Sunday, 27th January 2008
James Forsyth 3:09pm
There are two key endorsements yet to come in this Democratic race: Al Gore and Teddy Kennedy. This morning, a Kennedy did endorse Obama but it was Caroline, daughter of JFK, not Teddy. But now comes a rumour that the Senator from Massachusetts is ready to get behind Obama.
If Obama is to match Hillary Clinton on Super Tuesday he needs to win pretty much every news cycle. This endorsement will help him win a couple but I expect that the one they would really want is Al Gore’s which could be a game-changer as it would be such a rebuke of the Clintons.
Update: Ted Kennedy is throwing his weight behind Obama.
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James Forsyth 10:30am
In both Iowa and South Carolina, Obama has won by large margins in races with high turnout. Obama’s ability to win big really is quite something and should scare the Republicans if he is the nominee, he has a much higher ceiling than Hillary.
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James Forsyth 9:34am
Up until tonight, I always thought that Hillary Clinton would have little trouble in mending fences with African-Americans if she was the nominee. After this evening, I have grave doubts. First, the booing that accompanied the appearance of either Clinton on the TV screen at the Obama rally was prolonged and passionate. This was not pantomime booing but an outpouring of genuine anger and resentment. Second, the black community here feel that the Clintons played the race card and they are angry about it; one South Carolina state representative came into the press area...
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James Forsyth 9:16am
The sheer scale of Barack Obama’s win here in South Carolina is worth reflecting on. In a three candidate race featuring a native son and a former first lady with both nigh on 100 percent name recognition and a popular former two-term president campaigning for her Obama got 55 percent of the vote. For every vote cast for Hillary Clinton, Obama received two.
After a week in which race has been an uncomfortably prominent issue in the campaign, this result offer real hope in a state where the battle flag of the...
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1:55am
When Bill Clinton came on the screen just now, the audience here burst into passionate and sustained booing. A Democrat crowd booing Bill Clinton—it is nothing short of incredible. Also, among voters who said that Bill’s role in the campaign was important to their desicion the vast majority did not vote for Hillary. Bill Clinton has been rejected tonight by what was once his core constituency.
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1:00am
I’m at the Obama victory celebration and when Hillary came on the screen, the hall erupted in boos. When John McCain came on the screen—he is accepting the key endorsement of Charlie Crist, Florida’s immensely popular governor—there was no reaction. Tonight’s vote and Obama’s huge margin among black voters is a rejection of the Clintons and many here are incredibly angry with the Clintons about their tactics since Iowa and feel that they have played the race card. Indeed, Bill Clinton engaged in some crude racial spin earlier trying to dismiss Obama’s victory by pointing to the fact that Jesse Jackson, who described himself as the president of black America, won South Carolina in both 1984 and ’88.
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12:30am
The networks have already called South Carolina for Barack Obama and there is a real chance that he might have broken through the 50 percent barrier—a remarkable achievement in a three person race. Obama won African-Americans overwhelmingly pulling in more than 80 percent of their votes and scored a respectable 24% among whites.
The margin of their defeat is a big blow to the Clintons and could be the game changer that Obama needs. The smart money is now on this contest going on long beyond Super Tuesday.
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Saturday, 26th January 2008
11:09pm
Ahead of tonight’s results, Hillary has quit South Carolina and headed to Tennessee. I’ve spent the day out watching the campaign’s ground games and it was striking how much more upbeat the Obama campaign was. The Clinton camp are spinning that anything less than a 12 point loss would be a decent result for them.
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James Forsyth 4:12pm
Barack Obama’s election eve night rally was a typical high-energy Obama event with people having to be turned away at the door. The crowd was more multi-racial than most have been here in this Southern state with a lot of college students in attendance. Indeed, the Obama campaign seemed to have taken care that the crowd directly behind Obama was a fairly even mix of blacks and whites.
The event had the feel of a revivalist rally. The first thing Michelle Obama did was thank the audience “for praying for us.” The...
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Friday, 25th January 2008
James Forsyth 10:14pm
Bill Clinton really is the most naturally gifted politician of his generation. I’ve just got back from watching him host a QandA in Clinton, South Carolina and it is remarkable how good he is despite breaking most of the rules of campaigning. He turned up late, as he always does, and some in the audience were slow hand-clapping before he turned up. When he finally arrived, he gave long winded answers that frequently drifted all over the place. But nothing could distract from the connection that he has with the audience and his ability to explain complex policy in plain...
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