Obama is seeping right down to the very base of the grassroots.
I stopped by a public park today, right in the heart of downtown Seattle (well, the Cascade area, for those of you who know the place) to get a little workout shooting hoops.
Homeless people hang out in the park, mainly because it has a public bathroom.
It's not unusual for guys to ask if they can shoot with me, so when the middle-aged man shuffled over, I tossed him the ball. The guy had some skills and we knocked down a few together.
We talked about professional basketball, focusing mostly on the NBA championship series. When he started talking about Michael Jordan and the Bulls, I asked if he was from Illinois. When he answered "yes", I said "Obama country."
He answered, "Obama is my man."
I laughed.
"I love the way he talks. Have you noticed that all the other politicians say "I" and "me"? Obama says "we" and "us". I'm going to get an address this summer so I can vote for him. He makes me proud. He makes me proud of all of us."
We talked about ways to get that address so he could vote, then he said, "But the man's got to be smart about his running mate. It needs to be someone from the old school, but not like Hillary -- she'll try to outshine him."
I said, "Like Bill Richardson?"
He pointed at me and smiled, "That's who I'm talking about." He then went into an informed analysis of several other candidates he felt would do the job.
Izzy had never voted before in his life, but he's going to get an address so he can vote this time. Best of all, he's not a low information voter.
And he can make bank shots from behind the 3-point line.
I smell a landslide