May 01, 2008
Literal Barnstorming
SOUTH BEND, IN – Barack Obama, who has consistently done well in big cities but has struggled in rural areas, sought to show he can be the president of small town America at a town hall in a barn here Thursday afternoon.
The Illinois senator was introduced by a corn, soybean and cattle farmer and was surrounded by about a hundred farmers and local residents seated on picnic tables and folding chairs. Several bales of hay formed a circle around him, and a large wagon filled with more hay was parked off to the side.
Obama spoke in broad strokes about his plans for rural America.
“It is my belief that rural America represents what’s best about America: hard work, responsibility, individual initiative, a sense of community, a sense of family and the fact that rural America is having such a difficult time indicates that we’ve lost focus on our values and our ideals,” he said. “What I’ve tried to do is to say we’re going to protect the family farm. We’re going to make sure that that’s our priority. We’re going to emphasize conservation. We are going to develop a alternative energy economy that creates jobs and is good for family farmers but that is also sustainable.”
As he has been doing more and more lately, Obama emphasized his upbringing and his connection to “"small town” America -- noteworthy because of the criticism he faced in the lead up to the Pennsylvania primary after making comments about bitter small town residents who cling to guns and religion in the face of economic difficulties.
"My grandparents grew up in a small town in Kansas, and so the values that I think this community shares are the values, the ones that I grew up with," he said. "I don’t want to see those fade away and they don’t have to, but we’ve gotta have a president who is serious about these issues and I have been fighting for rural Illinois even since I got into the United States Senate and even before that when I was in state government. I want to make sure I’m fighting for you when I get to White House.”
Obama needs to make headway with white, rural and small-town voters in order to take the wind out of his rival Hillary Clinton’s argument that she is better able to win this important demographic, as recent exit polls have suggested.
Obama asked for questions, suggestions and advice today about how to help rural communities, and he spoke about trade, preserving farmland and food security. Still, many of the guests were concerned about other topics, from taking care of Iraqi veterans to how to improve America’s image around the world and how to guarantee equal pay for women.
Obama used humor to respond to a man who said he had read on the Internet that the senator did not believe in pledging allegiance to the flag. He called the charge bogus, explained that he leads the pledge when presiding in the Senate and compared the claims to the Nigerian letter scams.
"These emails have been sent around in each state depending on what state I’m about to go into, suddenly you start seeing all these emails," he said. "It’s a smear campaign that they’ve been running since the beginning of the campaign," he said. "Now if you ever get these letters from Nigeria saying that they’ve got a lot of money for ya, (laughter) I also don’t want- don't send that- don’t give ‘em your bank account number, alright? I want to make sure."
The crowd laughed.
Fort Bragg, Air Force One
Obama said he did not believe the government was prepared to take care of soldiers as they returned from Iraq, citing the recent news of unacceptable conditions at a North Carolina military base as an example.
“I don’t think they’re ready. You heard the story about Fort Bragg just recently,” he said. “"I mean, these are young men and women who just got back and they’ve got buildings with mold and sewage that’s backed up and this is after we already saw the same thing on Walter Reed, so you would’ve thought gone through every single fact to make sure that it’s up to speed. Nobody’s expecting luxury, but they do expect cleanliness and hygiene in the United States military.”
(NBC/NJ's ATHENA JONES)
Posted at 05:56 PM
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