Report: Bill Clinton Set To Speak At Dem Convention
The New York Times has the details from unnamed Democrats:
Yes, Bill Clinton will have a role at the Democratic convention.After a curious week of back-and-forth between the Obama and Clinton worlds, the former president was offered an invitation to speak on the second-to-last night of the party's convention in Denver. He will take the stage on Aug. 27, three Democratic senior officials said, before the address by the party's vice-presidential nominee.
The offer was extended by the Obama campaign on Thursday to Mr. Clinton, who accepted it.
So with Mrs. Clinton speaking on Aug. 26, followed by her husband, the Obama campaign is giving two nights of prime time coverage to the Clinton family.
Look for Bill's speech to be scrutinized endlessly by people searching for whatever hint of insufficient enthusiasm about Obama they can find.
Unfortunately, a lot of Clinton people around the blogisphere are driving themselves in a tizzy over this news. They're taking the fact that Bill will basically be introducing the VP as meaning it's set in stone that the VP will be Hillary. And while I'm not going to wade back into who should and should not be Obama's running mate, I honestly think those people are just setting themselves up for disappointment again.
August 8, 2008 8:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
OMG...why is he speaking prior to the VP? Is he going to announce the VP? Please tell me Hillary is NOT the VP.
I can't believe the Clintons are getting this much time at the Convention..this is a disaster!
Every time I hear HRC talk about 'symbolic ballot' and catharsis it is like deja vu when she said she did not need to take her name off the Michigan ballot because those votes wouldn't count! Then she turned around and beat an incessant drumbeat for them to count. So forgive me if I say. symbolic my ass!
Conventions are not about cataharsis, they are about celebrating the nominee!!!!!!!!!!!
And WTF is going on with Joe Scarborough this morning and some woman quoting The Center for Responsive Politics and saying that the oil INDUSTRY gave more money to Obama than McCAIN?!
Why are these folks allowed to blatantly lie and no one calls them on it. Why is their no distinction made between lobbyists on behalf of the industry giving to campaigns and individuals listing who their employer is when they give a donation?!
I can't STAND this deceit and deception that cable 'news" engages in with all this speculation and erroneous conjecture.
I know Obama relented and gave those Clintons these speaking roles because they are continuing to create drama behind the scenes and are deliberately taking this to the press.
It is about time that his supporters stood up and pushed these Clintons off the stage.
This should not be a Clinton dominanted convention. One of these speeches needs to be cancelled! Let the two of the speak together or something.
August 8, 2008 8:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Two words. Calm down.
Seriously, it'll be alright. In the end, there's one nominee, and it's his words that'll be ending the convention. Bill speaking is a great baton-passing opportunity (which I can only hope he's mature enough to take advantage of). Hillary has her night, which I think she deserves. Regardless of what happens, don't work yourself up over it. We'll be ok.
August 8, 2008 8:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Barf. I'd rather give Hillary a second night than let that narcissistic jackhole speak. Hopefully, he'll at least be wearing a shock collar.
I'm embarrassed about voting for him twice, frankly.
August 8, 2008 8:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Dear Barack:
Really bad idea.
Signed,
Mike D.
Al G.
John K.
August 8, 2008 8:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Look for Bill's speech to be scrutinized endlessly by people searching for whatever hint of insufficient enthusiasm about Obama they can find."
Perhaps that's because to date he's been not only unenthusiastic about Obama's candidacy, but downright pissed.
August 8, 2008 8:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
I understand that the Clintons basically ran the DNC for almost 16yrs, but what bothers me is the fact that they continously act as if BO owes them something. Its frustrating for me because BO didnt steal the nomination, he beat her fair and square and for the CLintons to be acting like a crime took place is such a turn off.
In that clip of Hillary speaking to her supporters on Wednesday she referred to BO as "her opponant." Yeah that will bring healing. She mentioned that she and her 18 mill voters needs "respect." Someone needs to find out what Hillary's definition of respect is because BO, imo, has been nothing but gracious to them and all they have down is spit in his face.
She and Bill, imo, will continue to flick at the scab until November. there will never be true unity in the party. If anyone things she wants BO to win then i have some magic pixy dust i want to sell you.
Why cant they do what most of the DNC leadership has done, fall in line? Why does everything have to be about them to the detriment of the party? Its time to pass the baton, but they wont give it up.
If the Clintons arent careful, when BO becomes president they are going to be yesterday's news and everything that comes with that faster than they would like.
August 8, 2008 8:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
I couldn't agree with you more.
It is completely unacceptable for these people The Clintons to be treated with such deference.
What are the party rules for putting a name up for nomination. Doesn't Obama have more folks on the rules committee than HRC? Why can't this notion be totally squashed in cmte.
I think it is time to consider that individuals who are keeping up this noise about Hillary, her '18Mvotes' and 'symbolicballot' to be thrown out the party. These folks are essentially traitors to the party. They are undermining the entire party chances of winning the WH. If they do not want to support the nominee, they need to just get the hell out the party and let us move into the 21st century without them.
The Clinton baggage needs to go, along with their donors and their whining and sore loser mindset.
I find all this intolerable.
I REALLY hope that Obama has a strategy to squash the Clintons because they have become a scurge on the party.
The Clintons simply do not know their place.
And Hillary is full of whitefemale entitlement.
August 8, 2008 9:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hilary's performance this week, while Obama is off the stage, should give us an indication of the tone they are going to take. Will she be Obama's attack dog? Will Bill go after McCain?
No wonder Obama insisted on the larger venue for his speech, he knew he couldn't avoid giving the Clintons their spotlight. And he knows he has to upstage them big time on his night.
August 8, 2008 8:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Her performance this week is going to be GREEK DRAMA "Comeback Kid' catharsis. She is addicted to campaigning and absolutely refuses to accept that she is not the nominee and that she loss to someone who she considers beneath her.
Her and Bill's disdain and dismissive attitude towards Obama is very palpable and deliberately so. Yet, Bill wants to shout from the rooftops he isn't racist?! Well, what the HELL is his problem, then? Obama beat their asses FAIR and SQUARe, yet Bill wants to pose this rhetoric questions of 'you could argue that no one is ever ready to be President'...I couldn't agree MORE! The problem is Bill doesn't apply that standard to HRC who demonstrated by how she ran that pisspoor campaign that she sure as heck is not ready to be president as she lacks the executive and leadership skills to even run her own campaign.
Give. Me. A. Break.
If Bill thinks this is how he will mend fences and demostrate his lack of racist mindset he is sorely mistaken. His actions reinforce that he is racially biased and can't accept that a black man beat him and Hill. Bill is going out of his way to tarnish the party's nominee just as he went to the racial polarizing extreme and engaged in racemongering in his attempt to win. The black community has not forgotten his words nor actions. The history of this nation means blacks have a very long memory when it comes to the new millenium GWallace tactics. Bill has a bully pulpit and he has turned it on the biggest source of pride and hope the black community has had in forty years.
Bill keep up with your pouting and your whining you are digging your own grave. You will never be welcome in any predominantly black church ever again.
The white entitlement mindset you and Hillary are projecting is something successful and accomplished blacks have endured for centuries. In kitchens as domestics, in fields as cotton pickers, in places of congress with separate entrances, water fountains and school house steps, as well as college campuses, corporate boardrooms, battlefieds all over the world and neighborhood communities with crosses on their lawn. All situations where their achievements went unacknowledged and or were swept under the rug in favor of the 'whitesonordaughter'.
People in the black community have seen this script played out over and over.
Bill Clinton is nothing but a HATER and so is sore loser Hillary who refuses to concede and they intend to STEAL the nomination based on leveraging white entitlement.
Clyburn called it as he saw it.
August 8, 2008 9:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Al Giordano is right. The next week is all about the Greek Drama. Obama and his team are playing this perfectly. While he is away recharging, he has the two biggest names in the Democratic Party (excluding himself) sucking up all of the oxygen over the next week. Masterful....
August 8, 2008 8:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Here's the link to the Giordano blog post to which I refer:
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/greek-drama-week-begins
August 8, 2008 8:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Al pretty much nails it, as usual.
August 8, 2008 9:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good article and I think this comment said it best:
No one ever went broke underestimating the moral underpinnings of the behavior of the Clintons. Whatever the Vegas odds, I would take the under when it comes to Hillary Clinton.
August 8, 2008 9:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
If this is true, then it's effing brilliant. Filling a news vaccuum with fake drama to drive up ratings for the convention: Machiavelli must be his campaign manager.
August 8, 2008 10:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
Unleash the unhinged! Aaaagghhh!!! Run for your lives!
August 8, 2008 8:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Put a hooker under the podium, ala Police Academy. That'll keep Bill on message.
August 8, 2008 9:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ol'red-facedr Bill is an abomination! After all his racist dog whistle rants, why would anyone think he would change. I am so looking forward to the end of all the Clinton arze-kissing once Obama wins the Presidency!
August 8, 2008 9:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hillary will speak on Tuesday.
I see the Bill speech as a hint to the possible VP, who could be a former Clinton supporter.
Could be Bayh?
PD: What's up with Halperin hinting to Panetta.
It's not going to happen, period.
Halperin, you still suck.
August 8, 2008 9:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
I would've been more surprised if he didn't speak at the convention, folks. He was the last Democratic president and a good public speaker, to boot.
August 8, 2008 9:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, it would be really news if he wasn't speaking.
August 8, 2008 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Word. And that's a news story we don't need or want, had enough of those- thank you.
August 8, 2008 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
besides, this is still barack obama's convention. Which means that the obama's campaign will be all over bill & hill's speeches, and will probably have final review of them. So u other than the passion of their delivery, u best believe that the campaign will know exactly what the clintons will say
August 8, 2008 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Exactly, which is why I'm actually quite excited about this announcement. I think Bill deserves a spot to save a little face from the primaries (ie save the legacy HE effed up) and he has a lot of appeal with quite a few folks yet. I think this will be good for the party at the end of the night. So I say good on ya for asking him, Senator Obama.
August 8, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
I really do not understand what is running through the minds of the folks posting anti-Clinton diatribes on this thread. There is no percentage in a civil-war, folks. Our man won; we should be happy, not bitter that the other candidate is still alive.
As middlesnamesareseriousbusiness wrote above, of course Bill Clinton is speaking at the convention. He absolutely should speak at the convention. We would be crazy not to have him speaking at our convention. He is a former president and a d@#n good speaker. Things are going swimmingly for us; why ruin it by nurturing unhinged grudges against a candidate who stands to help us more than harm us over the next few months?
August 8, 2008 11:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
Bill Clinton can go twirl on his own middle finger and so can his wife, even though he would prefer Monica. They are living in a whiteentitlement world where they simply refuse to give Obama respect.
The Clintons have not ever sacrificed anything for the good of the party. It is all about them and they have overstayey their welcome. Along with those meaningless 18M votes that didn't bring enough delegates for her to be the nominee. The Clintons have done everything in their power to create nothing but DRAMA and HATE for Obama within the party.
The Clintons and their supporters need to be shut out of the party. it is their donors and sell out to corporate interests that created all the uproar in the party. THEIR people are mad they bet on the wrong horse and the Clintons can't deliver on their promises because they lost and they have NO leverage with Obama after all their racemongering and mean-spirited campaigning.
No one has forgotten that endorsement of McCain by Hillary Clinton LONG after she had lost the nomination ...she simply refuses to accept it. They are LOSERS they are DONE.
Let them both chew on Lewinskyscented cigars.
August 8, 2008 2:36 PM | Reply | Permalink