Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Campaign 2012 Tidbits (25 of 26): Behind-the-scenes on Michelle’s DNC speech.



From Mark Halperin and John Heilemann’s Double Down – Game Change 2012 (New York: Penguin Press, 2013), p. 383:

[A DNC speech specialist] noted a passage [in Michelle Obama’s DNC speech draft] that alluded to voter suppression...  “That’s a pretty good section,” he remarked.

“Yes, I want that in there,” Michelle said firmly.

POTUS generally made a point of saying out of FLOTUS’s way when she was preparing oratory...  But when [David] Axelrod and [speechwriter Jon] Favreau started raving about Michelle’s speech as it was coming together, Obama made an exception and took a look at the text – and was struck by how personal it was, how much it referred to the girls.

“This one’s going to be tough for me to watch,” he told Favreau, “because I’m going to cry.”

. . .

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