The Obama Timeline

Against the War… But With Some Cover

Obama speaks at an anti-war demonstration on October 2, 2002, in front of a crowd of approximately 2,000 people at Chicago’s Federal Plaza. The event, sponsored by the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism (CCDS), is organized by Marilyn Katz, former SDS activist, Chicago public relations consultant, and long-time friend of Obama’s political guru David Axelrod. (Katz’s Vietnam War protest activities included throwing nails in the street to stop police cars.) There are no known recordings of Obama’s speech, thus giving him the opportunity to recreate his words to his liking at any time. Before the event, Obama talks with Axelrod about the “political ramifications” of the speech because he is looking ahead to his Senate run in 2004. The speech turns out to be only mildly critical of the likely war. While Obama remarks that a war in Iraq could lead to “an occupation of undetermined length with undetermined costs,” he also emphasizes that military intervention is sometimes necessary. The speech is clearly not anti-war enough for the crowd, but it gives him the opportunity to say he was against the war from the beginning if it turned sour, while providing some cover if it proceeded successfully. (The text of Obama’s 2002 anti-war speech no longer appears on official Obama Web sites.) [34, 837, 842 pp. 224–226; 1282]