Wow. The attack against Obama‘s “present” votes really has this crowd revved up, almost to Denver-levels of enthusiasm. Here’s the rhetoric, which is pretty potent:

On the other hand, you have a resume from a gifted man with an Ivy League education. He worked as a community organizer, and immersed himself in Chicago machine politics. Then he ran for the state legislature – where nearly 130 times he was unable to make a decision yes or no. He simply voted “present.”

As Mayor of New York City, I never got a chance to vote “present.” And you know, when you’re President of the United States, you can’t just vote “present.” You must make decisions.

—Dana Goldstein

Dana Goldstein, a former associate editor and writer at the Prospect, comes from a family of public-school educators. She received the Spencer Fellowship in Education Journalism, a Schwarz Fellowship at the New America Foundation, and a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellowship at the Nation Institute. Her journalism is regularly featured in Slate, The Atlantic, The Nation, The Daily Beast, and other publications, and she is a staff writer at the Marshall Project.