Sen. Obama cancels Utah Appearance to Respect President Hinckley’s Funeral

29 January 2008 @ 2:14 pm | 12 comments

Sen. Obama cancels Utah appearance out of respect for President Hinckley’s funeral:

The Illinois Democrat was scheduled to drop by the state on Saturday for a short appearance in Salt Lake City but his campaign said the visit was off.
  “Last night I spoke with President Thomas Monson and expressed my deepest sympathies to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the passing of President Gordon B. Hinckley,” Obama said in a statement. Monson is Hinckley’s likely successor.

Classy but also clever. He can now campaign elswhere as he scrambles to cover as many states as possible before next week’s Super Tueday.  Plus he just impressed a ton of Mormon Democrats.

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  1. David H. Sundwall’s avatar

    David H. Sundwall on 29 January 2008 at 2:29 pm

    And other Mormons as well, I should add.

  2. Michael’s avatar

    Michael on 29 January 2008 at 2:43 pm

    I wonder how non-LDS Utahns will react to this. I get the feeling from my time in SLC that even those vehemently opposed to the Church didn’t harbor ill feelings for GBH individually (except for the extreme kook fringe). But I agree with your analysis, he can claim that he wanted to be there while spending an extra few hours in CA or some other more delegate rich state.

  3. David H. Sundwall’s avatar

    David H. Sundwall on 29 January 2008 at 2:46 pm

    The SL Trib today has some very nice letters from non-LDS who fondly looked on GBH.

    I think most reasonable people will understand that he didn’t want to conlfict with such a major event.

    Who knows where Obama was going to have the rally but I bet it would be in SLC or close to the airport. I went to a Cheney rally for a 2002 congressional race and it was essentially a fly-by where he stopped just long enough to fuel up.

  4. Michael’s avatar

    Michael on 29 January 2008 at 2:50 pm

    He likely didn’t move the rally to the Provo Airport, I’m guessing.

  5. Nick Literski’s avatar

    Nick Literski on 29 January 2008 at 4:42 pm

    You know, Obama isn’t my first choice right now, but I think it’s unfortunate to jump to cynical conclusions here. If I’m reading correctly, some are suggesting that he never intended to visit Utah (or at least never wanted to), and just jumped on a convenient excuse in order to move on faster to California. Can’t it just be that he’s a decent human being, who recognizes that it would be in poor taste to hold a campaign event opposite public mourning for an LDS president, in a state which is 72% LDS?

  6. Michael’s avatar

    Michael on 29 January 2008 at 5:12 pm

    Nick, he obviously intended to visit Utah. I am certainly not suggesting otherwise. I certainly didn’t accuse him of not being classy either, just agreed with David.
    Instead, the current situation conveniently allows him to get probably as many points as he would have gotten for showing up plus additional points for his sensitive stance, without actually having to show up. We can also safely assume that he will not be taking in the funeral on BYUTV, and will be using that time in other campaigning efforts. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it does show that he is being “classy but [probably] also clever.”
    For all my disagreements with Obama, he does seem like a decent and classy human being, but if this was Hillary … I would be tempted to leave it at clever.

  7. David H. Sundwall’s avatar

    David H. Sundwall on 29 January 2008 at 5:15 pm

    Nick,

    I agree with you. I’m sorry I wasn’t more clear. That’s why I added the first comment by which I meant that even non-Democrat Mormons could be impressed.

    I think its smart politics but I was just plain impressed that he called President Monson.

    I don’t share Obama’s politics but like I said, it was a classy move. I wasn’t trying to be cynical, but just making a purely political observation that it also was to his advantage considering the circumstances.

    Sometimes good politics and good manners can coincide, if all too rarely.

  9. David H. Sundwall’s avatar

    David H. Sundwall on 29 January 2008 at 5:19 pm

    As Michael says Obama clearly intended to vist Utah. In fact there have been several stories on how much attention Obama has paid to the state, somewhat surprisingly. He recently opened a second campaign office there.

    My guess is that Obama thinks there is not much Clinton love in Utah (Bill came in 3rd in 1992) even among Democrats and he can capitalize on that as he can’t take any delegates for granted.

  10. Nick Literski’s avatar

    Nick Literski on 29 January 2008 at 6:01 pm

    Thanks, David and Michael. Sorry I seem to have read your intent wrong.

  11. Doc’s avatar

    Doc on 30 January 2008 at 11:46 pm

    He also impressed this Mormon independant. ;)