Eh, kind of. I didn't see it that way. On the Dem's level. I mean, Obama made a great speech ranting on about change, but was the only candidate of the three who didn't make a single reference to policy or any specifics. Just the wonderful awe of how pleasant "hope" is. Amazing. Hope is good, I guess. We certainly need it. But... he didn't seem to bother outlining what he thinks change is... other than NOT someone else. Oh well. Really? You're gonna watch that twice? ;)

Obama gave superb speech. I am a Republican, but facts and truths cannot long be pushed under the rug. The man is a great Orator. This is fact. hilary looked like a defeated girls basketball coach.

Hope is the reason people get out of bed in the morning. Only a person who has experienced the power of hope can speak of it with such authority and conviction. His speech was not a policy speech, but rather a speech of triumph ... his own glorious Roman arch. There is plenty of time for more of both!

I agree. I didn't mean to discredit Obama or the power of hope through my choice of words.

No mention of Chuck Norris' lovely wife on the other side of the Huckster's head (opposite of Chuck)? She was more excited than he was. She seemed like she was in church, talking to the preacher. I'm wondering if Norris is in this thing because his wife likes Huckabee so much. Maybe she's from Arkansas.

As for Obama's speech...amazing. I wasn't around in the 60's to hear the Kennedy speeches, but I felt like I was time warped back to a Kennedy speech. Obama's on a roll and Hillary might as well concede now. He's untouchable.

Great speech.Obama is a great "orator" but really needs to improve his debate responses.Here's hoping he can do that when the debates include fewer participants and he is allowed more time to speak.

You're telling me that the United States of America is ready to elect a black man named Barack Hussein Obama as president, complete with his even blacker wife as first lady? I'll believe it when I see it.

I know this country is ready for "CHANGE", i.e. a non-white, black president. It's just a matter of Obama getting the votes and his supporters outvoting the majority of small minded religious executive whites that run this country.

Once I stopped laughing from the hysterical and dead-on comments of my man Party Ben, I realized all during the Obama speech, I had a wonderful feeling of deja vu. Nothing wrong, merely an all-too-seldomly-remembered feeling of pride in those who stand as leaders. When it comes to political speeches there are very few that resonate so deeply. Jesse Jackson's in 1984 at the Demo convention in San Francisco had me in tears of pride and hope (and on the damn Jumbotron and national tv with makeup streaming down my face). I worked for George McGovern in 1972, being one of his cadre of national staff travelling in swarms about the country wresting primaries from the old guard and thinking we were invincible. It's a heady feeling being right. And then came the 1972 General Election. Being right meant almost nothing.

A new day in a new century and I have hope again. I'm a grandmother now, and my hope is not so much for my future, but for that of my beloved grandboy...actually all the beloved grandboys/girls. There's been precious little to smile about in the last two decades of political dynasties. Even with the glory days of the Clinton administration, there was always the presence of that venally vicious pack of liars and thieves calling themselves the Republican leadership. Not all of them were despicable, but the few dedicated despots overwhelmed the thinking and human side of their party. We lost all hope of reason and trust in our government, especially with the illegal coronation of the idiot prince "dubya" (he doesn't merit a capital D). And for the last seven nearly eight years, it's been really bleak when it comes to pride in being an American (which is something we must find another word for...America is a hemisphere with many countries not just our word to isolate for our own use - another thing to get over in the 21st century). But I digress.

The Obama speech had every hair on my body tingling with excitement. I've been giving him money since he announced and I'm going to continue until I max out, and then find many more to do the same. What's even more powerful than Obama's words is the spirit and promise he puts behind them showing he intends to follow through on his pledge to lead this country into being a better place to live...not just survive. He thanked his wife Michelle who I think shows even more strength and poise. He says she is his rock, adding he has to do what he says cause he's afraid of what Michelle would do to him if he didn't. I believe him. This is a woman who doesn't play, and quietly and rather elegantly goes about the business of being a mother, a wife, and a statesman in everything she does. We need her to help right this country. The intellectual, emotional, and physical strength of this duo is what we need. I have every hope for u.s. with them and the kind of allies they would bring to the table leading us into the 21st century. The nightmare of the last eight years should remind us we are electing a whole administration not just a President.

Hope is a empowering thing. It makes you want to live and see and feel. Once again, it's part of my political lexicon, thank the gods. Think, listen and vote people...our future is at stake. No time like the present to make it a good one. Obama '88!

Grandma

I watched it all too. And I thought every speech was good, really, until I watched Obama. He blew me away. Yes, I felt the chills like everyone else. He'd make a great president. But Edwards would too, and probably Hillary too.
BUT...it all ain't gonna mean a thing if we don't find some way to keep the Republicans from stealing another election. WHY does no one seem to be worried about this? Read FOOLED AGAIN by Mark Crispin Miller to see how many of them there are, how widespread their antics, how many creative ways they keep Democratic and black votes from being counted, from hauling the ballots away in pickups after dark, to "adjusting" the voting machines, to borrowing the bags of ballots marked in pencil and re-marking them in permanent ink. It's so outrageous!
If we don't fix this, before November, all this excitement is just...for nothing.

Now that the votes are in, I choose to look at it this way: 70% of the Dem/Ind voters in Iowa, DO NOT want Hillary. As a progressive and card carrying Democrat, that's a very positive and good thing.

I agree with you Grandma. I am thrilled by the record turn out in Iowa. Obama is inspiring our young and our old, our men and our women, people of every economic and ethnic background to participate in taking back OUR democracy.

Voter apathy has always been more about pathetic choices than laziness and disinterest. When the candidates are more or less equal "evils", why bother? When the candidates represent their corporate sponsors instead of constituents, why bother? When vote counts cannot be trusted, why bother? I am impressed that Obama refuses donations from lobbyists. Obama is giving all of us HOPE that we can ". . . tell the lobbyists who think their money and their influence speak louder than our voices that they don't own this government, we do; and we are here to take it back".

Without HOPE, this nation would still be a colony. Without HOPE, women would still not have the right to vote or to equal employment opportunity. Without HOPE, no one would ever try, let alone achieve, anything difficult.

Enough of the "good old boys". Enough of the backroom secret handshakes with PACs and big business. Enough of the say one thing and do another. It is time for major overhaul. It is time for real change.

I Keith's defense, he WAS sharing a stage with Chris Matthews. That'd suck the life out of anyone, especially when Tweety was in prima donna sweet-Jebus-I-Hate-Clinton mode. Poor Keith just had to sit there, eat shit and take it, knowing he'd only have to put up with Chris for a few hours ... at least until he's shackled again to a stage with Matthews at the next primary. *sigh*

I love the things Obama says, and when he invoked the name of Selma, it hit a knee-jerk reaction that made me tear up. But what does he propose that will really create change on that level? Will he defeat legislation discriminating against the civil rights of GLBT people? Will he have the power and the guts to shut the insurance companies out of any discussion about our healthcare system? I'm not saying that I'm sure John Edwards will do those things, but I think it's a bit hasty to jump from a powerful speech to hypothetical accomplishments.

Thanks for the comments everyone. I probably should have made more clear my ambivalence and, of course, cynicism, in approaching the Democratic candidates. I've had no real favorite among the three front-runners: Clinton knows her stuff, Obama sounds good, Edwards is fired up, but whatever, only Kucinich says what I'm really thinking. Especially about UFOs!!! Just kidding. With Obama, I've been deeply suspicious of the "cult of personality" that seemed to have built up around him, partially due to the vagueness of his speeches, since what are people supporting, exactly? Now, I haven't become an Obama donor, or even a supporter, really, but just looking at the Iowa speeches, Obama's was stunning, and I'll admit to getting kind of choked up watching it, not just for what he said but for the screaming excitement of the crowd. What occured to me was that perhaps my cynicism could perhaps be reeled back a little bit, and that maybe Obama's power as a symbol might be important, and worthy, in and of itself. Those of you who rolled your eyes at the "hope" and "change" platitudes are right, on paper it's cheesy, and this wasn't a policy speech, but what dawned on me (and seemed to dawn on the TV commentators last night) was that sometimes a speech that aims at the (broken) hearts of Americans might do more to help change policies, in the long run, than a power-point list of specifics. More than anything, I felt sympathy for Hillary, watching her last night: she can't catch a break, despite clearly being pretty brilliant and working her ass off. But she made her bed, yada yada, and it's not really about her any more. Have I drunk the Obama Kool-Aid? I hope not, but I find myself rooting for him to win in New Hampshire, and (wistfully?) imagining a "President Obama," and I think the reaction of the media indicates a similar realization that "oh yeah, politics can still inspire us."

Please, everybody, enough about this goddamn speech. Please especially stop the defiling of the memory of far better men, like Martin Luther King, with idiotic comparisons.

Good God -- quit being so fucking shallow. A speech can be about both hope and policy. But Obama's NEVER are.

The fact that Obama never talks policy is not accidental. He is in bed with the same people as Clinton and when he deigns to actually talk specifics, stands for very much the same things.

This is why the love fest with the media.

Get a goddamn grip.

I think the thing I hate most about this quadrennial ritual, is the part where some completely unworthy manufactured icon becomes the repository of liberal hopes and dreams. The last time that happened we got 8 years of Clinton and if you think that was a good thing, well then, there really is no hope for you.

"but what dawned on me (and seemed to dawn on the TV commentators last night) was that sometimes a speech that aims at the (broken) hearts of Americans might do more to help change policies, in the long run, than a power-point list of specifics."

Well if it dawned on both you AND the tv commentators it must be true. But what if no power-point worthy specifics are lurking somehwere in the wings on their way to enactment. That seems to be the case here.

You are also posing a false dichotomy -- as if the only kind of speeches possible are substance-free vision speeches and power point lists.

Martin Luther King whose name is being evoked with sickening frequency these days, never made any bones about what policies he stood for. He spoke of hope in far more poetic and visionary terms than the insipid, self-calibrating Obama and still left no doubt what problems he was talking about nor what his methods were for addressing them. King stood unequivocally for racial equality and near the end of his life against imperialism and for socialism. He could not possibly have been less like Obama.

Yes America has a broken heart. But it will not be healed with any permanence by a business-as-usual politician dressed as a prophet.

Enough with the Obama love. And enough with symbols. Policy is the ONLY thing that finally counts.

It is about enthusiast and pasion.Obama is day by day atracting more people of diferent backgrounds that resonate to what he has to offer as a simbol that can change America internally and in the eyes of the rest of the world.Obama, on the other hand is someone who know how the machine work in this country,he have been training in how the thing funtion usually around in politics.For that reason he could bring a gradual change to a nation that need it. Now, if you want a more radical transformation of the country then vote for Kuccini or Ron Paul.

Why any Mother Jones readers allowing the media to siphon genuine meaning from the presidential race by focusing on abstractions (change, hope etc) and symbols to the complete exclusion of policy matters?

Obama is not always vague. He has made clear that he would use military force against Iran; that he wants to increase the size of the military and keep troops in Iraq until 2010. He supports trade agreements. He has not once voted to defund the war.

In a talk at NASDAQ he told members of the investor class “the problem is that no one has asked you to play a part in the project of American renewal.” Really -- that's a problem? Who knew?

He thinks that any resolution of the health care crisis must include the hopes and dreams of the insurance companies.

Listen closely and what you hear is a man cleverly appropriating symbols of inclusion, fellowship, shared values in way that both swells the hearts of non-analytical, hope-deprived liberals while telegraphing his compliance and harmlessness to big business. Ever seen that "I'd like to teach the world to sing" Coke commercial from the late 60s? Obama is following the same marketing script.

It id also foolish to ignore the things Obama NEVER talks about: torture, Guantanamo, the erosion of civil liberties among others.

All I want to know from whoever gets nominated is one simple thing.Straight and to the point as to what they will do,and I do mean do,not just talk about,in regards to releasing from prison the political prisoner Leonard Peltier.Behind bars for 30 years for a crime the FBI knows now he did not commit,denied parole,yet a model prisoner.Bill Clinton was no help,tho,he,as he put it' "I feel your pain".Really? Then FREE LEONARD PELTIER!!!!

Devra, I know what you mean. Russell Means and the Lakota just nullified all treaties with the U.S. government and announced the foundation of a new sovereign state WITHIN the United States and the main media in this country basically ignored the event. A man named Obama can make a speech and everybody thinks MLK has returned from the grave. It shows how TRUE racism has always worked in this country.
Seven years ago, the people of the United States apparently went through a voluntary, mass pre-frontal
lobotomy. Now, I seriously doubt if they would recognize the truth if you fed it to them through an IV drip. As Dr. Means said in 1988, this entire nation has become a Reservation and I'm positive that these people will never wake up to that fact before it collapses in on them and they can't buy enough gas to get to Wal-Mart anymore.
Obama? Yeah, he talks a good talk. But it's the same forked tongue talk we've always heard from our politicians. While he talks about hope, he's taking money from Big Pharma, Insurance companies and every other Corporate ghoul to get him where he wants to be. In the end, if he gets elected, he will be THEIR man, not the peoples man. Things will be as they have always been. And Leonard? Why he's just as much a political prisoner of this Great, Just Democracy as the people in Guantanamo who have
NO right to even hear who accuses them. Leonard, whose people were here thousands of years before the Europeans came to steal and murder, HAS
no rights in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. And the lobotomized never give him a thought. This is what America has become.

i posted the below somewhere else but probably should have posted it here:

I'm delighted that Obama came out ahead and have every intention to support his campaign throughout. That said, I apparently wasn't hearing his speech the same way many have reported. I actually felt as though he was grazing some pretty familiar liberal populist territory. Pundits seem to suggest that general themes rather than expressing specific issues is savvy for a man who, for what it's worth, has led a life that should give him a unique perspective on America today. Perhaps generalized overtures towards themes of unity would be disrupted if he allowed for his differences to be accentuated. As a result, I think in some regard that Obama missed an opportunity to go deeper and really connect the tropes of change and unity to palpable issues within the states and worldwide (Kenya, for instance) Again, I'm holding out too much judgment here as I have to believe that the elected Obama would bring the bare a character with a lot more clarity and detail than he and his handlers feel is suitable at a moment when he's trying to bring as many people into the fold as possible.

Oh, yeah. If anyone is interested in building a NEW nation, go to www.republicoflakotah.com. Everyone is welcome in this New Republic if you are welling to give up you U.S. citizenship, a commodity that gives you the right to be taxed to death, have no health care, go die in any war THEY decide to fight, have your land taken by 'Imminent Domain' and be given the choice between a bowl of feces or another bowl of feces every four years. Personally, I think I'm going to go find out what REAL freedom feels like before I die.

For future reference: Hilary’s font is not Times or Times New Roman, and it’s not italic. It looks like URWAntiqua Medium Oblique, but it could be a version of Clarendon or Egyptienne. The sans-serif ‘CLINTON.COM’ is probably Gill Sans Oblique.

Obama’s font is a Grotesk of some sort. The closest match I’ve found is Drescher Grotesk BT Demi.

If you want to identify a font, go to Typophile or MyFonts What the Font or Identifont . At Typophile font geeks can identify almost anything.

http://www.typophile.com/forum/29
http://www.myfonts.com/WhatTheFont/
http://www.identifont.com/

Obama's gift is not just the ability to give a great speech, but that he is so inspirational that he actually MOTIVATES people. He exudes great power by motivating and organizing people. The Shrub and the ridiculus Republican attack on Bill's indescretion has divded us into nationalists vs liberals vs evangelicals. Even the Republican party is split into social conservatives, fiscal conservatives, and evangelicals. We have no direction. We need an inspiring leader. We need the motivational ability of Obama to unite us again. We as a people need to be motivated to demand action in the right(left) direction. He can do that. Congress will actually have to DO something with the masses surging toward a change that gives power back to the people.

I know exactly the next strategy for obama. Go to a Arsenio hall show, pull out a guitar and jazz it out.
thus becoming the next president. Clinton style.
Mr. Hall ... maker of presidents.

Re: the fonts, you're right Hillary's isn't exactly Times New Roman Italic, especially the one on the podium in the picture there. It's definitely a serifed italic though, and the banner especially just looked terrible, with the all-caps "LEAD!" looking kind of desperate. I was just kind of making fun of it by calling it Times New Roman since it had the look of "default font." As far as Obama's is concerned, MoJo editor Dave Gilson and I are going back and forth about this since he's saying it's Gill Sans, whereas I think Gill Sans is a little wider than that.

Fonts: the tea leaves of a campaign?

The font Obama is using is Gotham by Tobias Frere-Jones. (http://www.typography.com/fonts/font_overview.php?productLineID=100008)

"Though Frere-Jones wanted Gotham to exhibit the "mathematical reasoning of a draftsman" rather than the instincts of a type designer, he allowed Gotham to escape the grid wherever necessary, giving the design an affability usually missing from 'geometric' faces... its interest in the neat geometry of draftsmanship takes a back seat to the demands of fit and color, so letters which would not be improved by the application of mathematical rules have been drawn without them."

It was released a couple of years ago, recently appearing in a number of very popular and very trendy applications, and risks becoming over-exposed like so many fonts of-the-moment.

Feel free to draw your own analogies.

Obama's gift is not just the ability to give a great speech, but that he is so inspirational that he actually MOTIVATES people. He exudes great power by motivating and organizing people. The Shrub and the ridiculus Republican attack on Bill's indescretion has divded us into nationalists vs liberals vs evangelicals. Even the Republican party is split into social conservatives, fiscal conservatives, and evangelicals. We have no direction. We need an inspiring leader. We need the motivational ability of Obama to unite us again. We as a people need to be motivated to demand action in the right(left) direction. He can do that. Congress will actually have to DO something with the masses surging toward a change that gives power back to the people.