This is a diary repost: I wrote it earlier but I thought the night-time crew might like to meet Obama's awesome sister.
Barack's sister, Maya, is pretty amazing as a surrogate. She's funny and charming a great speaker and really inspirational (Hmmn...she reminds me of someone....)
I think the campaign is planning on using her more on the campaign trail and she's doing a great job. She was in Florida holding events including a fundraiser and even a meeting with teachers (she has a PhD in Education and is a teacher herself).
Here is her appearance at a Women for Obama yesterday. She had lots of personal stories to share including talking about their mother and grandmother, and how Barack's daughters make him cry. I think she's just as effective as Michelle in terms of reaching out to women, especially Hillary's voters, and showing a different side of Barack.
I basically love her already. (More below the fold.)
In terms of identity politics, Maya is Asian American and can therefore speak to the Asian community and actually went to a couple of Asian-American conferences in California last month. She's a woman and is actively reaching out to Hillary's supporters. And I was reading that along with really LOOKING Latina, she was a teacher in the Bronx for several years and is fluent in Spanish and I think even spent some time in Mexico.
But most importantly she offers an incredible view into who Barack is and how they grew up. And dispels the notion that he "came from nowhere" that some people who haven't read his books seem to have.
Maya's visit garnered some glowing local Florida press. A few excerpts:
From The Herald Tribune.
Maya Soetoro-Ng walked into a cafe in Ybor City on Thursday afternoon and hugged each reporter and photographer waiting for her. They were strangers, but no matter.
She gets the hugging thing from her mother Ann, she explained. Her big brother Barack Obama acquired other traits -- like their mother's sense of calm.
Soetoro-Ng, the Hawaiian half sister of the Democratic presidential nominee, is embarking on a mission few besides Obama himself could pull off.
She wants people to know how Obama grew up, hoping that will help voters understand the person he is today.
From The Tampa Tribune:
Barack Obama is a dedicated feminist who "lives surrounded by women," his half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, told a mostly female crowd at a Women For Obama event in downtown Tampa on Thursday.
Soetoro-Ng told the crowd that Obama helped rear her and now is rearing two daughters. "Those girls are what make him a feminist," she said.
She's campaigning for him during her summer break from her job as a high school teacher and university lecturer in Hawaii, and made her first visit to Florida for stops in Tampa's Mise en Place restaurant Thursday and today in Largo, where she will meet with a group of educators.
Her mission with the campaign clearly is to help reconcile Obama with women who supported Hillary Rodham Clinton in the primary race, and may be reluctant to transfer their loyalty, or at least their enthusiasm, to him.
"I want to focus a little bit on women because that's one of the reasons I'm here is to remind women that he is their advocate," she told the crowd. "I want to tell you about some of the strong women in our lives.
"I really want you to be able to get to know the man."
She did that largely by telling family stories.
From TampaBay.com
Maya Soetoro-Ng leaves no doubt she's a proud kid sister.
But hers isn't just any brother.
Thursday evening at Mise En Place restaurant, she was on a mission to reveal the softer side of Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, to help him woo women voters, especially those who have expressed bitter resentment over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's defeat in the long primary fight.
She says he's a feminist, who bought her the first women's health/sex ed book she ever read, Our Bodies, Ourselves. And he helped her "figure out which boys to discard."
Joined by state Sen. Arthenia Joyner and former state Democratic Party executive director Ana Cruz, both Clinton-turned-Obama supporters, Soetoro-Ng talked to the crowd as if it were composed of her closest girlfriends.
I really look forward to seeing more of Maya in the weeks to come. Yet another strong woman in Barack's life to show how deeply insane it would be for ANY woman to support Mr. "I love rape jokes, you Trollop, and yes Roe v. Wade should be repealed".
PS. Here is a vintage Maya video for anyone who hasn't seen it yet.
Update:
I'm on the Rec List! Thanks very much!!