If his Denver appearance Sunday is any indication, Barack Obama cannot match Bill Clinton as a motivational speaker. No one cried during Obama’s half-hour speech, as I have seen people do at every Clinton speech I’ve ever witnessed.
A few among a crowd of roughly 1,500 left before Obama finished talking at the 1770 Sherman Street Event Complex.
Fortunately, the Illinois senator doesn’t have to best silver-tongued Bill C. to be president. He must outtalk the considerably less oratorically gifted Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton to win the Democratic nomination.
The real question for Obama is: Can he continue to inspire?
That’s why 63-year-old Joe Perez drove to Denver from Greeley and arrived three hours before Obama.
“He gives me hope as a presidential candidate,” said Perez. “He will win because the American public is ready for a change. He’s energized people to a level I haven’t seen since JFK and RFK.”
Ah yes, the Kennedy comparison. You hear it from people who want to give Obama political street cred. State Sen. Peter Groff invoked John Kennedy while introducing Obama.
There were, however, no “ask not what your country can do for you” lines in Obama’s presentation. It was all universal health care, preschool for every child and out of Iraq by March 2008 – more talkalot than Camelot.
Still, Obama drew more than 10,000 to a public speech in Oakland, Calif., on Saturday. He fills a void. That void demands faith and credibility more than pithy phrases.
Rosemary Vermouth wanted “to see him in person to get a sense of him.”
“There’s something about him that makes me think I can trust him,” said the 59-year-old Fort Collins elementary school teacher. “The opportunity to be hopeful again is a wonderful thing. I haven’t felt this hopeful since 1968.”
Republican Richard Nixon won the presidency that year.
Vermouth, of course, was not among Tricky Dick’s faithful. But that, to her, was not as important as having something – or someone – to believe in.
Erica Joos, a 19-year-old University of Colorado student, echoed the sentiment. She may or may not vote for Obama, Joos explained. But she seems to care more than most of her peers about finding out what he stands for.
“I want to think I voted for what I believed in,” she said of casting her first presidential ballot.
Obama will earn that vote if he shares enough of her vision. If he passes ideological muster, Joos doesn’t care about his chances of winning.
That may be the national crossroads that Obama spoke of in his speech and so many in an incredibly diverse crowd referenced. Obama was born to a black Kenyan father and a white American mother. Physically, he is neither black nor white. That seemed symbolic as he stood before a group so mixed that it defied description by age, race or gender.
Though the flier announcing Obama’s appearance requested $100 contributions in order to attend, I didn’t see anyone turned away and talked to plenty of people who hadn’t anted up a C-note.
Of course, neither the media nor the public was allowed into the fundraiser that the candidate held with some of Denver’s deep-pocketed Democrats shortly after his speech.
That’s the way the game is played, and Obama played it, despite his assurance to the crowd that “politics isn’t a game.”
His comment came in the context of a story about a blind, crippled, disfigured Iraq war veteran who visited the senator during one of his weekly constituent breakfasts. It explained in part why enough people have flocked to Obama to make him a contender.
“We cannot afford to be cynical,” Obama told the Denver crowd.
The candidate, meanwhile, cannot afford to be less than inspirational if he’s to challenge for the presidency.
“I read his book,” said John Vermouth, Rosemary’s husband. “He writes eloquently and thinks deeply. And he doesn’t condemn people.”
Now, if he can just keep their attention.
“He’s timely,” said Herman Berry, an advertising salesman. “But as this thing goes on, he’s got to get a lot more specific and a lot stronger.”
Jim Spencer’s column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He can be reached at 303-954-1771, jspencer@denverpost.com or blogs.denverpost.com/spencer.
