Chicago Tribune headline: Obama snubs Clinton

[bajamary]

This is the headline from this morning's Chicago Tribune's website reads:

Obama Snubs Clinton

Barack Obama stood icily staring at Hillary Clinton before President Bush's final State of the Union, then turned his back.

So President Bush has delivered his last State of the Union. And what everyone in the House press gallery is talking about isn't the speech. Rather, it's the snub.

Sen. Barack Obama refused to make himself available to greet Sen. Hillary Clinton before the speech.

Note: The headline story has a photo of Hillary reaching out to shake Kennedy's hand with Obama standing with his back towards Hillary.

The story continues:

'When members of the Senate entered the chamber, Obama came in before Clinton. He went out of his way to greet as many House members as possible and walked halfway across the chamber to greet members of the Supreme Court, the president's cabinet, the military joint chiefs.

That made what happened next even more striking. Obama returned to stand by his seat next to Sen. Edward Kennedy who endorsed Obama today in a widely watched event that reverberated across the political world.

As Clinton approached, Kennedy made sure to make eye contact and indicated he wanted to shake her hand. Clinton leaned towards Kennedy over a row of seats and Kennedy leaned in towards her. They shook hands.

Obama stood icily staring at Clinton during this, then turned his back and stepped a few feet away. Kennedy may've wanted to make peace with Clinton but Obama clearly wanted no part of that.

As president, Obama has said he would meet with the U.S.'s enemies without precondition. But making nice with Clinton apparently is another mattter after the increasingly angry fight the two have waged, with charges and countercharges, for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The sense in the press gallery was that Obama didn't cover himself in glory. Someone even used the word "childish." (Not this writer.) Judging by how much conversation there was about this brush off in the press gallery, Americans will be hearing a lot more about this tomorrow and in coming days."

http://weblogs.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/blog/2008/01/by_frank_james_president_bush.html

[MethuenProgressive]

1. "Obama also maneuvered himself to shake Bush's hand."

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/01/realpals.html
Obama also maneuvered himself to shake Bush's hand. They exchanged smiles and, in the true Texas style of governors greeting legislators, Bush said, "Hey, buddy, how's it going?"

[1corona4u]

3. Here's a visual for those that missed that heart warming moment in time

[calimary]

17. If Obama was willing to reach out to shake bush's hand, he could at least

have done so to Hillary. It was childish and petty and snot-nosed and quite beneath him. He should know better. Besides, the snubs should go to bush, NOT one of Obama's own teammates. We Democrats are all supposed to be on the same side, aren't we? I would say bush is the REAL enemy, NOT Clinton.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. To be fair: It's the headline for a blog on the paper's website.

The thread title makes it sound like it's the newspaper's front page headline. It's not; it's some Trib commentator's blog.

[bidenista]

5. go to the newspaper site

They've put it as the main story.

[rodeodance]

4. Snubs the new word

[Skwmom]

6. Who owns this rag? Murdoch?

[bajamary]

8. Sam Zell owns the Tribune & LA Times and.......

Sam Zell owns the Chicago Tribune, not Murdoch. Zell also owns the LA Times, Newsday (I think) and the beloved-by-many Chicago Cubs.

Mrs. Zell has contributed to Obama's campaign.

[jlake]

15. Nope. A contributor to Obama. But thanks for playing.

[Tatiana]

7. Is this U.S. news or a recap of "Days of Our Lives."

The level of discourse in this country is so very low right now...

[Hepburn]

10. Yep....

...this "snub" business is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay out of line IMO and taking time from the discussion of REAL issues like the Economy, the War, Poverty and the need to have all covered by Medical Insurance.

Let's move on, OK?

[Occam Bandage]

9. Oh, wow. Another blog.

[Quixote1818]

16. About 10 people read those blogs too. nt

[Cant trust em]

11. Snub or no snub

It was just a dumb move. He should have moved heaven and earth to shake her hand. We can downplay this all we want but ideally if he shook her hand he'd be getting good headlines instead of crappy ones.

[comradebillyboy]

13. Bingo! the samrt thing to have done would be a big smile and

little friendly hug and kiss on the cheek. Did Obama ever think of "putting his game face on". These people are on camera all the time, cant afford unguarded moments like that.

[Cant trust em]

14. He needs to use my sister in law's line "winning the nice war"

You know how you have family reunions and there's that cousin or someone that you've never gotten along with? You go over and give them a hug anyway and ask them how they're doing and suck it up. That's what he needed to do here. He may hate ever fiber of his being but being phony is better than being rude (or at least give off the perception of rudeness).

[IA_Seth]

12. Where is the pic of this?

I must say, I missed it.

But seriously, is this the best we can do to vet our candidates?

I was an excited participant in the Iowa caucuses. Now I can't wait for this ridiculousness to be over and done with so we can start focusing on the REPUBLICANS. I think some of you forget that they are the opposition.