is America and if you want to be president of America, it might be [sic] behoove him to wear an American flag". Commentator Bill Maher, who was highly critical of such questions about Obama's patriotism and called it a "non-story" nonetheless referred to the incident as "[t]he first genuine controversy of the presidential campaign".

In mid-late October 2007, Obama came under fire from the Human Rights Campaign and others for a South Carolina gospel music campaign tour that featured singer Donnie McClurkin, who states that he is "ex-gay" and that homosexuality is a "curse [that runs against] the intention of God." Obama said in response that, "I strongly believe that African Americans and the LGBT community must stand together in the fight for equal rights. And so I strongly disagree with Reverend McClurkin's views." While not replacing McClurkin, the campaign added a gay minister to the tour.

As fall 2007 continued, Obama fell further behind Clinton in national polls. In late October 2007, two months before the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, Obama began directly charging his top rival with failing to clearly state her political positions. This shift in approach attracted much media commentary; The New York Times' Adam Nagourney wrote that, "Obama has appeared to struggle from the start of this campaign with how to marry what he has promised to be a new approach to politics — free of the partisan bitterness that has marked presidential campaigns for so long — with what it takes to actually win a presidential race." In an early-anticipated October 30 Democratic debate at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Clinton suffered a poor debate performance under cross-examination from her Democratic rivals and the moderator. Obama's campaign was reinvigorated and he began to climb again in the polls.

Campaigning in November 2007, Obama told the Washington Post that as the Democratic nominee he would draw more support from independent and Republican voters in the general election than Clinton. At Iowa's Jefferson-Jackson fundraising dinner Obama expanded the theme, saying that his presidency would "bring the country together in a new majority" to seek solutions to long-standing problems.

On November 21, Obama announced that Oprah Winfrey would be campaigning for him in the early primary states, setting off speculation that, although celebrity endorsements typically have little effect on voter opinions, Oprah's participation would supply Obama with a large, receptive audience. Then, on December 8, Oprah kicked-off a three-state tour supporting Obama's campaign, which drew record-setting crowds in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. The Oprah-Obama tour dominated political news headlines and cast doubts over Clinton's ability to recover her recently-lost lead in Iowa caucus polls.

Later in December, there was controversy regarding Obama's admissions of drug use as a teen. Obama first publicly acknowledged the issue in his 1995 book, Dreams from My Father. In the book, Obama said "Pot had helped, and booze. Maybe a little blow when you could afford it." The issue was revived on the campaign trail after a November 2007 speech at a New Hampshire high school. Obama told the students, "I've made some bad decisions that I've actually written about," noting that his "drinking and experimenting with drugs" accounted for a lot of "wasted time" in high school. Some, including Republican candidate Mitt Romney, criticized Obama for discussing these examples with students. Romney said that "in order to leave the best possible example for our kids, we're probably wisest not to talk about our own indiscretions in great detail." However, fellow GOP candidate Rudy Giuliani and Partnership for a Drug-Free America president Steve Pasierb praised Obama's candor. "I respect his honesty," Giuliani said. Pasierb told CNN that "really the truth works best" when discussing drug use with kids. Bill Shaheen, the co-chairman of Clinton's campaign in New Hampshire, mentioned the drug use in a December 12 conference call with reporters. Shaheen said that if Obama were to win the nomination, Republicans would use Obama's admissions against him in a general election. He suggested that in such a scenario, Republicans would ask, "'When was the last time? Did you ever give drugs to anyone? Did you sell them to anyone?'" He added that such "Republican dirty tricks" would be difficult to overcome. The comments immediately caused controversy, and Shaheen resigned the next day. Clinton denounced the comments and personally apologized to Obama. Her spokesman said that she "made it clear that this kind of negative personal statement has no part in this campaign." Appearing on Hardball with Chris Matthews, Axelrod accused the Clinton campaign of giving a "wink and a nod" to negative tactics. He criticized Clinton's December 3 statement in which she signaled a more aggressive approach and called it the "fun part" of the campaign. Axelrod said that the signal should come "from the top" that the campaigns will not be waged "in the gutter".

When the close proximity of the first contests to the holidays prompted many candidates to release Christmas videos — allowing them to continue presenting their messages, but in more seasonal settings — Obama chose one that gave speaking parts to his wife and daughters and emphasized a message of thanks and unity.

"Fired up! Ready to go!"

"Fired up! Ready to go!" became a rallying cry ubiquitous to Obama's campaign. According to the The New York Times, the chant originated during a rainy, early morning campaign stop during the summer in Greenwood, South Carolina. Obama was feeling fatigued among a small group of supporters, who reportedly were "miserable." When out of the blue, as Obama recounts:

A little woman, about 5-3, 65 years old, in a big church hat, with big glasses, she’s smiling right at me. She says, ‘Fired up!’ I jumped, but everyone acted like this was normal. They all said, ‘Fired up!’ We hear the same voice saying, ‘Ready to go!’ And the people, they all say, ‘Ready to go!’

This story is frequently recalled during Obama's stump speeches on how "one voice can change a room." The woman in the story, Councilwoman Edith Childs, appeared later with Obama at a rally in South Carolina. She later told reporters that if he were to win the presidency, that she would want one thing: "I want an invitation to an inaugural ball!"

Caucuses and primaries 2008

See also: Democratic Party (United States) presidential primaries, 2008 and Results of the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries

Iowa

Candidate support by age. Purple for Obama, green for Clinton. The number in parenthesis is the percentage of the primary electorate that each demographic group represented. (From composite exit poll data through February 19, adjusted to exclude withdrawn candidates.)

Candidate support by race and gender.

Obama won the first contest in the Democratic nomination season, the January 3, 2008 Iowa Democratic caucus. Obama had the support of 37.6 percent of Iowa's delegates, compared to 29.7 percent for John Edwards and 29.5 percent for Hillary Clinton. In his remarks to his followers that evening, he said "But on this January night, at this defining moment in history, you have done what the cynics said we couldn't do." He further noted that "our time for change has come" and suggested that in the future Americans will look back on the 2008 Iowa caucuses and say, "this is the moment when it all began."

New Hampshire

Obama's win in Iowa was seen as a boost to his already-improving chances in New Hampshire. On January 4, he told supporters in New Hampshire, "If you give me the same chance that Iowa gave me last night I truly believe that I will be the president of the United States of America." The campaign received another boost when former Senator and 2000 Democratic presidential candidate Bill Bradley endorsed Obama on January 6. At the ABC News/WMUR-TV Democratic debate in Manchester on January 5, Obama, Clinton, and Edwards all battled over who best exemplified the buzzword of the campaign, "change". In one key exchange, Clinton said, clearly targeting Obama's rhetorical prowess, "Making change is not about what you believe; it's not about a speech you make. ... We don't need to be raising false hopes." Obama replied that "The truth is, actually, words do inspire. Words do help people get involved."

Polling showed a tight race in the days leading up to the New Hampshire primary. All of the candidates barnstormed in New Hampshire during the four days after the Iowa caucuses, targeting undecided and independent voters in the state. The day before the election, polls conducted by CNN/WMUR, Rasmussen Reports and USA Today/Gallup showed Obama jumping ahead by 9, 10 and 13 points respectively. Despite the apparent surge of momentum, Clinton defeated Obama by a margin of 39.1 percent to 36.5 percent in the New Hampshire primary on January 8, 2008. Obama told supporters that he was "still fired up and ready to go", echoing a theme of his campaign.

In what has been deemed the "Yes We Can" speech, Obama acknowledged that he faced a fight for the nomination and that "nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change." The lyrics to the song in Yes We Can, an eponymous music video created by celebrity supporters of Obama, was entirely comprised of pieces of this particular speech.

Meanwhile, Internet theories sprung up about how the vote counting itself had been suspect, due to discrepancies between machine-counted votes (which supported Clinton overall) and hand-counted votes (which supported Obama overall). Fifth-place finisher Dennis Kucinich's campaign paid $25,000 to have a recount done of all Democratic ballots cast in the primary, saying "It is imperative that these questions be addressed in the interest of public confidence in the integrity of the election process and the election machinery." On January 16 the New Hampshire Secretary of State’s office began the recount. After recounting 23 percent of the state's democratic primary votes, the Secretary of State announced that no significant difference was found in any candidate's total, and that the oft-discussed discrepancy between hand-counted and machine-counted ballots was solely due to demographic factors.

Nevada

The Nevada Caucus took place on January 19. Obama received the endorsement of two very important unions in the state: the Culinary Workers Union (whose 60,000 members staff the casinos and resorts of Las Vegas and elsewhere) and the Nevada chapter of the SEIU. Clinton countered by appealing to the Hispanic vote in the state, emphasizing that they were at special risk from the fallout from the subprime mortgage crisis.

Prior to the caucus, comments made by Obama concerning former Republican president Ronald Reagan attracted rebuke from rivals and dissection from all sections of the media. Obama had stated in an interview that; "Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not." Hillary Clinton ridiculed the idea that the Republicans were the party of ideas, suggesting Mr. Obama had said that the Republicans had “better” ideas. Senator John Edwards criticized Obama specifically for referring to Ronald Reagan as an agent of change stating in a newspaper interview that; “I would never use Ronald Reagan as an example of change.”

One day after the Culinary Workers Union endorsed Obama, the Nevada State Education Association—a teachers' union that has not officially endorsed Clinton, but many of its top officials have—filed a lawsuit seeking to eliminate at-large caucus sites that had been setup in nine Las Vegas resorts saying they violated equal protection and one-person-one-vote requirements. The suit was viewed as a proxy legal battle between Clinton and Obama, as the caucus sites within the casinos would be primarily used by members of the CWU, who are more likely to vote for Obama. This led Obama to allege that the suit was filed in order to hurt his chances at the caucuses. "Some of the people who set up the rules apparently didn't think we'd be as competitive as we were and trying to change them last minute," he said.

On January 17, a federal judge ruled that the casino at-large caucus plan could go ahead. This was seen as a win for Obama because of the Culinary Workers Union endorsement. To further complicate matters, the major news and polling organizations decided to not do any polls before the Nevada caucuses, fearing the newness of the caucus, the transient nature of Nevada's population, and more fallout from their bad experience in New Hampshire.

Clinton finished first in the state delegate count on January 19, winning 51 percent of delegates to the state convention. However, Obama was projected to win the Nevada national delegate count with 13 delegates to Clinton's 12, because the apportionment of some delegates are determined by Congressional District. Delegates to the national convention will be determined officially at the April 19 state convention.

On January 23, the Obama campaign filed an official letter of complaint with the Nevada Democratic Party charging the Clinton campaign with many violations of party rules during the caucuses, based upon 1,600 complaints they had received. The Clinton camp said the Obama operation was "grasping at straws" and that they had their own complaints about Obama campaign actions during the caucuses.

South Carolina

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Obama addressing supporters the night before the South Carolina primary at the University of South Carolina

Rasmussen Reports released a poll January 7 showing that Obama led by 12 points, at 42 percent to Hillary Clinton's 30 percent. This was a substantial jump from December when the two were tied at 33 percent, and from November when Clinton led Obama by 10 points.

Issues of race came to the forefront as campaigning began for the South Carolina primary, the first to feature a large African American portion in the Democratic electorate. First, Bill Clinton referred to Obama's claim that he has been a staunch opponent of the Iraq War from the beginning as a "fairy tale," which some thought was a characterization of Obama's entire campaign. The former President called in to Al Sharpton's radio show to personally clarify that he respected and believed in Obama's viability.

Around the same time, Hillary Clinton said regarding Martin Luther King, Jr. in an interview with Fox News, "I would point to the fact that that Dr. King's dream began to be realized when President Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, when he was able to get through Congress something that President Kennedy was hopeful to do, the President before had not even tried, but it took a president to get it done. That dream became a reality, the power of that dream became a real in people's lives because we had a president who said we are going to do it, and actually got it accomplished." Some African-American leaders took this statement as a denigration of the accomplishments of King and the larger American civil rights movement. Hillary Clinton proceeded to blame Obama for the controversy, claiming his campaign had fanned the flames, a charge which Obama dismissed as "ludicrous". By shortly before, and during, a January 15 Democratic debate in Nevada, Clinton and Obama declared a truce on the matter, with both making reconciliatory statements about race, gender, and each other. However, Clinton's support among African Americans was thought to be damaged, with SUNY Albany's Debra Dickerson stating "The Clintons have to do something dramatic and symbolic to win back the trust of many African-Americans."

In part the tension resulted from the historical coincidence of the first viable African American presidential candidate, and the first viable woman candidate, running against each other in the same nomination race. One South Carolina pastor lamented that he had been waiting all his life for either "first" to happen, and said, "I really hate that they had to run at the same time in the same election. It just makes what should be a wonderful situation very stressful for folk like me. I never imagined you could have too much of a good thing." The American Civil Rights Movement and feminism had a long intertwined history in the United States, often working in concert but sometimes opposed; while the bitter 19th century split between Elizabeth Cady Stanton or Frederick Douglass illustrated the latter, the unified opposition to the Supreme Court nomination of Clarence Thomas had exemplified the former. After the Clinton-Obama tension on this matter, one Democrat said, "After Iowa, Obama was the post-racial candidate who appealed to all of our better natures. Now he's a black politician and she's a woman. And it is back to politics as usual."

The January 21 CNN/Congressional Black Caucus debate in Myrtle Beach was the most heated face-to-face meeting yet between the candidates, reflecting apparent personal animosity. Clinton criticized Obama for voting "present" on many occasions while in the Illinois legislature. "It's hard to have a straight up debate with you because you never take responsibility for any vote," she said. Obama explained that Illinois had a different system than Congress and that 'present' votes had a different function and use in the Illinois Senate. Obama said that he was working to help unemployed workers in Chicago while Clinton was "a corporate lawyer sitting on the board at Wal-Mart." He also took issue with statements made on the campaign trail by Bill Clinton, saying "I can't tell who I'm running against sometimes." The confrontation was the most-watched primary season debate in cable television news history.

On January 26, Obama won by a more than two-to-one margin over Clinton, gaining 55 percent of the vote to her 27 percent and Edwards' 18 percent. In his victory speech that night, he said, "Tonight, the cynics who believed that what began in the snows of Iowa was just an illusion were told a different story by the good people of South Carolina." Addressing the racial dust-up and the other campaign back-and-forths between himself and the Clintons, he said, "The choice in this election is not between regions or religions or genders. It's not about rich versus poor; young versus old; and it is not about black versus white. It's about the past versus the future."

Florida

In the last vote prior to Super Tuesday, Obama finished far behind Clinton in Florida. However, the state was previously stripped of all its delegates to the national convention for breaking party rules by moving its primary to before February 5. All candidates abided by an agreement not to campaign in Florida. Nonetheless, Clinton celebrated the 'win' and claimed that it gave her momentum heading to Super Tuesday. The Obama campaign said that Clinton was "basically trying to take a victory lap when there was no race."

Super Tuesday

Obama with Ted Kennedy at a rally in Hartford, Connecticut, the day before Super Tuesday

Following his win in South Carolina, Obama received the endorsement of Caroline Kennedy, daughter of former President John F. Kennedy, as well as Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy, the former President's brother. Ted Kennedy's endorsement was considered "the biggest Democratic endorsement Obama could possibly get short of Bill Clinton or Al Gore". In particular, it gave the possibility of improving Obama's support among unions, Hispanics, and traditional base Democrats, all demographics that Clinton had been stronger in to this point. Obama won 13 of 22 states on Super Tuesday (February 5, 2008): Alabama, Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, and Utah. His campaign claimed to have won more delegates.

More February contests

On February 9, Obama won the Louisiana primary, as well as caucuses in Nebraska and Washington State. He garnered 57 percent of the available delegates in Louisiana, and 68 percent in both Nebraska and Washington. On the same day, he won caucuses in Virgin Islands with 92 percent of the popular vote. The next day, Obama took the Maine caucuses amid what one senior Maine Democratic official called an "incredible" turnout.

The "Potomac primary" took place on February 12. It included the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia. There were 168 delegates up for grabs in the three primaries. Obama won all three, taking 75 percent of the popular vote in the District of Columbia, 60 percent in Maryland and 64 percent in Virginia. "Today, the change we seek swept through Chesapeake and over the Potomac," Obama said at a rally in Madison, Wisconsin that night.

On February 18, Michelle Obama attracted criticism when during a campaign speech in Milwaukee, Wisconsin she said, "Let me tell you, for the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country. Not just because Barack is doing well, but I think people are hungry for change". Barack's response to the criticism was, "Statements like this are made and people try to take it out of context and make a great big deal out of it, and that isn't at all what she meant. What she meant was, this is the first time that she's been proud of the politics of America," he said. "Because she's pretty cynical about the political process, and with good reason, and she's not alone. But she has seen large numbers of people get involved in the process, and she's encouraged."

Two more primaries followed on February 19: Wisconsin and Hawaii. Obama won both decisively, taking 58 percent of the vote in Wisconsin and 14 of the 20 available national delegates in Hawaii. On February 21, Obama was announced as the winner of the week-long Democrats Abroad contest.The Democratic presidential candidate defended himself and his wife February 24 against suggestions that they are insufficiently patriotic.Barack Obama’s campaign accused Hillary Clinton’s team February 25 of circulating a photo of the Illinois senator donning traditional attire – clothing worn by area Muslims – as a goodwill gesture during an overseas trip.Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton argued with each other over negative campaigning, health care and free trade February 26. Obama and John McCain engaged in a pointed exchange over Al-Qaeda in Iraq on February 27.

March primaries

Barack Obama campaigning in Houston on the eve of the Texas primaries and caucuses

Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were in a statistical dead heat in Texas, according to a poll released February 25 2008. During Obama's sweep of February's post-Super Tuesday primaries and caucuses, the March 4 primaries of Texas and Ohio became seen as a firewall for the Clinton campaign. In early polls for these states, Clinton held double digit leads in polls for those states, but by the end of February Obama had started to erode Clinton's lead in her key demographics and her lead had been reduced to single digits in some polls. In response to Obama's increases, Clinton's campaign began to increase their attacks on him, including an accusation of plagiarism due to similarities in Obama's campaign speeches and campaign speeches of Obama's campaign's national co-chair and Massachusetts governor, Deval Patrick, although Patrick specifically stated he told Obama to use it. During the February 21, CNN-Univision debate in Austin, Texas Obama responded to the accusation by saying, "The notion that I had plagiarized from somebody who's one of my national co-chairs, who gave me the line and suggested that I use it, I think is silly." Clinton received a round of boos from the crowd when she responded, "Lifting whole passages from someone else's speeches is not change you can believe in; it's change you can Xerox".

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Barack Obama speaking at the Nutter Center, Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio, February 25, 2008

On February 25, 2008, during the hotly contested primaries in Texas and Ohio, Obama appeared at rallies in both Cincinnati and - for the first time in his career - in Dayton, Ohio. The noontime audience at the Fifth Third Arena at the University of Cincinnati was estimated at 13,000. That evening, in Fairborn, just outside of Dayton, Obama spoke before a capacity audience estimated at over 11,000 at the Nutter Center, at Wright State University. Speaking for just under an hour, Obama charged the audience with an equal responsibility in "making things happen." According to the Dayton Daily News, "Sen. Barack Obama packed the Nutter Center like a rock star...painting himself as a man who will cut through petty partisanship and bring real change to Washington.".

In Ohio, as part of the campaign's self proclaimed goal to knock on a million doors the weekend immediately before the primary, Governor Deval Patrick (D-Massachusetts) and Governor Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kansas) spoke to Obama volunteers at volunteer rallies across the state on March 1 and 2, 2008. Obama, who had won the eleven contests in February following Super Tuesday, claimed victory in the Vermont primary and the Texas Democratic caucuses, on March 4, 2008 but lost the primaries in Texas, Ohio, and Rhode Island.

A portion of the Obama volunteers "staging" at the Mahoning Center in Youngstown, Ohio, the morning of March 1, 2008.

On March 8, 2008, Barack Obama won the Wyoming caucus by nineteen points. The Clinton camp continued to suggest that Obama would make a good Vice Presidential candidate for Clinton, and former President Bill Clinton made known his support of this as a "dream ticket" which would be an "almost unstoppable force". On March 10, he flatly rejected such suggestions. Obama noted that he, not Senator Clinton, held the lead in pledged delegates and that he had won more of the popular vote than Clinton. "I don't know how somebody who is in second place is offering the vice presidency to somebody who is in first place," he said. He told supporters in Columbus, MS that Clinton's VP suggestion was an example of what he called "the old okey-doke", further stating that the Clinton camp was trying to "bamboozle" or "hoodwink" voters. Obama wondered aloud why the Clinton campaign believed him competent for the Vice Presidency, but said he was "not ready" to be President.

On March 11, 2008, Obama won the Mississippi primary. There, Obama won approximately 90 percent of the black vote, compared to Clinton's 70 percent majority of white voters. On March 11 2008, David Axelrod demanded that Sen. Clinton sever ties with Geraldine Ferraro, a top Clinton fundraiser and 1984 Democratic vice-presidential nominee, who said publicly that Obama was a major presidential contender only because he is a black man. Sen. Barack Obama widened his lead over Sen. Hillary Clinton in the overall delegate count when he was declared the winner of the March 4 Texas caucuses on March 12 2008.Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton would both statistically tie Republican John McCain in a general election matchup, according to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll released March 18 2008.The National Archives on March 19 2008 released more than 11,000 pages of Sen. Hillary Clinton's schedule when she was first lady. Sen. Barack Obama's campaign had pushed for the documents' release, arguing that their review is necessary to make a full evaluation of Clinton's experience as first lady. Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama released their tax returns from 2000 to 2006 on his campaign Web site March 26 2008, and he challenged Sen. Hillary Clinton to release hers.

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, a former 2008 Democratic candidate, endorsed Obama on March 21. Prominent Hillary Clinton advisor James Carville pointed out that the endorsement came during the week before Easter and likened Richardson's endorsement to Judas Iscariot's biblical betrayal of Jesus Christ. Richardson had served as former President Bill Clinton's ambassador to the United Nations and Secretary of Energy. Amid controversy, a Clinton spokesman said that he would apologize had he made the comment but Carville declined to do so, further calling Richardson's decision an "egregious act". Richardson responded by refusing to "get in the gutter" with Carville, and said that certain people around Clinton feel a "sense of entitlement to the presidency".

On March 20, 2008, Obama gave a preview of his strategy in a potential general election campaign against Republican John McCain. Obama blasted McCain for backing tax cuts for the wealthy without corresponding spending cuts, and for his support of the Iraq war, which Obama blamed for high gasoline prices. "John McCain seems determined to carry out a third Bush term," Obama said. He added that McCain once opposed what Obama called the "irresponsible" Bush tax cuts, but now wants to make them permanent. He also asserted that McCain wants a "permanent occupation in Iraq".

International leaks and passport issues

In February 2008, Ian Brodie (Chief of Staff in Stephen Harper's Prime Minister's Office) became the center of a political controversy when it was alleged in the Canadian press that he leaked a memo tied to the American Democratic political primary. According to the memo, Barack Obama's economic advisor Austan Goolsbee had met with Canadian consular officials in Chicago and told them to disregard Obama's campaign rhetoric regarding the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), a charge the Obama campaign later denied. In Canada, the leak was seen as an attempt by Conservative Prime Minister Harper's office to harm Obama's political campaign and help Republican candidate John McCain.

Brodie, during the media lockup for the February 26, 2008 budget, stopped to chat with several journalists, and was surrounded by a group from CTV. The conversation turned to the pledges to renegotiate the North American free-trade agreement made by the two Democratic contenders, Obama and New York Senator Hillary Clinton. Brodie, apparently seeking to play down the potential impact on Canada, told the reporters the threat was not serious, and that someone from Clinton's campaign had even contacted Canadian diplomats to tell them not to worry because the NAFTA threats were mostly political posturing. The Canadian Press news agency quoted that source as saying that Brodie said that someone from Clinton's campaign called and was "telling the embassy to take it with a grain of salt." The Clinton campaign denies it. "We flatly deny the report," says Clinton spokesperson Phil Singer. "We did not sanction nor would we ever sanction anyone to say any such a thing. We give the Canadian government blanket immunity to reveal the name of anyone in the Clinton campaign think they heard from."

The story was followed by CTV's Washington bureau chief, Tom Clark, who reported that the Obama campaign, not the Clinton's, had reassured Canadian diplomats. Clark cited unnamed Canadian sources in his initial report. Media later reported the source as Canadian Ambassador Michael Wilson. There was no explanation last night for why Brodie was said to have referred to the Clinton campaign but the news report was about the Obama campaign. Robert Hurst, president of CTV News, declined to comment.

The Prime Minister's communications director, Sandra Buckler, has said that Brodie "does not recall" discussing the issue. On March 4, 2008 Harper initially denied that Brodie was a source of the leak — but he appeared to be referring to a diplomatic memo that described the key conversation between an adviser to Obama and Canada's consul-general in Chicago, Georges Rioux. Harper did not appear to be distinguishing between the two leaks later in the day. Harper asked the top civil servant, Clerk of the Privy Council Kevin Lynch, to call in an internal security team, with the help of Foreign Affairs. Members of the opposition asserted that an internal inquiry is unlikely to look seriously at Harper's own high-level political aides and appointees, such as Brodie, or Michael Wilson, Canada's ambassador to Washington.

On March 10, 2008 Canadian MP Navdeep Bains called on Canadian Ambassador to the United States Michael Wilson to step down as Canada's ambassador to Washington while the leaks that damaged Senator Barack Obama's presidential campaign are investigated. Wilson has publicly acknowledged that he spoke to CTV reporter Tom Clark who first reported the leaks before the story aired, but refused to discuss what was said. It now appears that Wilson, who was finance minister under former Canadian Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney, took part in political leaks that damaged a Democratic presidential contender.

There have been three separate incidents involving Barack Obama's State Department passport file since 2008 began; while the instances of unauthorized access have occurred over a three-month span, Obama was notified only on March 20th, as upper levels of the State Department themselves, first became aware of the breaches. On March 21 2008, the United States Department of State revealed that Obama's passport file was improperly accessed three times in 2008. Three contract employees are accused in the wrongdoing. One, who works for The Analysis Corporation (TAC), accessed Obama and McCain's records, and was disciplined. The two other workers, who worked for Stanley Inc., each accessed Obama's file on separate occasions and were fired. An unauthorized access of Hillary Clinton's file was also made in mid-2007, but was considered a training error and unrelated to the other instances. John O. Brennan, president and CEO of Analysis, is a consultant to the Barack Obama campaign and contributed $2,300 to the Obama campaign in January 2008. Brennan is a former senior CIA official and former interim director of the National Counterterrorism Center. The chairman of Stanley Inc., Philip Nolan, is a Clinton supporter and contributor; his company has had contracts with the United States Department of State since 1992 and was recently awarded a $570 million contract to continue providing support for passport processing. The State Department is focusing an internal inquiry on the TAC employee, but plans to question all three of the contractors who accessed the candidates' files.

Role of superdelegates

Following the Potomac primary, the potential role of superdelegates in deciding the Democratic nomination was heavily discussed. In particular, the possibility of one candidate gaining more pledged delegates from primary and caucus wins, but losing the nomination to the other due to the decisions of superdelegates, made some Democratic leaders uncomfortable. The Clinton camp, behind in pledged delegates, advocated that superdelegates exercise their own judgment in deciding which candidate to back, while the Obama camp, ahead in pledged delegates, advocated that superdelegates follow the will of the voters and back whichever candidate had the most pledged delegates. Some party leaders, such as Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, argued for the latter interpretation, while others such as Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean argued for the former. Dean also said party leaders would not force a deal, but "let the voters vote."

African American superdelegates previously pledged to Clinton, found themselves under pressure to switch to supporting Obama's candidacy; one example being John Lewis, a noted civil rights leader, Selma marcher, US Representative from Georgia, and superdelegate, who formally switched endorsements to Obama on February 27 2008; Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr. suggested that those staying with Clinton might face Democratic primary challenges in the future. MoveOn.org started an Internet petition to urge superdelegates to "let the voters decide between Clinton and Obama, then support the people's choice."

While Clinton was viewed as having an institutional advantage in amassing superdelegates by virtue of her fifteen years of national prominence in party politics, Obama had heavily outspent Clinton in previous contributions to superdelegates through their political action committees.

Speculation that Barack Obama had amassed about fifty additional superdelegates, removing Clinton's final advantage in the race, was reported on the eve of the March 4 primaries and caucuses; with the Clinton victory in most of that night's contests, the Obama camp chose not to release those names as expected on Wednesday.

Primary voting and Delegate count

Pledged Delegate margins by state. Obama won the delegate count in the darkest purple states by the largest margins, while Clinton won the delegate count in the darkest green states by the largest margins. They tied in MO and NH.

Popular Vote margins by state. Obama won the popular vote in the darkest purple states by the largest margins, while Clinton won the popular vote in the darkest green states by the largest margins.

Media coverage

An October 29, 2007 study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy found that through the first half of 2007, Obama had received by far the most favorable media coverage of any of the 2008 presidential candidates, with 47 percent of stories having a favorable tone towards him, 16 percent having an unfavorable tone, and the balance neutral. In terms of amount of coverage, Obama had been the subject of 14 percent of all campaign coverage, the second largest amount after Clinton.

By December 2007, the Clinton campaign charged that Obama's campaign was getting much more favorable media treatment than their own, especially once Clinton's poll results began slipping. Washington Post media analyst Howard Kurtz found a number of journalists who agreed with the claim, with Mark Halperin, Time magazine's editor-at-large for political news, saying, "Your typical reporter has a thinly disguised preference that Barack Obama be the nominee. The narrative of him beating her is better than her beating him, in part because she's a Clinton and in part because he's a young African American. ... There's no one rooting for her to come back."

Shortly before the New Hampshire primary, NBC anchor Brian Williams conceded that at least one NBC reporter said regarding Obama, "it's hard to stay objective covering this guy." In a retrospective of media coverage after the primary, The Politico determined that Williams may have been onto something: "Reporters are human, and some did seem swept up in the same emotions many voters experienced when they saw a black man win snow-white Iowa by preaching a gospel of change. Many are sympathetic to Obama’s argument that the culture of Washington politics is fundamentally broken." In a January 14 New York Times/CBS News poll, 12 percent of Democratic primary voters thought the media had been harder on Obama than on the other candidates, while 51 percent thought it had been harder on Clinton.

Obama's treatment of the traveling press corps was itself unusual. Not only did he keep an aloof posture, rarely talking to the national media, but his aides did not try to wine and dine or spin the press. Howard Kurtz observed, "In an age of all-out political warfare, the Obama campaign is a bit of an odd duck: It is not obsessed with winning each news cycle. The Illinois senator remains a remote figure to those covering him, and his team, while competent and professional, makes only spotty attempts to drive its preferred story lines in the press."

Measurements in late January by the University of Navarra indicated that Clinton and Obama were receiving roughly equal amounts of global media attention, once Obama won the Iowa caucuses.

Although he has enjoyed mostly positive press coverage during his campaign, the news media, talk radio and the blogosphere began began to focus their criticism on the senator in late February 2008, both bringing new charges to the public eye, and re-raising older allegations. Notable among these was the public disclosure of Obama's connections to former Weather Underground members and current college professors William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn. Obama's connections with another academic, PLO supporter and Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi, were also problematic for the senator. Finally, as his fraud trial began on March 32008, indicted developer Tony Rezko's links to Obama, including a real estate deal, were once again a common media topic.

Coverage of Obama's religion during the campaign

Coverage of Obama's childhood and heritage

Various allegations and criticisms have been made during the campaign concerning Obama's religious background and heritage, both by political opponents and by some members of the media. The process began in 2004, when columnist Andy Martin issued a press release falsely alleging that Obama is "a Muslim who has concealed his religion," a statement which received little media attention. In late 2006, as the announcement of Obama's presidential candidacy approached, chain e-mails appeared claiming that Obama was a hypothetical "Manchurian Candidate." In January 2007, two of the Obama campaign's first hires were opposition researchers, immediately assigned to debunk the these e-mails.

On January 17, 2007, the day after Obama announced his candidacy, the Internet magazine Insight published an article claiming that Clinton campaign staff thought it was true that Obama had attended a Muslim seminary as a child in Indonesia and were planning to use that information against him during the upcoming primary election campaign. Insight's anonymously sourced allegations (described as an attack on both Clinton and Obama by the Clinton campaign, an allegation repeated by others) were brought to national attention when reported on by Fox News and elsewhere, which "set off the echo chamber" according to one columnist.

The Clinton and Obama campaigns quickly denounced the allegations. Investigations by CNN, ABC and others showed that Obama had not, as Insight had written, attended an Islamic seminary. Instead, for his first three years abroad Obama attended St. Francis Assisi Catholic School, and in his last year transferred to State Elementary School Menteng Besuki‎, an Indonesian public school for children of all faiths in the majority Muslim nation. A series of Chicago Tribune reports found that "[w]hen Obama attended 4th grade in 1971, Muslim children spent two hours a week studying Islam, and Christian children spent those two hours learning about the Christian religion. The series also stated: "In fact, Obama's religious upbringing in Indonesia depended more on the conventions of the schools he attended than on any decision by him, his mother or his stepfather. When he was at a Catholic school for three years, he prayed as a Catholic. When he was at a public school for a year, he learned about Islam."

Bipartisan criticism has appeared criticizing the media's failures in propagating a false story, notably in the Columbia Journalism Review, and on ABC News' Nightline program, where Norman Ornstein of the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute was quoted:

"There's now almost a predictable process here. People have learned how to get things covered, even when they shouldn't be covered.... You either start with a revelation in the Drudge Report or Insight magazine, then that gets picked up by the New York Post or The Wall Street Journal and Fox News and by the blogs, and before long there's enough noise out there and enough buzz that comes from it that everybody from The New York Times to The Washington Post to the network news broadcasts decide they have to cover it. And it doesn't matter if it's true or not."

Former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey made some comments about Obama's supposed childhood connections to Islam as he endorsed Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination. Kerrey later wrote a letter of apology for his remarks to Obama, saying: "I answered a question about your qualifications to be president in a way that has been interpreted as a backhanded insult of you. I assure you I meant to do just the opposite." Obama has said that he accepted Kerrey's apology.

In February 2008, a photo of Obama dressed in a turban and other local clothing while on a 2006 visit to an ethnic Somali community in Kenya appeared on the Drudge Report, which attributed it to a Clinton staffer upset at Obama getting more favorable coverage in the media than Clinton. The photo was interpreted as suggesting Muslim garb, and the Obama campaign accused the Clinton campaign of “shameful, offensive fear-mongering”. A spokesman for Clinton replied that the release of the photo had not been sanctioned by the campaign — but added that "We have over 700 people on this campaign and I’m not in a position to know what each one of them may or may not have done."

E-mails and flyers repeating false allegations about Obama and other candidates were distributed to voters in Iowa and South Carolina just before they went to vote for presidential candidates. In Iowa Obama told his supporters: “You have e-mails saying that I’m a Muslim plant that’s trying to take over America. If you get this e-mail from someone you know, set the record straight.” Sen. Clinton's campaign fired at least two campaign volunteers for forwarding related e-mails about Obama.

Obama's campaign organization has responded with a letter from Christian leaders vouching for his Christian faith, as well as with appeals to supporters to help correct any misunderstanding. From November 2007 to January 2008, as part of a drive to promote awareness of his Christian faith, Obama gave interviews to Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network, to Christianity Today and to the religious website Beliefnet.com.

Another false accusation sometimes accompanying the religious ones is that Obama refuses to say the Pledge of Allegiance. This is based on misrepresenting a Time magazine picture of Obama listening to the U.S. National Anthem with his hands at his sides while the others on stage have their right hands over their hearts. He does, in fact, say the Pledge and sometimes leads the Senate in doing so.

On March 3 2008, the day preceding the Ohio and Texas primaries, the subject of Obama's background again surfaced, this time following a CBS News 60 Minutes interview with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. When asked about Senator Obama's heritage, Senator Clinton responded with an answer perceived by some to be vague, and her comments were criticized by some evening news broadcasts on Monday.

Controversy over Obama's church and former pastor

See also: A More Perfect Union

In March 2008, Obama's relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, pastor of Obama's church for the first 20 years of his membership (as well as for 16 years before that), started to draw attention when Wright's sermons began receiving media coverage. In one December 2007 address, Wright stated that Clinton had an advantage over Obama because she is white. "Hillary ain't never been called a 'nigger!'," Wright said. "Hillary has never had her people defined as non-persons."

In 2003, Wright claimed that the U.S. government provides drugs to African-Americans.

"The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, not God Bless America. God damn America. That's in the Bible, for killing innocent people ... God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."

In another sermon delivered after the September 11 attacks in 2001, Wright used as his repeated coda the phrase "America's chickens are coming home to roost," expanding on a comment made by former ambassador Edward Peck who was interviewed on Fox News the previous day. Identifying the "chickens" as taking the country from the Indian tribes by terror, bombing Grenada, Panama, Libya, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki, and supporting state terrorism against the Palestinians and South Africa, he concluded that his parishoners' response should be to examine their relationship with God, not go "from the hatred of armed enemies to the hatred of unarmed innocents." This was widely interpreted as saying that America had brought the attacks upon itself.

Addressing the uproar over these sermons, which were labeled anti-American by one major newspaper, on March 15 2008 Obama denounced the "forces of division" that he said had become part of the race for the White House. Obama said, "all of the statements that have been the subject of controversy are ones that I vehemently condemn." He said that some of the comments by his pastor, a former member of the US Navy, reminded him of the country's "tragic history when it comes to race." Presumptive Republican nominee John McCain defended Obama in the Wright matter, saying:

"I think that when people support you, it doesn't mean that you support everything they say. Obviously, those words and those statements are statements that none of us would associate ourselves with, and I don't believe that Senator Obama would support any of those, as well. ... I do know Senator Obama. He does not share those views. ... I know that, for example, I've had endorsements of some people that I didn't share their views ... but they endorsed mine. And so I think we've got to be very careful about that part."

Obama also said the remarks had come to his attention at the beginning of his presidential campaign but that because Wright was on the verge of retirement, and because of Obama's strong links to the Trinity faith community, he had not thought it "appropriate" to leave the church. Obama had begun distancing himself from Wright when he called his pastor the night before the February 2007 announcement of Obama's presidential candidacy to withdraw his request that Wright deliver an invocation at the event. A spokesman later explained "Senator Obama is proud of his pastor and his church, but... decided to avoid having statements and beliefs being used out of context and forcing the entire church to defend itself." Wright did attend the announcement, prayed with Obama beforehand, and in December, 2007 was named to the Obama campaign's African American Religious Leadership Committee. On March 14, the campaign announced that "Rev. Wright is no longer serving on the African American Religious Leadership Committee."

Some critics found this response inadequate. For example, Mark Steyn, writing in the National Review, stated: "Reverend Wright['s] appeals to racial bitterness are supposed to be everything President Obama will transcend. Right now, it sounds more like the same-old same-old." Politico made a similar comment: "Obama’s cross-racial and even cross-partisan support has been driven by a belief that he is a new-era politician, not defined by the grievances and ideological habits of an earlier generation", and quoted an "expert": "Wright is a “huge, huge problem...The new information, especially about his minister and his twenty-year association with this church, really undermines the message he’s been delivering for the last year, it completely undercuts it".

On March 18, Obama delivered a speech entitled "A More Perfect Union" at the Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. During the course of the 37-minute speech, Obama spoke of the divisions formed through generations through the legacy of slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow laws, and the reasons for the kinds of discussions and rhetoric used among blacks and whites in their own communities. He made references to John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. among others. While condemning the ill-received remarks by his former pastor, he also sought to give them historical context by describing some of the key events that have formed the 67-year-old Wright's views on race-related matters in America. Obama then spoke of his unwillingness to "disown" Wright, whom he has compared to "an old uncle", as akin to disowning the black community or disowning his white grandmother. However, he did note that Wright had already been proven wrong in his views of America through the unprecedented reception to his own presidential candidacy. In closing he urged the nation to not fall victim to racially divisive remarks that have seen the country unable to sustain an open dialog concerning race matters. The next day, Obama told CNN's Anderson Cooper that the episode had "shaken me up a little bit", and that he hoped to "open a new conversation about a new direction in the country". Obama stated that he considered some of Wright's remarks to be "unpatriotic", and that Wright's mistake was in ignoring the progress America had made since the days of Dr. King's activism.

In the speech, Obama described his grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, and certain uncomfortable moments she experienced with other races. Obama expanded on this theme in a later interview, and described his grandmother's opinions:

"The point I was making was not that my grandmother harbors any racial animosity, but that she is a typical white person. If she sees somebody on the street that she doesn't know - there's a reaction in her that's been bred into our experiences that don't go away and sometimes come out in the wrong way and that's just the nature of race in our society. We have to break through it. What makes me optimistic is you see each generation feeling less like that."

Obama's use of the phrase "typical white person" was highlighted by a gossip columnist for the Philadelphia Daily News and subsequently picked up by commentators on the Huffington Post blog, ABC News and other media outlets. Several of the commentators suggested that if Hillary Clinton had used the phrase "typical black person" the public response would have been different.

In the wake of the controversy, Clinton re-took the lead in the Gallup national tracking poll, and she was ahead of Obama by 7 points on March 18. By March 20, the race was back to a near dead heat, with Clinton holding a statistically insignificant 2-point lead over Obama. John McCain has recently taken a slight lead over both Democrats in hypothetical General Election match ups. This lead over both Democrats is 3 points in a poll with a 2 point margin of error. By March 22, Obama had regained his lead over Clinton and was up by 3 points.

Effect of the Internet

Social networking sites

Many commentators have noted Obama's strong support amongst social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook.com.

Chris Hughes, a Facebook co-founder and co-ordinator of on-line organizing within the Barack Obama presidential campaign, called the on-line surge backing Obama "unprecedented". As of mid March, the "American Politics" application on Facebook listed Obama as the 5-1 favorite over Hillary Clinton. Furthermore, the Obama campaign was a launch partner for Facebook's new F8 platform.

One group on Facebook, "Barack Obama (One Million Strong for Barack)", has 507,523 members as of March 28, 2008. Obama's politician page lists 726,930 supporters as of March 28, 2008. On February 2 2007, Obama attended a rally at George Mason University organized by "Students for Barack Obama", a group that began on Facebook, with several thousand in attendance.Other countries have also registered Facebook groups in support of Senator Obama including Canada and several European countries.

Obama's official website itself incorporates networking elements which allows supporters to create their own profiles and blogs, as well as to chat and plan grassroots events. My.BarackObama.com (MyBO) is a social networking website created by the campaign. It was first launched on February 11, 2007, and was billed as "a MySpace for his supporters". It was built and designed by internet technology and political strategist firm Blue State Digital and Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes.

The site now has over 70,000 registered users, and the Obama campaign credits the online social networking tool with increasing fundraising and event turnout. Other presidential candidates have since created their own social networking websites, such as Republican Sen. John McCain's "McCainSpace".

The bulk of MyBO's activity takes place in group and event organization, where members first create or join on-line "groups" which share common email listservs and blogs. These groups are then used to plan offline events, ranging from casual "meet ups" to large fundraising events, with those who RSVP for fundraising events via MyBO having the option of fulfilling their fundraising promise in advance through online payment. Of the $25 million the Obama campaign raised in the first quarter of 2007, over $6 million was raised through on-line channels.

Viral videos

The Obama primary campaign has received publicity from the introduction of several high-profile music videos concerning the senator. The first was an off-topic parody song portraying a fictional love between Senator Obama and a provocatively-dressed young woman, entitled I Got a Crush... on Obama, first appearing on June 13, 2007. The second video was Yes We Can, after the ubiquitous Obama campaign slogan, itself originally a long-standing union chant in the US. It was released on February 2, 2008, and was a straightforward, star-studded endorsement by a range of actors, musicians and other celebrities, led by Grammy-winner Will.i.am of the Black-Eyed Peas, singing the actual words of an Obama speech following the New Hampshire primary. The video was generating over a million views on YouTube a day following its release. By March 27, 2008, the song had been viewed over 17 million times on YouTube and other sites.

The video of Obama's speech A More Perfect Union also "went viral", reaching over 1.3 million views on YouTube within a day of the speech's delivery. Links to the speech were among the most widely shared on Facebook, and by March 27, the speech had been viewed nearly 3.4 million times.

Political positions

Main article: Political positions of Barack Obama

‎ Barack Obama hearing about the lack of medical coverage for seniors with local resident Marian Edwards at rally at the Nutter Center at Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio, February 25, 2008.

Presidential candidate and Senator Barack Obama has taken positions on many national, political, economic and social issues, either through public comments or his senatorial voting record.

One such position is Obama's stance on health care. In contrast to the position of Hillary Clinton, who has said she wants "universal healthcare for everyone", Obama has repeatedly said that he wants to see that every American has the option of having health care as good as every U. S. Senator has.

Opinion polling

Main articles: General Election Polling and Democratic Primary Polling

Following Obama's interview on Meet the Press, opinion polling organizations added his name to surveyed lists of Democratic candidates. The first such poll (November 2006) ranked Obama in second place with 17 percent support among Democrats after Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) who placed first with 28 percent of the responses. A Zogby Poll released on January 18, 2007, showed Obama leading the Democratic contenders in the first primary state of New Hampshire with 23 percent of New Hampshire Democrats supporting Obama. Senator Clinton and former Senator John Edwards were tied for second place with 19 percent each. A Washington Post/ABC News poll on February 26-27, 2007 placed Obama in second place with 24 percent among likely Democratic primary voters, with Hillary Clinton garnering 36 percent as the leader.

Opinion polls taken in April 2007 differ widely from each other: Obama was listed in third place nationwide, 24 percent behind Hillary Clinton and 2 percent behind John Edwards. In an April 30, 2007 Rasmussen Reports Poll, Barack Obama led the poll for the Democratic nomination for first time with 32 percent support. By June however, Clinton was winning all the major national polls by double digits except one that showed Obama with a one point lead, and by July, all major national polls showed Obama trailing Clinton by double digits.

Polling analysts are expected to take note of whether opinion polling statistics regarding Obama prove to be accurate, or are ultimately subject to the so-called "Bradley effect" observed in some previous American elections. The Bradley effect occurs when a smaller percentage of white voters, by a statistically significant margin, actually vote for an African American candidate than the percentage of those voters who said that they were likely to vote for that candidate during pre-election opinion polling. This continued to be a concern in some earlier primary states, but as the season progressed Obama showed electoral success with white voters in states like Virginia and Wisconsin.

At the end of March 2008, as over 40 states had already held their Democratic primary processes, Barack Obama built on his national Gallup daily tracking poll results to become the first candidate to open a double-digit lead since Super Tuesday, when his competitor Hillary Clinton had a similar margin. On March 30 the poll showed Obama at 52% and Clinton at 42%. The Rassmussen Reports poll, taken during the same time frame, also showed an Obama advantage of five points. These polls followed weeks of heavy campaigning and heated rhetoric from both camps, and another late-March poll found Obama maintaining his positive rating and limiting his negative rating, better than his chief rival Clinton, even considering Obama's involvement in controversy during the period. The NBC News and Wall Street Journal poll showed Obama losing two points of positive rating and gaining four points of negative rating, while Clinton lost eight points of positive rating and gained five points of negative rating.

Endorsements

Main article: List of Barack Obama presidential campaign endorsements

See also: Newspaper endorsements in the United States presidential primaries, 2008

See also: Congressional endorsements for the 2008 United States presidential election

Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley endorsed Obama hours after his announcement, abandoning his tradition of staying neutral in Democratic primaries. A day later, Obama traveled to Ames, Iowa where he was endorsed by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller and State Treasurer Michael Fitzgerald. Just days before the crucial New York Democratic Primary, Obama won the endorsement of the Young Democrats Club of Pelham, a key endorsement considering 16 percent of the club supported Hillary Clinton. Perhaps Obama's biggest celebrity endorsement is talk show host Oprah Winfrey, who has occasionally joined Obama on the campaign trail and hosted a fundraiser at her Santa Barbara, CA estate. Following his win in South Carolina Obama received the endorsement of Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of President John F. Kennedy, and Senator Ted Kennedy, his brother. For the first time in its ten year history, MoveOn.org endorsed a Presidential candidate when Obama received 70 percent of an online ballot the organization held of its members. On February 3 2008, another member from the Kennedy family, First Lady of California Maria Shriver, announced her endorsement for Obama. On February 26, former Democratic candidate Chris Dodd endorsed Obama, followed on March 21 by another former Democratic candidate, current New Mexico governor and retired United Nations ambassador Bill Richardson. Richardson served under President Bill Clinton as Secretary of Energy and as a United Nations ambassador.

Fundraising

File:Obamaaustin.jpg

Senator Obama rallying support in Austin, Texas, February 2007.

Hyatt board member Penny Pritzker currently serves as the national finance chair of the campaign; Pritzker served on the finance committee for Obama's 2004 Senate run. Obama has said he will not accept donations from federal lobbyists or political action committees during the campaign. While he started to collect private donations for a general election account, Obama asked the Federal Election Commission if he could later return the money if he decided to take public funds. In response, the FEC allowed presidential candidates to take contributions for a general election campaign even if they later decided to accept public money.

Alan D. Solomont, who led a group that raised $35 million for John Kerry in 2004, has signed on with the campaign, saying Obama "is the sort of person America wants in the White House right now." Other fundraisers that have joined the campaign include David Geffen, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and Mark Gorenberg.

Obama's fundraising prowess early on matched that of Hillary Clinton's and, financially speaking, stayed competitive with her. On April 4, 2007, Obama's campaign announced that they had raised $25 million in the first quarter of 2007, coming close to Hillary Clinton's $26 million in first quarter contributions. Over 100,000 people donated to the campaign and $6.9 million was raised through the Internet. $23.5 million of Obama's first quarter funds can be used in the primary, the highest of any candidate.

Obama's fundraising skills were affirmed again in the second quarter of 2007, when his campaign received $32.5 million in donations. This is $5.5 million more than his nearest rival, Hillary Clinton, whose campaign raised around $27 million. Obama's 258,000 individual donors revealed his wide grassroots appeal and success raising funds via the Internet. Altogether Obama's campaign raised US$58 million during the first half of 2007, topping all other candidates and exceeding previous records for the first six months of any year before an election year.

For the third quarter of 2007, which typically sees lower numbers than the rest of the year, Obama raised $20 million, still a large amount but bested by Clinton, who led all candidates with $27 million raised. Obama's campaign reported adding 108,000 new donors through in the quarter, for a total of 365,000 individual contributors in the first nine months.

In the fourth quarter of 2007, Obama raised $23.5 million, while Clinton raised $27.3 million.

As of January 2008, Obama had received over 800,000 donations from over 600,000 individual donors.

The Obama campaign raised $32 million in the month of January 2008 alone, from over 250,000 separate supporters. When it was disclosed that Hillary Clinton loaned $5 million of her own money to her campaign, Obama's supporters donated over $6.5 million in less than 24 hours. So far in 2008, over 400,000 separate donors have contributed to the campaign. When the Clinton campaign reported that it had raised over $10 million in the five days after Super Tuesday, the Obama campaign reported raising "well more" than that.

Candidate financial disclosures released following the Wisconsin and Hawaii primaries raised Barack Obama's estimated January take to $37 million, about $17 million more than the second-placed candidate Hillary Clinton. Much of her fundraising was furthermore ineligible for primary-contest spending, and her campaign is projected to have ended the month in debt by over eight million dollars, one-quarter of that being unpaid fees to consultant Mark Penn. Also on Wednesday, the Obama campaign announced it was approaching one million individual donors in the campaign to date.

In February, the Obama campaign surpassed the one million donor mark, a first for a competitive primary campaign in the United States. and raised $55 million, setting a record for political fundraising in one month.

External links

• Official Campaign Website
• Official Student Division on the Campaign Website
• Obama '08 on YouTube
• Spartan Internet Political Performance Index ranking for Barack Obama by week
• New York Times Resource on Barack Obama
• Barack Obama Presidential Campaign at Curlie
• Vote 2008: Barack Obama - Online NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
• Chicago Tribune's Barack Obama page
• Obama on the Issues