I’ve been surprised at the animosity towards Obama that I’ve seen here. But I’ve been far more disappointed because much of it appears driven by a lack of knowledge about his background, as well as a marked preference for a different candidate.
So I feel compelled to take a moment to explain why I am, and have, for some time, been a supporter of Barack Obama.
In summary, here is why I support Obama:
- He is intelligent, and intelligent enough to listen to those he opposes.
- He’s got MORE experience than Hillary Clinton, in terms of years in elected office.
- His positions closely match my values.
Intelligence
I think most of us agree that it’s important to have a person with intelligence in the White House. Goodness knows we’ve seen what happens when that is missing!
Intelligence isn’t just what you know, and say. Intelligence is also realizing what you don’t yet know, and being willing to listen to others, and also, importantly, to those who do not agree with you.
Obama learned to listen while working as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago. As Kenneth Walsh wrote in his U.S. News article about Obama of 8/26/07:
David Kindler, a colleague at the time, said the lanky newcomer with the funny name understood that a community organizer is a combination of educator, confessor-priest, social activist, motivational expert, mediator, and campaign leader. To accomplish his mission, Obama spent hours with Altgeld residents one on one, learning their problems and their dreams, and he resisted taking credit for success, preferring to give it to individuals in the community.
Obama realized that if he knew more, he could do more, and at the age of 27, older than most of his classmates, he became a law student at Harvard University.
In their Boston Globe article titled “At Harvard Law, a unifying voice” (1/28/07), reporters Michael Levenson and Jonathan Saltzman wrote:
Beyond his appearance, what set him apart was his approach to argument, the lifeblood of the law school and the constant occupation of the young lawyers-in-training. While other students were determined to prove the merits of their beliefs through logic and determination, Obama preferred to listen, seek others’ views, and find a middle way.
“A lot of people at the time were just talking past each other, very committed to their opinions, their point of view, and not particularly interested in what other people had to say,” said Crystal Nix Hines, a classmate who is now a television writer. “Barack transcended that.”
Even on campus, Obama was not just a student, but an activist as well:
In the fall of 1989, when Obama returned to campus for his second year, students were protesting the lack of minority law school faculty. They staged sit-ins in the law library, camped outside the office of Dean Robert C. Clark, and carried signs that read “Diversity Now” and “Homogeneity Feeds Hatred.” The tensions continued the following spring, reaching a high when Derrick A. Bell Jr., the first tenured black professor at the school, resigned in protest. Obama was a member of the Black Law Students Association, which organized many demonstrations that spring. But he was less confrontational than some of his peers.
“Barack was a stabilizing influence in that he would absolutely support those efforts, but was also someone who could discuss and debate them with students or faculty who had different views,” said Professor Charles J. Ogletree Jr., who became Harvard’s seventh tenured black professor in 1993.
When the topic of running for president of Harvard Law School’s prestigious publication, the Harvard Law Review, was raised by friends, Obama was initially reluctant. That position was seen as a stepping stone for those who wanted to go on to career positions at top run law firms. But in the end, Obama gave it a shot.
“You should not underestimate the significance of him being the first black president of the Harvard Law Review because that was and remains a very elite group,” said Bell, now a law professor at New York University. “These were some tough folks. . . . It’s almost as impressive that he was elected president of the Harvard Law Review as him being elected senator of Illinois.”
Obama so earned the respect of his classmates that the Black Law Students Association asked him, as opposed to the traditional judge or professor, to give the keynote address at their annual conference.
What did Obama do, given this honor? He urged his fellow classmates not to simply go forth and feather their own nests, but to take their education and use it to address society’s ills.
He practiced what he preached.
When he left Harvard, instead of feathering his nest with a high-priced law position, he chose instead to return to Chicago to work as a civil rights lawyer and to teach at the University of Chicago Law School.
Experience
Experience does matter, greatly, in my opinion. If Obama’s first role in politics was his Senate seat, frankly, I’d have concerns. In fact, that’s one of the reasons I didn’t support Edwards in the previous election cycle. I felt he didn’t have enough experience.
The truth is, Obama has more experience in elected office than Hillary Clinton.
Obama was elected to the Illinois State Senate in 1996. He wasn’t immediately welcomed, as Peter Slevin noted in the Washington Post of 2/9/07:
“When you come in, especially as a freshman, and work on something like ethics reform, it’s not necessarily a way to endear yourself to some of the veteran members of the Illinois General Assembly,” said state Sen. Kirk W. Dillard, a Republican who became a friend. “And working on issues like racial profiling was contentious, but Barack had a way both intellectually and in demeanor that defused skeptics.”
…In 1997, Obama was not instantly embraced, Dillard said: “The fact that he was a law professor — and a constitutional-law professor — and he was a Harvard graduate made many members of the General Assembly roll their eyes.”
But Obama was determined, and persistent. “He was very aggressive when he first came to the Senate,” said State Senator Emil Jones, Jr., who chose Obama, at the recommendation of former judge and Democratic congressman Abner Mikva, to represent the Senate Democrats on an effort to reform campaign financing. As Slevin wrote:
Obama favored more ambitious changes in campaign law, including limits on contributions, but nipped and tucked in search of consensus.
“What impressed me about him was his ability in working with people of the opposite party,” said Mike Lawrence, director of the Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University. “He had definite ideas about what ought to be contained in a campaign finance reform measure, but he also was willing to recognize that he was probably not going to get everything he wanted.”
The result, according to good-government groups, was the most ambitious campaign reform in nearly 25 years, making Illinois one of the best in the nation on campaign finance disclosure.
When you hear Obama talk about reaching across the aisle, he is not doing that out of naïveté, but out of experience. He knows that dialog, not partisanship, is the only way to move forward in a bi-partisan legislature.
Obama was re-elected to the State Senate in 1998, skipped the 2000 cycle to run, unsuccessfully, against a popular Congressman, returned to the state Senate in 2002, and then left in 2004 when he became a United States senator for Illinois.
Edwards served one six-year term. Hillary is on her second six-year term. Obama started his Senate term in 2004, but when you add in that Obama served in the Illinois State Senate for six years, Clinton is entering her eighth year in public office, but Obama is entering his tenth!
Neither Edwards nor Clinton served in any elected governmental other than the U.S. Senate. And while Hillary was at her husband’s side for a long political lifetime, she was not herself running the show.
Experience is key. But what kind of experience? Obama has worked in many different environments, from teaching to organizing to writing (his first job out of college was as an editor for a company that was later bought by the Economist) to creating not just legislation, but legislation that got passed.
Knowing when to hold ’em, and when to fold ’em, is also key. Obama is reputed to be an excellent poker player, an attribute that would come in handy when dealing with foreign leaders, as well as domestic opponents.
Obama on the Issues
Obama has a solidly liberal record, with high ratings on issues that are important to me from various interest groups. Want a quick listing? Check out Project Vote Smart’s page on Obama.
You can also look for his votes on U.S. Senate legislation, and can click through on the bills to compare his vote to that of other Senators. Obama has a solid record of voting with his party.
I encourage people to stop reading uninformed or malformed opinions about Obama, and to look into his actual record.
I will support whoever the Democratic Party nominates in the 2008 election. But my first choice is absolutely Obama.
If you haven’t given him a serious look, I encourage you to make an attempt. You might just like, very much, what you see. There’s a lot of substance behind the poetry.