Obama Day at Washington Caucuses

I thought this was a pretty interesting tidbit from The Slog (the blog of The Stranger, Seattle's local alternative weekly) culled from the reporter's experiences at the Clinton and Obama rallies held on Thursday and Friday:

Obama doesn't do very well on the exit poll question about whether a given candidate "cares about people like me," also known as the empathy score. HRC does much better. I was expecting to feel that empathy gap at their rallies—and I did, but it was reversed. Obama is much, much more skilled at responding to a crowd. HRC had a long list of local green companies (prepared by Jay Inslee) and did her conscientious nods to unions supposedly in attendance, but she studiously ignored shouts from the audience (including "I love you!") and didn't seem to notice as an old lady fainted and was wheeled out of the hall in a stretcher (right in front of the press risers). When Obama gets the "I love you!", he immediately responds, "I love you back!" When a girl almost fainted in the crowd immediately in front of the stage, he interrupted his speech for a good minute or so to get her a bottle of water and and ask people to clear a path so she could sit down.

BTW, Clinton got over 5,000 to her rally, while Obama filled the Key Arena (where the basketball Sonics play for the time being) with over 17,000 fans (and turned away well over 3,000 more).

Here are a couple of pics from the Seattle P-I:





And I'm sorry if I'm falling into some kind of anti-HRC meme by posting these photos, but what's the deal with the crazy eyes?











Seriously. Alright. Here's a better shot to end this cavalcade.