Oh boy. Obama admits to being tired and making mistakes on campaign trail

The chances of him getting the nomination are huge. My mother adores him. Oprah just threw her support behind him. He is not my first choice, but I wouldn't have to hold my nose to vote for him...and this. It bothers me. Couldn't he have just said he made a mistake?
I don't want to know that our President gets tired and makes mistakes when he is tired any more than I want to know that my Doctor secretly hates his job or his patients (one reason I would never work for my personal doc).
Anyway...FWIW, this bothers me.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6638207.stm

>>>>snip
"In case you missed it, this week there was a tragedy in Kansas," he said, adding that 10,000 people had died.

The true number of people killed was 12. Mr Obama later appeared to blame tiredness for the gaffe.

>>>>snip

During his speech the Democratic senator from Illinois did however appear to realise his mistake.

"There are going to be times when I get tired," he said. "There are going to be times when I get weary. There are going to be times when I make mistakes."

Mistakes are made. But never by him.

But I take chucklenuts out of the equation when thinking of Presidents because he certainly wasn't elected either time and has absolutely no Presidential qualities.

But I bet he will bleed over this for a few days.

People make mistakes when they're tired..seems Obama is only human. Gotta love him.

A mistake from misspeaking is not the same as making a deadly miscalculation.

I know you know this Horse..I'm just sayin'.

campaign is terrible for their health-----for all of them.

It's way too early.

A moderate sized PA county ... Very competitive race ... I am unchallenged in the primary, and I am already half burnt with six months to go ...

I have to tell you, NOTHING wrong with admitting it, as long as you don't come across as whinning about it ... That is the only potential downside ...

ANY context!

I'm willing to give Obama a pass on a couple slips of the tongue.

As for the tired, weary bit, campaign life's even more grueling than presidential life. These guys sometimes don't sleep at all for days at a time.

I foresee many, many gaffes. And the media getting worked up about only the ones coming from our side.:eyes:

I read something from them the other day as well that cast a bad light on our side.

once you're in a general, one-on-one election, the campaign settles into a certain rhythm. It's this running against half a dozen or more people that keeps you on your toes.

campaign season we have going.

I'll take this opportunity to get on my public financing of electoral campaigns hobby-horse; the campaigns would be shorter, as well.

I don't think it's any exaggeration to say that public financing of campaigns can save America as we know it.

tired to vote on a key issue recently?

Oh, guess he was just too busy =/

I think that the prescription bill was poison and he chose not to drink from the well.
A non-vote actually WAS a vote.

That is one of bush's biggest problems. His ego won't allow him to admit when he is wrong.

At least he's honest, a quality that's been sorely lacking in our current administration.

Speaking of Obama, is anyone else getting a ton of fundraising literature from him in the mail? I got a mailing from Michelle Obama yesterday and sort of laughed when I read the first paragraph:

It wasn't exactly a typical date with an up-and-coming Harvard-educated lawyer who worked at a prestigious Chicago firm. He didn't take me to a fancy restaurant. There were no tickets to the opera or ballet, nor did we rub elbows with high society.

Instead, he took me to a small neighborhood church on the South side of Chicago...

Um...Michelle, I adore you but I'm an opera fan.

They get "tired" and "make mistakes" and are...well...just less than perfect! Mortals are icky.

Julie

and of course far far worse then invading a country based on lies and misrepresentation

2006 showed us that people are tired of lies and misrepresentations, but NOT honest mistakes

BUT it will certainly receive more airtime than the WMD lies. That's the problem. We know it exists. These candidates can't make these kinds of verbal gaffes.

Oh dear, indeed...

Obama admitted he was tired...have you any idea what it's like running for President? For those that want to trash Obama for this slip, you can bet your favorite candidate will slip up at some point too.

Obama admits his faults.

He's not my first choice either, but I feel a lot of respect towards him.

Admitting it openly's even better. Everybody in this campaign is going to make a statement that's wrong. Hopefully they'll discover that it's wrong, and come up with something better. Somebody who's ready to admit a mistake openly & promptly is better placed to correct it. That's a good sign.

I don't like Obama's debate comments on Iran. But I do like the idea of a politician who isn't afraid to say "I get it wrong sometimes" rather then blundering on with the same old misjudgments for fear of loss of face. There's strength in not needing to pretend you're right when you know you got it wrong.

He is just campaigning and not running the country right now...I am not dissing Obama. I would rather he just not show this weakness this early in the campaign. I'd rather NONE of our candidates show ANY weakness this early. Every weakness gets put on a 24-hour news loop. One word (think Macaca), one statement (think articulate) can bring a candidate down. As I said, he is not my candidate...but he does have great potential to be our nominee and at that point--he DOES become my candidate.
Mark my words--this statement will haunt him down the road.

Then he needs to start drinking some Red Bull or something. Whether it's fatigue or whatever (sounds like a bullshit excuse to me, to be honest), that was the sort of stupid mistake that needs to stop. Yes, Bush makes gaffes all the time, but Bush is such a dolt that people expect this sort of thing from him and nobody notices when it happens - plus, the media has Bush well covered.

People like Obama may be running for themselves, but they have a responsibility to ALL of us to make sure we don't get four more years of festering Repug shit in the Oval Office. He needs to pull his head out of his ass NOW.

BTW, I only sleep four hours a night, I couldn't hold a candle to Obama on discussing issues (or academic background), and I still can't imagine myself making such a stupid fucking mistake - especially if I knew my every word would be reviewable on the Internet forever.

It's stupid shit like this that will cost us the White House if the Bush press corps get a chance to sink their teeth into it. Obama sinking to Bush's level of stupidity, even if "fatigue" is responsible, is unacceptable. Besides, if Obama can be such a dumbass because "there are going to be times when I get tired," how the hell would he run the country?

Jesus. This shit needs to stop.

We don't need any more "before the war before I was against the war" shit that detracts from the real messages that our candidates put out. I'd rather they spend time discussing their platforms than doing damage control.
Like it or not, these campaigns have to be as close to perfect with every single word vetted if we want to take this damned country back.

Having to travel giving speeches and appear fresh and enthusiastic at each stop and knowing that the media is there waiting for every mistep would be very wearing on someone who wasn't expecting so much national attention as a first term Senator.

He's going through what entertainers do when they suddenly have a "hit" and their career takes off. The handlers and managers come in and suddenly your life is not your own. He now has to deal with all that plus the "Secret Service" protection and a grueling campaign schedule on top of his senatorial duties.

Fast Fame can be very exhausting and sometimes the psyche just rebels and the mind doesn't work with the mouth. :shrug:

Are we supposed to be freeper-like and not discuss potential pitfalls of these candidates?
With that being said--we cannot afford these stupid mistakes. We'll never get the WH if we don't hold our candidates feet to the fire on them.

Why is this bothering you so much?

never admits his mistakes, or his manhood would be tarnished, too late his manhood is already tarnished.

and get some work done then.

Obama mis-spoke plain and simple.

And he said so.

Not QUITE the same as lying an entire nation into an elective war/quagmire don't you think?

I'm still waiting for the giggling murderer in the WH to admit to THAT particular mistake....

Let's maintain a little perspective here can we?

Sheesh....

It's news. Now stick your fingers in your ears...lalalalalalalalala...I'm not listening....lalalalalala.
Now, that worked well didn't it? I just checked again...the story is still there.
Imagine that. It didn't go away.
Also...I would rather not explain away any mistakes made by our candidates by saying "Smirky did it too".
Smirky also set the bar so fucking low that it is now on the ground. I'd like our candidates to raise the bar, not simply crawl under it.

that there is a free and fair press in this country?

On MSRNC's website there were no less than 5 (FIVE) separate links to the story...

It maddens me to see it, but I am not surprised it is there...

Why aid the whole thing by leading the circular firing squad?

It's a non-issue, and the returdlicans and their presstitute enablers know it, because for examples of other high-profile politicians "mis-speaking" they won't have to go very far...

I can see the ad now. Vote for Obama. At least he's better than Boosh.


Doesn't seem very flattering.........

Wow, you have a very high standard...and a low-threshold for imperfection...

:eyes:

:shrug:

I found a story at the top of the BBC headlines...it's out there. I didn't create it. I didn't have to look very far.
I posted it. ALL of our candidates have to get better because I personally don't want to see their errors repeated on an endless 24 hour news loop.
WE HAVE TO WIN THE WH IN 2008.
I don't care which candidate does it...but I don't want them spending all of their time on damage control. Our message has to get out there. This was a preventable mistake. They have to do better.

Gimme a break...

Do you REALLY think that the wholly-owned Right-Wing media in this country won't bash our candidates REGARDLESS of what they say and do?

Which country have you been living in lately?

Bush almost makes the Queen two hundred years old in his latest verbal gaffe, and I have yet to see any signs of the Rethuglicans throwing him overboard, but Obama makes ONE error and his message isn't going to get out there, and he's going to have to spend the next two months in damage control...??

Mountain out of a mole-hill much?

We can't have that kind of honest talk on the campaign trail.

:sarcasm:

I don't want to know that WHEN they get tired--as we all do--that they make mistakes.
Damage control should have been "I misspoke. I am sorry" and not offer a plethora of excuses.

people wringing their hands over what he said.

:sarcasm:

There will be enough sliming from the Republican side as the election gets closer. Do we really need to wig out every time something like this happens? The guy made a mistake. Nobody's perfect.

Let me know when you do that and I will ask them to remove my post.
Look, I didn't sift through his website of speeches and find this and run back to the den with it.
It is one of the TOP stories on the BBC. I'll sure be glad when you have it removed.

that's not what I intended, and I'm sorry. I know that you didn't scour the internet looking for this story. What I said was meant as more of a general comment about the hyperventilating that goes on here on DU when a candidate on the left makes a mistake and how some people immediately jump to the conclusion that that candidate is no longer electable/fatally flawed/whatever.

It sometimes seems as though we don't even need the Republicans to bash our candidates since, if DU is any indication, we're plenty good at doing that on our own.


Edit: clarity.

He probably meant that 10,000 were affected or something. He *was* tired. It's a small mistake, and I VASTLY prefer that a candidate admit them.

Why doomsay now?

This campaigning is much to long and exhausting. It would be crazy to think these people will not make gaffes!!!:crazy:

criticize any candidate. The flames are easy to start here these days.

BTW... I will not touch this subject with a hundred foot poll as I forgot to put on my flame retardant outfit today.

:hi:

I just think our candidates have to be perfect. It isn't fair but it is the way it is. The media isn't kind to them in the first place...and when you give them substance...whoa nelly.

:shrug:

But if you want to discard candidates for one thing they say, in error, be my guest.

Not what I said and you fucking well know it.
Like I said--take over the news cycle and make this a non-story and I will be thrilled.
The speech gaffe isn't the story--the story is that he said that he makes mistakes when he is tired. We all get tired.
But his framing of his excuse sounds like he frequently makes mistakes when he is tired. THAT is the problem.