Jon Favreau and JK

[MBS]

Interesting history of Favreau (and ALSO of JK's convention speech) from the Sunday magazine of the Boston Globe. Favreau's graduation address at Holy Cross sounds pretty neat in itself. Author is Charlie Pierce, well-known magazine journalist and Boston local:
See http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/magazine/articles/2008/12/21/the_speechwriter_in_chief/
Here's an excerpt: the ??? is my commentary.

One day at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston, the people putting together the various speeches hit something of a snag. There was a certain turn of phrase that Senator John Kerry wanted to use in his speech accepting the convention's nomination. As Jon Favreau, then a 23-year-old Kerry speechwriter, recalls, it was the line: There are no red states or blue states, there are only the United States of America, all of us pledging allegiance to the red, white, and blue. The problem was that the phrase was also included in the text of the convention's eagerly awaited keynote address, which was to be delivered by a well-regarded senatorial candidate from Illinois.

The Kerry people dispatched Favreau, fresh out of Holy Cross and, before that, out of North Reading High School, to explain to Barack Obama that he would not be using that particular turn of phrase on this evening. "So, I walked in where Senator Obama was practicing his speech," Favreau recalls, "and I said that I had to talk to the senator and get this line out. So he comes up to me and says, 'Are you telling me I have to cut this line out?' " Obama's staff defused the situation quickly. Kerry got the line, got the nomination, and (????) got something of a beating (???) in November. Obama gave his speech -- minus the line . . . .

. . .not long after the Kerry campaign ended, Favreau was invited to breakfast with Obama in the Senate Dining Room. "It was one of the most easygoing interviews I ever had," Favreau says. "He asked me why I went into politics, what issues I cared about."

In fact, Favreau had sounded similar themes in his valedictory address to the class of 2003 at Holy Cross. He told his classmates: "Here's some of what we need. Soccer coaches, den mothers, PTA members, neighbors who help you move in and promise to keep in touch when they move you out, friends who come early and stay late, shoulders to cry on, big brothers and sisters, family comedians, T-ball umpires, letter-to-the-editor authors, voters who care about any issue from traffic lights and tax reform to potholes and peace on earth, organizers and activists, critics and supporters, voices for those who are having trouble getting theirs heard, summertime porch-sitters with special degrees in talking about everything and nothing until the mosquitoes bite, mentors, philanthropists, signature collectors, boo-boo fixers, grocers to the hungry, roofers to the homeless, and believers -- especially believers."