Barack Obama Rocked it!!
Senate seat hopeful gives an impassioned speach
By Lara Karuna

Move over, Eminem, Barack Obama is my new #1 Groupie Butt list candidate (see: Hollywood Swingin’). Obama would get the Democratic/ politician Groupie Butt… I think this involves less Dom and Weed and more books and debates… But, hey I am versatile!

But, seriously, if any of you watched Tuesday night’s Democratic Convention, (I’m sure all of you had it marked on your calendar) then you know what I am talking about. Barack Obama, the keynote speaker and Senate candidate for Illinois, rocked it for real! With passion I haven’t seen from a politician in my lifetime and charisma I haven’t seen since Clinton, Obama could potentially be the leader we’ve been waiting for.

Born the son of a Kenyan father and a white mother from Kansas, Obama is the face of an emerging America that reflects our melting pot population. Obama grew up in Hawaii where he says he was exposed to the multi cultural side of America. In this setting he learned tolerance and acceptance. After his parents divorce, Obama joined his mother in Jakarta, Indonesia where he saw the extreme disparities between the rich and the poor. From there he received a B.A. from Columbia and a law degree from Harvard, becoming the first African American elected president of the Harvard Review.

In his rousing speech, Obama spoke of not a black or a white America but of the United States of America. He spoke of hope, not “blind optimism,” but the kind of hope of “slaves sitting around a fire singing freedom songs… the hope of a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too.” The speech was accompanied by thunderous applause and even I, sitting at home in front of CSPAN, with my non- newspaper-reading sister, clapped with passion as we heard his inspiring words.

Like Lord Acton said, “power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely," and so I hold my breath on Obama, but let’s hope that in the cynical world of money, power and politics he maintains the fresh, idealistic passion that I saw Tuesday on TV. We are due for a great leader and maybe, just maybe it could be Obama… let’s wait and see. Meanwhile, Obama, you are officially on my list.