Obama's 26-year-old speechwriter is inspired by JFK, RFK, King

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: What Would Obama Say?
By ASHLEY PARKER
Published: January 20, 2008

....(Jon) Favreau, or Favs, as everyone calls him, looks every bit his age, with a baby face and closely shorn stubble. And he leads a team of two other young speechwriters: 26-year-old Adam Frankel, who worked with John F. Kennedy’s adviser and speechwriter Theodore C. Sorensen on his memoirs, and Ben Rhodes, who, at 30, calls himself the “elder statesman” of the group and who helped write the Iraq Study Group report as an assistant to Lee H. Hamilton. Together they are working for a politician who not only is known for his speaking ability but also wrote two best-selling books and gave the much-lauded keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. “You’re like Ted Williams’s batting coach,” Mr. Favreau said. But even Ted Williams needed a little help with his swing.

“Barack trusts him,” said David Axelrod, Mr. Obama’s chief campaign strategist. “And Barack doesn’t trust too many folks with that — the notion of surrendering that much authority over his own words.”

When he first met Mr. Obama, Mr. Favreau was 23, a recent graduate of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., near where he grew up. Mr. Obama was rehearsing his 2004 convention speech backstage, when Mr. Favreau, then a member of John Kerry’s staff, interrupted him: the senator needed to rewrite a line from his speech to avoid an overlap. “He kind of looked at me, kind of confused — like, ‘Who is this kid?’ ” Mr. Favreau recalled. Mr. Obama became his boss the following year....

***

Mr. Favreau also used this time to master Mr. Obama’s voice. He took down almost everything the senator said and absorbed it. Now, he said, when he sits down to write, he just channels Mr. Obama — his ideas, his sentences, his phrases. “The trick of speechwriting, if you will, is making the client say your brilliant words while somehow managing to make it sound as though they issued straight from their own soul,” said the writer Christopher Buckley, who was a speechwriter for the first President Bush. “Imagine putting the words ‘Ask not what your country can do for you’ into the mouth of Ron Paul, and you can see the problem.”

Many Democratic candidates have attempted to evoke both John and Robert Kennedy, but Senator Obama seems to have had more success than most. It helps that Mr. Obama seems to have the élan that John Kennedy had, not to mention a photogenic family. For his inspiration, Mr. Favreau said, “I actually read a lot of Bobby” Kennedy. “I see shades of J.F.K., R.F.K.,” he said, and then added, “King.”...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/fashion/20speechwriter.html?ref=fashion

[ursi]

1. they've done well

[davidwparker]

2. his 26 year old speech writer is TALENTED!

[Darth_Kitten]

3. I guess butter wouldn't melt in their mouths........

:sarcasm:

[BeyondGeography]

4. Kid writes a helluva speech

26 years old...Maybe there's hope for this country after all.

[Darth_Kitten]

6. Yeah, don't delve TOO deep.........

n/t

[BeyondGeography]

9. Oh look, Spam Kitten is here

[Darth_Kitten]

13. Oh, name calling, how, like youknow, classy.

Guess the truth HURTS. Oh, so SORRY, dearie.

I guess when you don't have much to go on, resort to name calling? Yeah, I guess I spam alot. :sarcasm:

next.......

[BeyondGeography]

20. What truth?

This was a positive article about a talented kid, and you came here to piss on it. Nice.

[itsrobert]

5. We know already. All the run-on quotes by MLK, RFK, and JFK

over power an Obama speech. Very unoriginal speeches.

[Darth_Kitten]

8. Funny how they quote figures from the......60's.....hmmm.

that hedonistic decade. :sarcasm:

[robbedvoter]

7. Which is why Obama is not that "invested: in those 60's fights? Nice one, NYT

Bill Moyers debunked last night the MLK-Johnson BS. he also added that NYT was the only one refusing to retract their lies. NYT is the one who invented the White Water bs.

[soundguy]

10. I'd Think Before I Bragged About That,

Gee I am puppet reading speeches written by a kid inspired by guys that others in the race actually knew, and some of their managers and writers may actually have called them friends. Man, Obama is just not ready for prime time. It's really kinda sad when you don't have anything to run on, so you have to resort to having your minions go on a non stop slur fest, and then talk about platitudal matters because you can not point to any struggles or accomplishments in your own career. You can't go up against the great republican slime machine with training wheels on.

[NYCGirl]

14. You know that groundbreaking speech at the 04 Democratic Convention?

Obama wrote that. There's a reason Kerry gave him that chance.

[NWHarkness]

11. JFK? RFK? MLK?

Weren't those guys responsible for some of the "excesses" of the 60s?

[mac2]

12. Words, words, words.....

with no action or intent.

[polichick]

15. Let's elect the speechwriter then...

Maybe he's the real Dem.

[Darth_Kitten]

16. LOL

this is great!

[balantz]

17. There are some rare candidates from time to time

that speak from their own mind and don't use speech-writers.

[polichick]

18. I think it's good to use a writer occasionally...

Edwards is the one with the most progressive platform, and I like him as a person ~ but he needs a writer to help him broaden his message. Lots of Americans have trouble relating to those mill stories he tells over and over ~ he'd do better if he would change up the language to include different kinds of people, even those who aren't poor.

[ladjf]

19. Perhaps, if they had lived through the Reagan administration

,they might have steered Obama clear of his Reagan comments. I know. History can be learned through reading. But, contemporary experience is hard to beat. Ask our founding fathers who had personally familiar with the corrupt politics and religion of Europe.

[Darth_Kitten]

21. Hey, what's reality when held up to symbolism anyways?

Maybe Reagan was just misunderstood? :sarcasm: ;)

[ladjf]

22. Hmm. That's what Socrates and other Greek philosophers

used to argue about.