I just received an email from the DNCC (below the fold). The email is clear: both Hillary Clinton and Mark Warner will be speaking on Tuesday.
As announced earlier this week, Mark Warner, former Governor of Virginia, will deliver the Convention’s keynote address, and Senator Hillary Clinton, who is a champion for working families and one of the most effective and empathetic voices in the country today, will be the headline prime-time speaker on Tuesday night.
So Warner gets the keynote speech (not in prime time?) while Clinton is the prime-time headliner.
Hmm. That’s some contorted language there. Anybody care to translate?
News from the Democratic National Convention
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Wednesday, August 13, 2008
CONTACT: Jenni Engebretsen – DNCC 720-362-2006 Jenny Backus – OFA
720-362-2367
THE 2008 CONVENTION:
TUESDAY, AUGUST 26th – RENEWING AMERICA’S PROMISE
Key Speakers on the Economy to Include Governors Napolitano, Patrick, Rendell, Schweitzer, Sebelius & Strickland;
Senator Bob Casey, Jr. & Federico PeñaDENVER – With millions of Americans struggling to get by, the Democratic National Convention Committee (DNCC) and the Obama for America Campaign announced today that some of America’s strongest leaders on the economy and energy will speak about how to renew America’s promise on Tuesday night of the Convention. America’s top Governors, Senators and a former Secretary of Energy and Transportation will echo Barack Obama’s call for a new economy with new energy.
Tuesday night’s featured speakers include Convention Co-Chair Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano, both early supporters of Barack Obama, who will outline his detailed economic plan to grow the economy, create jobs, restore fairness and expand opportunity.
Governors Ted Strickland of Ohio and Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania will discuss how the failed policies of the last eight years have betrayed our values and left an economy out of balance.Barack Obama believes you can’t have a strong economy when you have a weak middle class, and speakers like Senator Bob Casey, Jr. of Pennsylvania and Governor Deval Patrick of Massachusetts will share how Obama’s policies have been directly shaped by the people he has met as he traveled the country.
Building on Obama’s New Economy with New Energy message, Governor Brian Schweitzer of Montana and Federico Peña, former Mayor of Denver and Secretary of both Energy and Transportation, will speak about the nexus between energy and the economy and highlight new and innovative policies to help working families in rural, urban and suburban communities.
As announced earlier this week, Mark Warner, former Governor of Virginia, will deliver the Convention’s keynote address, and Senator Hillary Clinton, who is a champion for working families and one of the most effective and empathetic voices in the country today, will be the headline prime-time speaker on Tuesday night.
###
About the DNCC:
The 2008 Democratic National Convention Committee is the official arm of the Democratic National Committee responsible for planning and organizing the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver. www.demconvention.com
Paid for by 2008 Democratic National Convention Committee, Inc.
Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
My first impression on their wording (“a champion for working families and one of the most effective and empathetic voices in the country today”): a phony fawning of the candidate I supported. Doesn’t the DNCC (or the DNC) see how silly the wording sounds on a topic that everyone has been guessing about?
So, the keynote speaker or headline prime-time speaker … who goes first?
They just don’t get it.
From a Marc Ambinder article in The Atlantic this afternoon (http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/08/clinton_advisers_debate_wisdom.php):
“A side note: news that Mark Warner would be the official keynote speaker took some Clinton advisers by surprise. During negotiations with the Obama campaign over her speaking role, the possibility of Clinton’s speech being deemed the keynote was floated, according to these advisers, but it was never formally offered.”
Just speculating here (obviously) but perhaps it had something to do with a negotiated deal to keep Hillary from entering her name into consideration?
Also, I don’t understand why the media is all “well that eliminates Warner from VP contention.” I thought that ship had sailed LONG ago….
How much longer can we afford to cater to Clinton grudge-nursing when Obama and McCain are neck and neck? Hey, all those people who said the Clintons (and their supporters) are nothing but walking egos, you are still being proven right.
By the way, not a peep from either Jan Napolitano or Kathleen Sebelius about who called shotgun first.
I’m um, just going to go ahead and ignore the pro-Clinton anger exhibited in some sectors and get right to the meaty stuff, if people don’t mind.
The language is convoluted because both pols deserve top billing and they can’t afford to sideline either of them. Clinton’s strengths are well-documented so I hope people will forgive me if I ignore them. Warner is a different kind of story all together. He needs to be at the convention and he needs to be a headliner because he’s on the ballot in a battleground state, he’s incredibly popular in that state, and he’s going to win huge.
Why does that matter? A lot of people have been throwing around the notion for the past few months that simply having Mark Warner’s name on the ballot turns a lot marginal/lean-Republican races into surefire Democratic victories. Those people should probably stop lying to themselves. It would be one thing if Mark Warner was super-popular among Democrats only, but there are a lot of independent and moderate Republican voters who are going to turn out to vote for him, as well, and no where is it written that they’re required to vote for the Democrat in every other race just because they voted for the Democrat in the Senate race. Ticket-splitting is a long-standing tradition in Virginia, so Obama’s campaign needs to make the most of every opportunity to link the Presidential candidate with Mark Warner publicly between now and November for the benefit of undecided, pro-Warner voters.
…I lied, I can’t let Sleepless in Virginia’s comment pass. People who think the entire purpose of the Obama campaign is to slight Hillary Clinton need to remember that the purpose of the Presidential campaign is to win the Presidential election. Ignore with me for the moment spotter’s inflamatory bashing of Clinton and her supporters; a lot of people like Hillary, and that’s fine, but you’re imagining things. There’s only one question being asked every day at the Obama campaign: “what do we need to do to win?” Letting Mark Warner share top billing with Hillary? That’s just part of the answer to that question.
Hey silence, I totally agree with you on Warner and his value to Virginia in getting Virginia Republicans to also support Obama …. but that’s nothing really new.
No one said a word about Clinton supporters thinking that “…the entire purpose of the Obama campaign is to slight Hillary Clinton…” I surely didn’t say that and I don’t think that either. That’s a bit of twist of my comment, don’t you think? And I don’t know a single former Clinton supporter who thinks that either. This sweeping characterization of folks, no less Democrats, is surprising.
Frankly, I think it would have been more appropriate to have included at least some complimentary wording on Senator Warner’s major accomplishments here in Virginia. The absence of any bio on him looks “funny”… especially being the keynote speaker!
I’ll stick by my original view … the wording looks pandering and silly, to me. Warner deserved more words than he got.
“And I don’t know a single former Clinton supporter who thinks that either.”
Scroll the little mouse wheel down and click Howling Latina’s link, and you’ll get an idea of some of the things I’ve heard since yesterday. But I do acknowledge that it’s likely that I read your specific comment in the wrong sort of tone, especially after superimposing the tone spotter used in her frankly asinine comments about walking egos, etc. For that, I apologize.