Iowa = Illinois

In Iowa yesterday, Obama said he thinks he may have an advantage in Iowa: the fact that he lives next door.

"I feel like I'm home," Obama told the Associated Press. "Illinois is basically Iowa, and then we have Chicago."

Plenty of coastal residents lump all the Midwest provinces together, as "those square states" one flies over on the way from one shore to another. But it's unusual to hear folks from the Heartland do it themselves.

I doubt people in Iowa are going to like the comment that it's basically the same as Illinois. And people in Illinois but not in Chicago continously complained they're forgotten to Chicago.

Ground Up

A story from the New York Times explains Obama's fundraising campaign philosophy as a grass-roots, bottoms up campaign. I agree, and think it it very note-worthy that only individual contributions have been accepted, keeping PACs from buying his vote. Below is a synopsis of the story.

Two and a half years after he had taken quite a “spanking,” as he put it, in his bid to unseat an incumbent congressman, he was still struggling to pay off a $20,000 debt, eking out donations of $1,000 here, $2,000 there. His fund-raising prowess has helped make him the chief rival to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

Interviews and campaign finance reports show Obama drew crucial early support from Chicago’s thriving black professional class, using it as a springboard to other rainmakers within the broader party establishment. Soon he was drawing money — and, just as valuable, buzz — among wealthy Chicago families, as well as friends from Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago.

Obama appears to have such a firm hold on so many of Chicago’s big donors that Clinton, who grew up in a Chicago suburb, did not even have a fund-raiser here during the crucial first quarter of this year. Obama’s campaign says its grass-roots support is expanding rapidly, in part through $25-a-ticket fund-raisers designed for a new generation of donors.

I have been asked what it is that people see in Obama, and I think this is a good summary from the New York Times:

Even as he cultivated an image as an unconventional candidate devoted to the people, not the establishment, he systematically built a sophisticated, and in many ways quite conventional, money machine.

Social Darwinism

Barack Obama, as well as John Edwards and Hillary Clinton, spoke at the Communications Workers of America conference on Tuesday. He accused the Bush administration on of pursuing a policy of "social Darwinism" that leaves every man and woman struggling. He vowed to look out for average workers and changes if elected president.

"It's a strategy that we've seen this administration pursue over the last six years, that basically says government has no role to play in making sure that America is prosperous for all people and not just some," Obama said to applause during an appearance before the Communications Workers of America.

The Illinois senator said the attempt to "divvy up the government into individual tax breaks" may be tempting, but government research and investment is what has made advances possible in the United States.

Watch This!

What a great video produced by a fellow blogger, News Snob

Poll Standings

Proving yet again that Americans don't vote on candidates for the right reason, John Edwards has gone up five percent in the polls since the announcement last week of Elizabeth Edwards' cancer. Don't get me wrong, I feel for the family, who has already had their share of tragedy, but it's no reason to now throw my support to John Edwards. Edwards is now at 14 percent, but is still third in the standings.

In the same poll, Barack Obama is holding steady at 22 percent, still second to Hillary Clinton, who has 35 percent.