I'm in Illinois, used to live in Hyde Park, have lots of U of Chicago connections, and I'm one of Barack Obama's biggest fans.
But please, enough with the OBAMA IN '08, '12, etc. posts. In '08 he'll have completed four years of the job he was elected to do, which, in case you've forgotten, is representing the state of Illinois. He'll have been the junior senator from Illinois for a total of four years. And first and foremost, he is our senator.
This poor guy has the whole Democratic Party breathing down his neck. Yes, he's an electrifying speaker, but he's still relatively inexperienced with the whole national stage thing. And, with the Democratic Senate minority's pitiful showing, frankly, he's not likely to be real successful getting legislation approved in the near future, no matter how smart and driven and charismatic he is. If you expect him to singlehandedly save the Democratic Party, you're just going to set him up for failure. I don't want that to happen to him.
An example of this kind of phenomenon occurred during the Obama/Keyes debates. Keyes is such a narcissistic wingnut that he would plow anyone under with his trademark bullshit, and I think Obama held his own simply by giving straight answers that demonstrated his clear grounding in Illinois state interests and by refusing, for the most part, to engage with Keyes. However, Obama is
not an experienced debater yet--his rhetorical style is still more suited to the classroom. His off-the-cuff style is pretty low-key. Yet because everyone expected him to come roaring out of the gates like Daniel Webster arguing down the devil, he was perceived to have fallen short in that first debate, despite all the nonsense Keyes was spouting. That probably gave Keyes more of a boost than he deserved.
And Obama is a senator. This means that he will probably do a lot of compromising to get legislation through that benefits Illinois and progressive causes, as Kerry certainly did in his long tenure, and he'll vote against bills that the Republicans have stuffed with dirty tricks, which they can then hold up in a presidential campaign and say, "Barack Obama is soft on defense, homeland security, etc!" That's the problem Kerry faced nationally, because the electorate en masse is so easily distracted by shiny things and therefore probably won't take time to understand how complicated legislative work really is.
Obama's not like Blagojevich, who is probably less principled but, as our governor, can easily set himself up as advocate for the little guy in getting cheap drugs from Canada despite threats from the big bad FDA, partly because he's the executive branch, partly because our party controls most of the state currently.
My take on the whole thing: we shouldn't depend on Obama for the whole future of the Democratic Party. We should focus on promoting and electing more Obamas everywhere. He's a shining example of the kind of progressive politician who can unite people without compromising his base or his roots. We need to learn from him, not expect him to carry us. Let him be the junior senator from Illinois for a while. And let him, someday, maybe lead the Democratic majority in the Senate. And in '16, if he's willing, I'll gladly, gladly support him for President.