Obama Steps Up

Every line in the speech has a purpose, making a full review prohibitive. But two particular points bear noting. Early in the speech he references Dr. King just before the Montgomery bus boycott as black people weren't sure to believe in themselves. A clever response to those African Americans who may be reluctant to support Obama because they can't be confident he will succeed.

Then there was his exigesis on "hope." He specifically calls out Hillary Clinton for her "false hopes" accusation in the debate. It was a poor choice of words at the time and he serves those words up to her here. Hope, he says, is not simply sitting passively and "hoping" things will get better. Instead hope is why people struggle against impossible odds.

On top of that, Obama hit back at the man himself, fmr. President Bill Clinton, for his attacks on Obama. Bill has been serving as Hillary's Meanie Surrogate du jour, though one she cannot fire for once. Obama went after Bill for statements "that aren't supported by the facts." The full AP story does a nice job of running through each Clinton statement and comparing it to the Obama statements on the record. You make the call, but it certainly looks like Clinton is awfully fast with the truth. Of course, that depends on what your definition of "is" is.

Unfortunately, a number of outlets are posting a truncated version of the story that merely goes through a Bill says/Barack says cadence without any detail.