President Obama appeared for Hillary Clinton in Philadelphia, giving the kind of barnburner speech that he's best at, making the case for an optimistic campaign for America's future. In his usual discussion of the strengths of Clinton and how Trump disqualifies himself on a daily basis, Obama was most forceful in calling out the traditional media: "We can not afford suddenly to treat this like a reality show. We can't afford to act as if there's some equivalence here."
He railed, as much as Obama rails, at the professional media for the "frivolous stuff that gets covered everyday." He directly addressed the "guys in the back," saying, "I'm just telling you the truth about how I feel about this. Do you mind if I just vent for a second?" Then he unloaded: "You know, you don't grade the presidency on a curve. This is serious business." Then he started in on transparency: "You want to debate transparency, you have one candidate in this debate who's released decades worth of her tax returns. The other candidate is the first in decades who refuses to release any at all. You want to debate foundations and charities? One candidate's family foundation has saved countless lives around the world. The other candidate's foundation took money other people gave to his charity and then bought a six-foot-tall painting of himself."
Then fitness for the presidency: "One candidate who's traveled to more countries than any secretary of state ever has, has more qualifications than pretty much anyone who's ever run for this job and the other who isn't fit in any way, shape, or form to represent this country abroad and be its commander-in-chief." He chided the traditional media for allowing for "our standards for what's normal" to have changed, "because he says it over and over and over again the press just gives up and they just say, well, yeah. Okay."
He lauded Clinton, saying "for four years, I had a front-row seat." He said "I watched her intelligence, I watched her judgment, I watched her discipline." He talked about her term as his Secretary of State in which "she worked hard, tirelessly, flying around the world again and again. I don't know how many times she lapped the world, but she went around a long time." And in all that, he said, "she had never forgotten what she was fighting for. To make sure every American has the same opportunity as her daughter and granddaughter and your kids."
Then to Trump: "And then you've got the Donald. Who just last week went on Russian state television to talk down our military and to curry favor with Vladimir Putin. He loves this is guy." Then about the Republican party, and "what's happened" to it. "They used to be opposed to Russia and authoritarianism and fighting for freedom and fighting for democracy and now their nominee is out there praising a guy saying he's a strong leader because he invades smaller countries, jails his opponents, controls the press, and drives his economy into a long recession." "I have to do business with Putin," he said, "but I don't go around saying that's my role model."
"We can't take this election for granted," he said, urging the crowd that "you have to help her by voting for Democrats up and down the ticket," making the case for Kathy McGinty running against Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, and for all Senate candidates. "If you don't think the stakes are high enough," he said, "remember for months the Republicans in the senate have refused to do their job and fill a vacancy for the Supreme Court."
Obama was in turns funny and light-hearted and then deadly serious, drawing the contrasts between the divisive and dark vision Republicans—and Trump—are offering versus the experience, the optimism, the effectiveness of Hillary Clinton. With the much-needed chiding of the traditional media for all its failures in this campaign. This is a president whole-heartedly fighting to see his legacy cemented, and continued, and built upon by Hillary Clinton.
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