No More Mr. Nice Guy: Obama Mocks Hillary In Stand Up Routine
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01.18.08 -- 8:20 AM
The White House campaign has brought a new act to Vegas.
Barack Obama has stepped up his campaign against Hillary Rodham Clinton, and he's trying to use humor to bring her down before this weekend's Democratic presidential caucus.
His argument is starkly different from the "Iowa nice" approach he used in recent weeks when campaigning in the first caucus state. Candidates who go negative there have a history of turning off voters, so Obama rarely criticized Clinton directly in Iowa _ instead he made veiled references to "some of my opponents" _ and he won the state.
But there's nothing subtle about Las Vegas. With a high-stakes match on the line Saturday, Obama embraced local traditions by debuting a biting political standup routine Thursday night that mocked his rival.
Obama began by recalling a moment in Tuesday night's debate when he and his rivals were asked to name their biggest weakness. Obama answered first, saying he has a messy desk and needs help managing paperwork _ something his opponents have since used to suggest he's not up to managing the country. Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards said his biggest weakness is that he has a powerful response to seeing pain in others, and Clinton said she gets impatient to bring change to America.
"Because I'm an ordinary person, I thought that they meant, `What's your biggest weakness?'" Obama said to laughter from a packed house at Rancho High School. "If I had gone last I would have known what the game was. And then I could have said, `Well, ya know, I like to help old ladies across the street. Sometimes they don't want to be helped. It's terrible.'"
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