There is nothing wrong with having passion for your candidate. I’m an Obama supporter and proud of it. But frankly, Spotter, if it weren’t for people who have been as nasty as you, I’d have thrown my support to him much sooner. I liked him. And I knew John Edwards, my first choice, was not going to get the nomination. But I just couldn’t jump aboard the Obama bandwagon until I absolutely had to

That’s directly because of you and others who have said publicly that if he didn’t win, you would not back Hillary. Yes, that actually did turn off potential Obama supporters. Fortunately most of us are open minded and listened to what he had to say and tuned you out.

Here’s what Paul Krugmain, a man I admire very much had to say:

I won’t try for fake evenhandedness here: most of the venom I see is coming from supporters of Mr. Obama, who want their hero or nobody. I’m not the first to point out that the Obama campaign seems dangerously close to becoming a cult of personality. We’ve already had that from the Bush administration — remember Operation Flight Suit? We really don’t want to go there again.

What’s particularly saddening is the way many Obama supporters seem happy with the application of “Clinton rules” — the term a number of observers use for the way pundits and some news organizations treat any action or statement by the Clintons, no matter how innocuous, as proof of evil intent.

I’m sorry to say that this describes you and some of your fellow Obama supporters to a T and it’s very disappointing.

I don’t think Vivian is out of line at all. Unfortunately, you have been for a while now.

SJ — good comment.
Spotter — Your vapid, baseless attack tactics are annoying people everywhere on the blogosphere. How about going away for awhile. BTW, you are doing your candidate incredible damage. If Obama’s like you….no thank you.

and what tactics are they> the super delegates? the news has been all over this for naught. many of those same delegates said they would vote what their state votes.
so don’t darn the party “leadership”. There are rules that were voted on by the members of the national party and they are being abided by. we just happen to have two great candidates that people are still voting on in a primary.
you do like to vote don’t you???

So let’s be very clear: you think that because I’m “disappointed” in the behavior of the leaders of the Democratic Party, that is somehow an attack on all Democrats who support Obama.

One heck of leap you are making there

Just so we’re clear, I was in a section of enthusiastic Obama supporters. When Hillary Clinton came on, we rose, clapped, cheered, and continued to do so at many points throughout her speech as well as at the end. I think she made some excellent points, although to me she looked like she was tired and still getting over the flu. I only wish some of the Hillary Clinton supporters had been as polite, but apparently they cannot bring themselves to show other Democrats the courtesy they demand on behalf of their preferred candidate.

When people like Donna Brazile are threatening to quit the party over strongarm tactics from party leadership, it might be wise to step back and reconsider. All those voters with their messy enthusiasm are going to have the final say, whether the Clinton camp likes it or not.

As for Ds attacking Ds – well, if you want to have a hand in destroying the Democratic Party, then we have nothing more to talk about.This event was for all Democrats, not just the Hillhaters/Obamamaniacs. The Republicans get the party loyalty thing. It’s a lesson so-called Democrats haven’t learned yet.

I was at the Obama rally last night and I can tell you I did not hear ANY supporters trashing HRC.
There are MANY Obama supporters who refuse to speak ill of another Democrat and simply want their candidate to win.

I’ve also thought about Kaine’s intro at the JJ. He’s a national co-chair of his campaign, he’s supposed to be fired up. I didn’t hear attacks. I just heard a lot of “I had a feeling”. He was enthusiastic as was the crowd.

Its sad to say, campaigns cant always control their supporters and we may have a few that mirror NLS. All in all, this is one of the most positive campaigns I have EVER seen.
It gives me hope, call me a “hopemonger”.

As for tolerance – what I won’t tolerate is Democrats trashing Democrats, something many Obama supporters, including yourself, think is OK.

Our country has come a long way. It’s wonderful.

As for the length – well, I knew going in that it was going to be a long night. Not sure where Obama was before but I’ve known for a while that he wasn’t scheduled to be there until after 10pm. That’s why the event ran so late.

I have to say that I didn’t react to the introductions the same way that you did — perhaps because I am supporting Obama? I would have shared your reaction to Doug Wilder had he done anything more than he did — had he made a sales pitch for Barack, for example. But as a former black Presidential candidate himself, I think he can be forgiven for seeing with some pride (and wanting to comment oh so briefly) on Barack’s success. For those who were not there, what Wilder did was to say, at the end of his remarks, something to the effect that “it is not my place to make this speech an endorsement, but I would be less than honest if I did not say that I hope Barack Obama is the nominee” (or something like that). The point is not exactly what words he used as much as the fact that he only used one sentence to do it.

I was actually out of the room when Jennifer McClellan gave her introduction of Hillary Clinton, so I don’t know how it compares to Tim’s rather boisterous introduction of Barack, but I figured that the whole purpose of an introduction is to fire up your folks to make some noise. If Jennifer didn’t do that as loudly as Tim did, that doesn’t make Tim wrong or ill-mannered to have done so.

I also didn’t have the sense that his speech was so anti-Hillary. But I can’t seem to find the transcript that I had found on line just a few hours ago.

All in all, the only thing that really offended me was that it took so damn long.

I’m glad you stayed through Obama’s speech, I think it is very rude that some of the other bloggers (cough *NLS* cough) were rude and left.
Thanks for a good wrap up of the event.