Hi everyone, both the candidates are doing small/invite only events today here in Portland. Desperate for details, I found a liveblog of each event at our local paper's website:
Oregonian liveblog of Obama visit
Oregonian liveblog of Clinton visit
More below the fold!
At this point, according to the blog, Obama is in the midst of a town hall discussion with employees at a software company in the suburbs of Portland.
Meanwhile, Hillary is running late to her appearance at Doernbecher Children's hospital, and...
It has gotten so cold that hospital staff are passing out blankets....Children are sleeping on the chairs all bundled up. Others are huddled under heat lamps. Adults are wandering around with blankets on their shoulders.....Michelle Jackson, a nurse in the intensive care unit, is annoyed with Hillary Clinton: "She's late, and I have patients waiting."
Okay, not to be petty and I know campaigns get behind schedule, but c'mon, Hillary, these are nurses and kids waiting in the cold! Her staffers should be better organized than this.
UPDATE 1--Hillary has now arrived and is being introduced over at the children's hospital. Whew! Barack has wrapped up his Q and A. It sounds like it was a very nice event.
UPDATE 2 Arrrghh-HRC is pulling her health plan exclusion crap again:
She said her health care plan would cover everyone. "My opponent's plan does not," she said. About 220,000 Oregonians would be excluded from it, she said.
Enough with the attacks and distortions, please!
UPDATE 3 More detail from Barack's "lingering" exit at the Beaverton (yes, this is Oregon all right) software company:
"Thank you for coming! Thanks for coming out."
He shakes hands with the uniformed security people at Vernier and gets his picture made with them.
Christine Vernier says she was delighted by the visit. "He's my man!" She was especially glad to hear him talk about higher education funding and his plans to improve science education.
UPDATE 4 Okay, this is kind of off topic, but I attended a conference yesterday for work (I'm in market research) and two local pollsters were on a panel about the election. The Republican pollster said if Obama is on the ticket, the Dems win. He also said he is urging all his friends to donate to Hillary and that "we really want this primary to continue." The Dem pollster said if the fight continues to the convention, the Dems lose, but otherwise we win. It was an interesting discussion.
UPDATE 5 The Oregonian just posted a slideshow from Barack's Beaverton event:
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I totally understand that smaller town hall events are important as well as getting out of Portland, where Obama is already strong, and increasing his support elsewhere in the state. Still, I am bummed that there is no big rally in Portland for Obama this time. He is doing a rally in Eugene at the University of Oregon, and also visiting central Oregon tomrrow--both great stops to make.
May 20, of course, is the big day when our mail-in ballots are due. I am hoping since this is such a huge milestone for the campaign, that Barack will spend election night here in Portland. What a party that would be!
Meanwhile, a quick note to everyone in Portland-the Obama HQ finally has lawn signs available!!!