Just a Mama for Barack Obama

Unlike my son Aleks, I'm not particularly astute or attune to national daily political goings-on, except on a visceral level. I can't tell you much about a particular candidate's policies, philosophies voting history, but I can tell you how a particular candidate makes me feel.

Barack Obama makes me feel HOPEFUL. That, in itself, is a huge difference from what any candidate has made me feel in years. Obama feels real in ways that I don't think I've ever felt from a candidate. I have a feeling my parents' generation might have felt this way about Kennedy, who had the same "looking to the future and we have work to do" approach to the action and the mood he'd bring to the White House -- and to a struggling nation.

I never really liked Hilary, and I can't even tell you why. (I told you, this is all very visceral and not at all logical or educated!) She seems too harsh and too... well, too 90's. And her husband's involvement in her campaign doesn't help her on that front, much as I admire him. Bill Clinton, after all, pretty much defines the 90's. And a step backwards, even to the decade of his (mostly) positive presidency, is not what we need right now.

The next president needs to be soooooo NOT the 90's. Or the millenium decade, which will, so unfortunately, be defined by the buffoon who's currently bringing down the presidency and the nation and my mood and my hope and my belief in anything even remotely political or anyone in politics.

And then along comes Obama. OK granted -- right from the beginning I have to admit that he's just damn sexy -- and I am well aware of the danger of that kind of thinking! It is, after all, likely a good part of what got Mr. Buffoon elected, since many middle aged, middle American women probably said exactly the same thing about him that I'm now saying about Obama. (But Bush is sooo NOT sexy, and in my opinion never has been! How could those women not see the sneakiness in his eyes? He looks like a serpent!) Obama's sexy in the same way that my college professor was sexy: I can't separate his raw sex appeal from his very appealing, very high intelligence.

But let's leave sex appeal alone for now (if we must).

I simply believe Barack Obama when he speaks. I don't get the feeling that he's bowing to handlers, or to the media, or even to his constituents. I get the feeling that he's just so incredibly secure in his opinions and ideas (but not closed-minded) that he's decided just to always speak his mind and be honest and if it rings true for people, great. If not, then I have a feeling he'd rather bow out than change his in-the-trenches, I'm-one-of-you approach.

Now, I could be wrong on that because I also know that he's had presidential ambitions for a very long time -- like since kindergarten! -- so I don't think he'd let go of that very easily. But fortunately he doesn't have to, because he does ring true for a helluva lot of Americans right now. Thank goodness. And I think largely thanks to Obama, young people are beginning to take notice and get involved.

It's about time. But really, who can blame them for feeling removed for the past decade? It's been a catch-22 for so long: young people feel removed from politics, so the politicians ignore them. Finally now, a politician is embracing them, while also managing to embrace their parents. Hell, that's no easy feat! When in the past three generations could parents and their young adult children sit around the dinner table and completely agree on a political candidate? Maybe that happened with John Kennedy; I know my parents loved him. But then, they were already young parents themselves and, being German immigrants who had lost their parents in the war, there wasn't the opportunity in our family to test that theory.

So without telling you specifically WHY I feel as I do about Barack Obama, and without bringing it down to his policies and promises, I'll just say that he gives me hope. He gives me hope that he can bring together our divided and divisive country and, just as importantly in my opinion, he gives me hope that he can begin to repair severely broken relationships with countries around the world which Mr. Buffoon single-handedly destroyed to the point that they're in ashes right now. (I heard it constantly when I was in Germany: we don't blame you for your president... but how could your country have voted him into office? TWICE?)

Can one man do all this? Nope. But one man backed by a hopeful, trusting and determined nation CAN. It's about time, and I am so excited to watch and to be involved in the process of bringing Obama into the White House later this year!