Sold on Obama

I've been a fan of Barack Obama's since his speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention, which prompted me to turn to my roommates and say: "This guy's going to be the first black president!"

But it wasn't until this week that I really believed he could win the 2008 election. As recently as one week ago, I was still hesitant: he's too young, he doesn't have enough experience, his middle name's Hussein, and he's black in a country that only has a few blacks in state-wide elected positions, and has never had a black president or vice president. While I personally have very liberal views about race, I'm also a Southerner who prides himself on being a realist, so I understand why many black Americans, including friends of mine I've discussed the elections with, are worried that the country isn't ready to elect a black president.

So when I say I'm sold on Obama, it is despite months and months of intense skepticism. And while it may seem counterintuitive, I think that's why I'm so excited about his candidacy. I've spent months waiting for Obama's initial luster to wear off; instead, he's convinced me that he is clearly the best choice to be our next president.

Obama's performances in Iowa and New Hampshire have convinced me not only that he is the most intelligent and charismatic candidate the two parties have to offer, but also that he is the only one who has a chance to unite post-9/11, post-Bush America. This country faces serious, serious challenges on almost every front, and I genuinely believe that the only way to successfully confront them will be getting beyond partisan politics.

Talk of "post-partisan" politics strikes a lot of older commentators as phony campaign speak. My response would be that those commentators just don't get it. Has any other candidate promised a coalition cabinet? More broadly, I genuinely believe that the two-party system will become a relic fairly soon, perhaps as soon as 2016 or 2020. Until then, I'm pulling for (and, on the weekends, volunteering for) Barack Obama.

Andrew Sullivan: "Goodbye to All That" [Atlantic]
"GOP Doubts, Fears 'Post-Partisan' Obama" [Washington Post]

(Speaking of Obama, Christopher Hitchens has written yet another bizarre column that begs the question: "Why on Earth is this guy being paid to write about American politics?!" Not only does Hitchens claim that Obama should not be considered black, but he also seems to have a problem with the fact that the Obamas attend a predominantly black church. Of course, the fact that they go to church at all probably offends Hitchens, in and of itself. But aside from Hitchens' atheist fundamentalism, does he really not understand why it is notable that the United States has its first black front-runner? Hitchens asks "why is a man with a white mother considered to be 'black,' anyway?" Is he really completely unaware of the fact that millions of biracial people were the victims of legally-sanctioned discrimination as "blacks" over most of the course of American history? If we were living in a vacuum where the past was completely irrelevant, maybe Hitchens would have a point; since we aren't, one has to wonder how a major columnist has such a deaf ear to the historical context.)