Yepsen: Obama's Superb Speech Could Catapult His Bid

Nov. 12, 2007 — -- The six leading Democratic presidential candidates showed up for the Iowa Democratic Party's big Jefferson Jackson Dinner on Saturday night, and five of them gave very good speeches.

Barack Obama's was excellent. It was one of the best of his campaign.

The passion he showed should help him close the gap on Hillary Clinton by tipping some undecided caucusgoers his way.

His oratory was moving, and he successfully contrasted himself with the others — especially Clinton — without being snide or nasty about it.

That was an important thing for him to do. Historically, the Iowa party's "JJ" dinner is a landmark event in Democratic presidential caucus campaigns. All the key party activists, donors and players are present. This year, about 9,000 of them showed up.

(Most were from Iowa, though there was some grumbling that Obama packed the place with ringers from Illinois. Joe Biden even greeted them in his speech. The charge that they brought in outsiders was denied by the Obama people, who were nevertheless pleased they beat the other candidates in the noise war inside Veterans Memorial Auditorium.)

What's important isn't the hoopla. It's what the candidate does on the stage and while all did quite well, Obama was particularly impressive. Should he come from behind to win the Iowa caucuses, Saturday's dinner will be remembered as one of the turning points in his campaign here. For example:

• He said the Iraq war "should have never been authorized and should have never been waged," a shot at the votes Clinton and most of the others cast in favor of it.

• Obama took another dig at the Clinton era when he said "we have a chance to bring the country together to tackle problems that George Bush made far worse and that festered long before George Bush took office."

• He tweaked Clinton for not taking questions at some of her events by saying: "Not answering questions because we're afraid our answers just won't be popular just won't do it." (Clinton is also currently vexed by controversy over her staff trying to plant questions with Iowans.)