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Obama Continues to Retool Convention Speech; Expresses Some Doubt

(CBS)
From CBS News' Maria Gavrilovic:

(CHICAGO) - Barack Obama has spent much of the weekend working on his convention speech, spending hours upon hours at a downtown Chicago hotel writing. Yet despite his diligence, he expressed some doubt about the most important speech of his political career.

"I am still tooling around with my speech a little bit, it may not be as good as the other headliners the first three nights," Obama said today moments before he boarded a plane to return to Chicago.

Campaign aides said Obama has spent much of his time writing and re-writing portions of the speech, often with his speechwriting team, but sometimes alone. He has been writing his speech in longhand and then retyping it on his computer. Last night, after a busy and pressure filled day in Springfield, Obama returned to Chicago's Park Hyatt hotel and worked on the convention speech for almost 4 hours, well past midnight.

At a campaign picnic in Eau Claire, Wisconsin this afternoon, he told supporters that he hopes both his and Michelle's speech will help the public identify more with their family.

"You'll have a sense of who I am," Obama said adding, "what our values are and how we're raising our kids and I think what you'll conclude is that 'he's sort of like us."

Michelle Obama, who is already in Denver with her mother and two daughters, will address the Democratic Convention tomorrow evening. Obama takes the stage on Thursday. His speechwriting team will begin traveling with him on the campaign trail tomorrow.

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