Don't be mistaken, there are many reasons why I support Barack Obama, for instance his positions on health care, education, energy and foreign policy have a lot more to do with my decision to vote for him than his ethnicity. I admire his stance on lobbyist money and PAC's and the actions he took to eliminate that segment of fundraising from the DNC. I believe that, unlike his opponent, he has the interests of the people he would lead and represent at heart and is not in the business of saying anything to win. He is committed, again unlike his opponent, to winning the war on terror and defeating the causes of terrorism; that among them are generational poverty, hunger, lack of education and repressive authoritarian government in the Middle East.
Barack Obama is an intelligent, empathetic, pragmatic realist who understands not only the problems facing the United States and the world at large but the causes of those problems. He has a universal world view and understands the deep, unspoken and almost unidentifiable connection between all people. He sees problems from an objective point of view and considers possible outcomes of multiple courses of action before deciding on a particular solution; a characteristic that should be of the utmost import to voters considering the past seven-and-a-half years of gut-instinct, knee-jerk reactionary foreign policy that has mired our great nation in two wars in a region we, regrettably, knew very little about.
Barack Obama recognizes the inappropriate levels of influence of the monied interests in the corridors of national power and that something must be done to stop it. He realizes that something must be done to curb, if not eliminate, this influence if the voices of the American people are to heard and our elected officials are to be able to act on that which they hear. Barack Obama feels our pain (for lack of a better term) because until he and his wife made millions on their highly popular memoirs they were faced with a mountain of college debt while trying to raise two daughters. He is a family man who cares deeply for the health and welfare of his wife and children and wishes, above all, to be a loving and respectful husband and father.
Barack Obama is a deeply spiritual man who spent years of self discovery attempting to define his beliefs. He is sure in those beliefs and acts upon them. He believes in the common decency and humanity of all people. He believes that the answer to hate is not more hate, but compassion. He believes that the forces of moderation and reason, by virtue of their arguments, are destined to ultimately prevail. He believes that people and nations ought to act towards others as they would be acted upon. In other words, Barack Obama is a true Christian.
Barack Obama is a patriot. He love America and has a deep and abiding respect for the institutions of her government. He knows and respects the Constitution, indeed he taught the Constitution to graduate students. He respects the offices within our government and those that hold said offices. He believes in the basic goodness and compassion of the American people and respects and honors, indeed he shares, their core values and traditions. In what can only be described as a serendipitous coincidence, his oldest daughter Malia was born on the Fourth of July. He honors and respects those that have the courage and fortitude to serve our great nation in military uniform and believes deeply that they ought not be sent to war on false pretenses or have their benefits cut or denied upon their return home.
Barack Obama realizes that the President of the United States is not the King of Earth. He understands not just how to say "sovereignty" but what it means. He knows that all nations demand and command a certain level of respect and that governments are formed by people, and as such ought to be engaged that way. He sees the role of the United States as that of a leader to be respected, not a ruler to be obeyed. He knows that when the world speaks, we ought to listen.
Barack Obama cares about the environment. He knows that that environment is a delicate balance that is at risk of being thrown out of balance by our actions. He believes that it is our obligation to protect our environment that we may continue even to exist. And he knows that to do so we must drastically reduce our use of fossil fuels and will make the necessary investments and sacrifices to do just that.
Barack Obama knows what challenges face our world and how to solve them. His life story is a compelling testament to the American dream and his faith is guide which informs his worldview and decisions. He is incredibly intelligent and capable of arousing the best of all of us with his soaring rhetoric and brilliant articulation of his positions. He contains within himself the last best hope for the world and the burden is upon us to ensure his inauguration as the next President of the United States.