DISQUS

if you were john temple and you were responding to something that had been printed in the rocky mtn news, someone on this site would call you defensive, or worse.

there isn't a day that goes by -- and today, mr. obama's comments on economic policy that he made in golden offer a perfect example - when claims by national politicians aren't refuted. why wasn't this 'simple reporting' provided on your site?

don't get me wrong. at this point in the campaign, i've every intention of voting for senator obama. and i think, by and large, this story on palin and her speech was informative. but by picking on her re-use of old rhetoric, etc., while insinuating that obama once again nailed it in front of throngs of followers, i think it's injecting bias into a story that ultimately weakens the work that was put into it.

i went to junction anticipating being thoroughly impressed. i was not. obama was flat. he used dozens of the same quote lines he's already used, verbatim. i actually found it hard to pay close attention because his speech was, frankly, boring. but that's OK. no one hits a home run every time up. if anything, all this made obama seem more real to me. and i think i found a new respect for him and the unbelievably daunting task he faces every day in this campaign in which he is attempting to make history.

making him out to seem infallible hurts this cause, in my view.

well, for what it's worth, i was in junction this morning, while the crowd was large (5,800 according to organizers), it wasn't exactly overflowing. there was plenty of empty space in the back of the area cordoned off for 'ticketed' spectators.

senator obama most definitely re-hashed the bulk of his nomination acceptance speech from a few weeks ago. he definitely relied heavily on his teleprompter for the very few fresh sections of it. in his pre-speech 'thank yous' he mispronounced the word Ute as "ootay."

he departed before the cheers died down and he did not take any questions.

for what it's worth ...

i didn't see this liveblog, and really don't have much of an opinion on it, one way or the other. i guess my initial response would be, if the paper had the permission of the family to be there, was justifiably giving the story lots of attention in print, then what's the problem? aren't newspapers supposed to be transforming to the digital revolution? seems to me like critiques of 'blinky, whirly geek tools' are trying to have it both ways.

however, my biggest problem is w/ the characterization of mr. temple's reply. i found nothing prickly or defensive to it whatsoever.