Obama's Speechwriter: A Baby Faced, 26-Year-Old White Guy

AT the Radisson Hotel in Nashua, N.H., Jon Favreau sipped Diet Coke and munched on carrot sticks and crackers to pass the time. His boss, Senator Barack Obama, wandered in and out of the room.

Finally, results from the New Hampshire Democratic primary started coming in, surprising everyone. Hillary Clinton was pulling past Senator Obama, who had won the Iowa caucuses only five days earlier.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[eaglecapri]

I can't wait for Obama's inaugural speech!

[ptarantino]

The article briefly mentions Ron Paul & I have to say, shouldn't the 72 yeard old Dr. get some credit for NOT having a speech writer?

[roncraw]

My father should be Obama's speech writer.He had a saying Obama should take to heart. Quote he said "Hope in one hand and shit in the other and see which one gets filled first.

[degjack]

Well if 26-year old baby face is all that, why isn't HE running for president???

[degjack]

Obama edits the speeches and delivers them.
'Nuf said....

[piotr]

Oh My God!!! the guy is WHITE! How can this be? Obama is... black, blackish kinda, certainly not white, and he has a WHITE speech writer? What the world is coming to...

[Zhonni]

What is this supposed to mean that a black guy could not write the speeches or Obama should hire an all black staff?

Try again.

[Ginzaman]

A question. Why was it necessary to say that his speech writer is white? What's next? Obama then hires an African-American speechwriter to cover all the bases? I know you won't do it. But I'll say stop the cheap neocon shock headlines, HuffPost. PLEASE!

[independentrepublicrat]

All national politicians have speechwriters. Is there any particular reason the HuffPo is pulling this out of their behinds like it is unique or even unusual. There is no shortage of lunacy at all levels around here.

[Tellmethetruth]

I listened to Obama, and felt sorry for him. He has no idea what the Civil Rights movement was all about, who RFK, JFK, or MLK were beyond what anyone can read about in a book. It is no wonder baby-boomers, both White and Black, find Obama a poor imitation of the leaders of a movement and not authentic.

MLK's words were born out of centuries pf suffering, none of which Obama's ancesters knew about. Obama's personal struggles and issues are totally different from African Americans whose ancesters knew slavery. Obama's struggles come from being being the child of a mixed marriage, abandonment by his foreign born father, and being raised by a single mother. This mixed marriage wouldn't have happened prior to the Civil Rights movement, making Obama's experience generational post Civil Rights movement issues of the culture's attempt to integrate. No doubt Obama's personal experience has it's tears and suffering, but it is the suffering not from growing up in a segregated world, but at the failed attempt at having an integrated family and intergrated society.

It is new path that is being carved and no words from MLK, JFK, of RFK suffice. Obama needs to find his own voice because imitating others words isn't working.

Perhaps Obama needs a new speech writer, not one who looks to the past for answers, but recognizes those who suffered from the failures of the "Dream," and still doesn't abandon the "Hope" of the integrated family and integrated society. This means owning up to the generation of Americans born out of the 1960's who came from broken homes (70% of Americans)... which means defining the dream and defining the "hope."

Obama needs a new speech writer.

[MagisterLudi]

Obama has only speech template:

Blah blah blah HOPE, blah blah CHANGE blah blah HOPE OF CHANGE blah blah blah blah I HATE HILLARY blah blah America....

No WONDER Reagan is his role model.
Soon all of his speeches will begin with "Well, my fellow Americans..."

[MagisterLudi]

Barak's quote:"I think it's fair to say the Republicans were the party of ideas for a pretty long chunk of time over the last 10 or 15 years."

I wonder if Baby Face helped him to write that pearl of wisdom?

[MagisterLudi]

"Senator Obama answered doubts about his inexperience by saying he has gained tremendous insight from his work as a community organizer, civil rights attorney,law professor, key club president, 4H treasurer, lunch room monitor, two years of jazz, and four years of tap." Amy Poehler

[MagisterLudi]

What a touching human story.

A white, Ivy League educated guy is writing speeches for a rich mostly white rich senator...

I am sobbing into my pillow.
Surely, just for that we should vote for Ba... Bar....Barak... sorry I was wiping my tears of joy.

[StillAmused]

The issue isn't that the guy is 'white' -- it's that he's 26 friggin' years old. What has he seen? What the fuck does he KNOW, beyond how to effectively string words together? What was he doing during the Vietnam war? Watergate?

Ever read or listen to Peggy Noonan? Lots of poetic flourish, but her head's up her own butt.

If you're wondering about Obama's airy but frequently insubstantial rhetoric, now you have part of the answer. No diminution of Obama's core persona or sincerity... just part of the answer.