Daley Blames - Who Else? - The Media For Oprah-geddon
Chicago Gets Googled
Friday Flashback - Old School Oprah
Today's Transgender Day of Remembrance Honors the Dead
Review: Paramount Room
About 17,000 union members, along with their friends and their families, filled the south end of Soldier Field for a debate, hosted by the AFL-CIO, among the Democratic contenders. A sweaty sea of union members in colored T-shirts, representing everyone from the Service Employees International Union to the United Steelworkers, from the AFSCME to the IUPAT, drank cold bottles of water and listened to Democrats talk about how their administration would work for working families, if elected.
Never one to shy from the limelight, Mayor Daley took the stage before the debate began to address the crowd, lauding the new agreement between the city and it's unions, and pointing out that Chicago's skyline was filled with tower cranes driven by unionized Operating Engineers. (Never mind that Chicago Federation of Labor President Dennis Gannon, an Operating Engineer himself, led the rebellion against the mayor in the last municipal elections.) The audience responded with boredom and a smattering of boos.
As Secret Service agents milled about stuffed into suits and dark sunglasses, Keith Olbermann took the stage to moderate. Unlike the bloggers tapping furiously at their laptops during the Presidential Leadership Forum a few days earlier at McCormick Place, this crowd was a little rowdier, a little more fired up to hear the candidates that four out of every five active union members would go out and vote for in 455 days. While Chris Dodd and Dennis Kucinich made much hay of their labor sympathies, the crowd seemed split between Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.
Although Obama and Clinton are leading Edwards in national polling, he's locked in a three-way race in Iowa, and courting the labor movement is part of his strategy to carry the early primary state. Attacking Clinton as a Washington insider, he told the crowd "the one thing you can count on is you will never see a picture of me on the front of Fortune magazine saying, ‘I am the candidate that big, corporate America is betting on,'" he said. "That will never happen. You can take that to the bank."
Clinton took several swipes at Obama, chastising him for an earlier speech on Pakistan. "You shouldn't always say everything you think if you're running for president because it has consequences across the world. And we don't need that right now." Obama responded by saying "I find it amusing that those who helped to authorize and engineer the biggest foreign policy disaster in our generation are now criticizing me."
Coming out of Soldier Field last night, the explosions of a post-debate fireworks show ricocheting off the steel and cement structure that holds the new stadium together, we reflected on the commentary we heard in the crowd last night: Bill Richardson is running for Vice President, and Joe Biden played attack dog to John Edwards, appearing to carry the burden for Clinton, leaving her a clear path to take the high road as she vies to stay ahead of Barack Obama. Only 454 days left to go.
Image via jshueh.
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
It's almost as though you guys ignore the difference between it's and its on purpose these days.
I would have expected more insight about the labor angle, if any, from this debate--you know, free trade; NAFTA/CAFTA, health benefits, etc. and how the candidates differ--as you manage to find a labor angle is just about everything, as per your expertise. Perhaps the candidates did not talk much about such issues?
Have so many many empty promises and promises that are not even possible to keep ever been made to so many people (in colorful t-shirts) who were lapping all it up with spoons? I am still waiting for promises of rainbows and unicorns from one of the candidates. To paraphrase, "when elected I promise will fix everything make everything wonderful, really, you can believe me. I am just like you. Your concerns actually matter to me. See me smiling and nod my head? See me frown and tip my chin? See I really am genuine in my concern for your plight. vote for me. You can trust me. free health care, the job you deserve, paid time off, free higher education, balloons for the kids." They all make me feel dirty somehow.
It amazes me that after post after post about how the media is reducing this election to a style-race; that you would post on a debate that gives you a perfect opportunity to outline the candidates policy positions and instead choose to describe shirts and fireworks.
Part of the problem Ken. At what point are you bloggers considered MSM?
Yeah, you would a guy who attended (and the writer attended, right?) could offer better commentary, especially given the guy's strong labor credentials. Oh well.
no mention of biden completely self-destructing? or dodd and biden's seeming willingness to do HRC's dirty work for her, attacking obama and edwards aggressively so she could stay above the fray...presumably because biden wants to be Secretary of State more than president...?
this is the kind of insipid, trivial political coverage that makes long election cycles painful. instead of getting a chance to really explore the positions of candidates, articles like this reduce debates to snark offs and the cadidates follow your lead because they need coverage.
chicagoist...maybe kevin can do local stuff, but you need someone with a bit more savvy to cover national stuff.
Yes, I'm disappointed at the lack of any coverage about Kucinich. While Obama had the clear pre-existing support of the majority of the attendees, Kucinich got the most enthusiastic responses based on what he actually said. The crowd repeatedly went wild for him, yet the press acts like he wasn't there, or had nothing interesting to say! Kucinich had nothing to hide in his voting record, and was the only candidate who answered the questions directly and honestly. Why can't he get equal coverage? The Tribune barely mentioned him, and the Sun-Times didn't mention him at all. I thought Chicagoist might!
And also, I thought that someone would cover the fact that Biden got booed several times for simply being an asshole. I don't know what type of person takes a question from the widow of a West Virginia miner and decides not to answer her question in favor of trying to get in a point about a previous discussion. That is pure stupidity. And callousness.
union construction workers should give Daley a standing ovation, because without his pro-business policies a good portion of the construction projects keeping them in Wranglers and NASCAR grandstands wouldn't even exist.
of course, if they were unemployed they would boo anyway so what difference does it make what they do.
"construction projects keeping them in Wranglers and NASCAR grandstands"
you sound like the most pretentious dick i could ever have the misfortune to meet. the condescension that hipper than thou urban types pile on anyone that works with their back is fucking nauseating.
i know a lot of people, including artists, musicians, actors, and authors, who have supported themselves doing construction work. frankly, i would wager that even the average construction-lifer has more tact, common sense, and decency that your worthless ass.
die.
I was there last night and agree with Guest #6.
I also have this to add:
The democratic candidates (read politicians in general) need a lesson in brevity. I understand that ninety seconds is the oratorical equivalent to "just the tip" but how can I be expected to extract your feelings on a particular subject when you're answering a question that was asked 20 minutes ago?
Brevity is counter to the entire idea off modern politics, which must fill the amount of time allotted to it, regardles of whether it makes any sense.
I want to know the candidates' stand on Lollapalooza. Why hasn't anyone addressed that?
Also agree with guest #6 and especially the comment about Biden and his absolute disrespect for the widow. Dodd and Clinton were also being opportunists in a similar way.
Some key topics:
NAFTA/WTO, crumbling national infrastructure (in wake of MN bridge collapse), right to unionize, keeping manufacturing jobs in US, healthcare, pension (holding companies accountable),
iraq and what to do with al qaeda, who is most pro-union
Kucinich did get the most applause and was direct and witty but he is too progressive many to even consider. Biden, Dodd and Clinton are no different from each other. Edwards is all rhetoric (told the crowd he joined a picket line just that Sat. but forgot to mention he was doing it for a commercial). Richardson, who? Obama stumbled A LOT but did well when attacked esp. when defending his point about Pakistan. Funny, sometimes his answers didn't make sense, more like political blathering, but people cheered for him anyway.
Best part of the night: a question was asked if China was our ally or adversary. Richardson says they are not our enemy but our competitor. Obama agrees and adds that China always bails us out financially. Biden repeats and adds that "China holds the mortgage to our house." Clinton agrees with Biden.(see a pattern here?) Dodd agrees with everyone and so does Edwards but he adds something about toys. Then Kucinich says,(paraphrasing) "We were always told if you dig a hole deep enough, we'd get to China. Well here we are."
Jasculca/Terman is the PR firm that was hired by the AFL-CIO to produce the Democratic candidate’s forum at Soldier Field. Jasculca/Terman has a very diverse list of clients.
Notice how "green" some of the clients are, and how some purport to be.
Hahaha.