Obama Responds to Hillary's Campaign Ad

http://youtube.com/watch?v=SYfbf64gBXc

In this video, Obama is responding to Hillary's Campaign ad that says who do you want answering the phone in the white house at three in the morning? Throughout it, he is using a kind of claim pattern of a persuasive speech to persuade the audience that he would do the best job in a national emergency like this. His first claim that her question is only being used to scare people into voting for her, and he says that this isn't the question that should be asked. He says that the real question is what judgment will you exercise when picking up the phone? Although this question was implied in Hillary's question, by restating it in this way it almost makes her question sound trivial, which gives him the upper hand to begin with. He uses good parallel structure and repetition in the next claim when he says that Clinton, Bush, and McCain each ...gave the wrong answer, and he also is vocally expressive in this repetition. He then goes into what his response was, it would be unwise..., and gives support for why this was so and what should have been done. He then makes two statements/claims in a row which sum up why they should want him "answering the phone". He says that this is the judgment that he has made in the past, and these are the same judgments he will make at the President of the United States. There is almost a third statement that can be implied here which is basically that this is why they should vote for him. When he goes into his judgments, he is playing off of Maslow's needs hierarchy, using safety needs in the first too points, physiological needs when he talks about giving soldiers the right equipment when they go off to war, and esteem needs when he talks about giving soldiers respect when they return from war. He then reiterates some previous claims, saying that they are using terrorism to scare votes out of people and he will never use this, he restates what kind of judgment the country needs and then concludes well by saying that this is the same judgment he will use. I think that this was a very good response to the question. First of all it was concise -- under three minutes but it still covered everything. He emphasized his own good judgment, while respectfully criticizing Hillary's (as well as McCain's) at the same time. Throughout the speech, he makes good use of pauses and uses very good articulation. He also has good posture, which makes him look very official. These are things that he does consistently through all of his speeches and makes him a very good speaker.