| 8/5/2008 5:36:19 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
velaine
Valley, NE
age: 41
| Why isn't Barack Obama doing better? Why, after all that has happened, does he have only a 2-3 point lead over John McCain, according to an average of the recent polls? Why is he basically tied with his opponent when his party is so far ahead?
His age probably has something to do with it. So does his race. But the polls and focus groups suggest that people aren't dismissive of Obama or hostile to him. Instead, they're wary and uncertain.
And the root of it is probably this: Obama has been a sojourner. He opened his book ''Dreams From My Father'' with a quotation from Chronicles: ''For we are strangers before thee, and sojourners, as were all our fathers.''
There is a sense that because of his unique background and temperament, Obama lives apart. He put one foot in the institutions he rose through on his journey but never fully engaged. As a result, voters have trouble placing him in his context, understanding the roots and values in which he is ineluctably embedded.
The New York Times described Obama's 12 years at the University of Chicago Law School. ''The young law professor stood apart in too many ways to count." He was a popular and charismatic professor, but he rarely took part in faculty conversations or discussions about the future. He had a supple grasp of legal ideas, but he never committed those ideas to paper by publishing a piece of scholarship.
He was in the law school, but not of it.
This has been a consistent pattern throughout his odyssey. His childhood was a peripatetic journey through Kansas, Indonesia, Hawaii and beyond. He absorbed things from those diverse places but was not fully of them.
His college years were spent on both coasts. He was a community organizer for three years but left before he could be truly effective. He became a state legislator, but he was in the Legislature, not of it. He was famously bored by the institution and used it as a stepping stone to higher things.
He was in Trinity United Church of Christ, but not of it, not sharing the liberation theology that energized Jeremiah Wright Jr. He is in the United States Senate, but not of it. He has not had the time nor the inclination to throw himself into Senate mores, or really get to know more than a handful of his colleagues. His Democratic supporters there speak of him fondly, but vaguely.
And so it goes. He is a liberal, but not fully liberal. He has sometimes opposed the Chicago political establishment, but is also part of it. He spoke at a rally against the Iraq war, while distancing himself from many antiwar activists.
This ability to stand apart accounts for his fantastic powers of observation, and his skills as a writer and thinker. It means that people on almost all sides of any issue can see parts of themselves reflected in Obama's eyes. But it does make him hard to place.
When we're judging candidates (or friends), we don't just judge the individuals but the milieus that produced them. We judge them by the connections that exist beyond choice and the ground where they will go home to be laid to rest. Andrew Jackson was a backwoodsman. John Kennedy had his clan. Ronald Reagan was forever associated with the small-town virtues of Dixon and Jimmy Carter with Plains.
It is hard to plant Obama. Both he and his opponent have written coming-of-age tales about their fathers, but they are different in important ways. McCain's ''Faith of My Fathers'' is a story of a prodigal son. It is about an immature boy who suffers and discovers his place in the long line of warriors that produced him. Obama's ''Dreams From My Father'' is a journey forward, about a man who took the disparate parts of his past and constructed an identity of his own.
If you grew up in the 1950s, you were inclined to regard your identity as something you were born with. If you grew up in the 1970s, you were more likely to regard your identity as something you created.
If Obama is fully a member of any club -- and perhaps he isn't -- it is the club of smart post-boomer meritocrats. We now have a cohort of rising leaders, Obama's age and younger, who climbed quickly through elite schools and now ascend from job to job. They are conscientious and idealistic while also being coldly clever and self-aware. It's not clear what the rest of America makes of them.
So, cautiously, the country watches. This should be a Democratic wipeout. But voters seem to be slow to trust a sojourner they cannot place.
| | 8/5/2008 5:39:06 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | onelife2live
Janesville, WI
age: 44
| I just think if Mitt Romney were the candidate, the numbers would be reversed...jmo
Or Ron Paul for that matter...of all the Republican candidates McBush was not the right choice at this point and time in our lives..jmo
[Edited 8/5/2008 5:40:23 PM]
| | 8/5/2008 5:59:59 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
layla22
Peoria, IL
age: 55
| this OP does a good job of outlining the "barama mystique."
in recognizing this odd detachment he has, i referred to him in a posting recently as "the enigma which is obama."
| | 8/5/2008 7:05:05 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
knightnyte2
Spring, TX
age: 56
| to use a phrase by someone else in this political and current events forum, he is an empty suit. He might be a smart man, I have no doubts about that. But what he stands for, nobody but him knows. We do not need a wait and see person. Vision might be a good idea too. There are so many blind people in America with hands out, what are you going to do for me? Kennedy repeated what I believe Teddy Roosevelt said, Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. We've forgotten what that means. Everybody wants a lil bit from uncle sam.
peace... don't be hatin'
[Edited 8/5/2008 7:05:45 PM]
| | 8/5/2008 7:07:31 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
man4life
Brooklyn, NY
age: 43
|    
 
| | 8/5/2008 8:37:06 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
1pinkstar
Omaha, NE
age: 55
| this OP does a good job of outlining the "barama mystique."
in recognizing this odd detachment he has, i referred to him in a posting recently as "the enigma which is obama."
Do you have anything new to add to this post, Layla, other tham mimicking what was already written?
| | 8/5/2008 8:39:33 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
jmk83
Florissant, MO
age: 25
| this OP does a good job of outlining the "barama mystique."
in recognizing this odd detachment he has, i referred to him in a posting recently as "the enigma which is obama."
Do you have anything new to add to this post, Layla, other tham mimicking what was already written?
Why do you have to pick on layla so much, what did she do to you?
| | 8/5/2008 9:29:30 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
1pinkstar
Omaha, NE
age: 55
| Is she your mom? Unless she has something to add other than being a "yes man," there's no need for her to post here, is there?
| | 8/5/2008 9:31:28 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
layla22
Peoria, IL
age: 55
| true--he seems to soak up new positions and spew them out...as the polls or public opinion seem to dictate.
| | 8/5/2008 9:45:12 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
1pinkstar
Omaha, NE
age: 55
| I'm talking about you, girl.
| | 8/5/2008 9:46:59 PM | Barack the Sojourner | | 
sdcentaur
Sioux Falls, SD
age: 48
| 
| | 8/5/2008 9:49:29 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
jmk83
Florissant, MO
age: 25
| true--he seems to soak up new positions and spew them out...as the polls or public opinion seem to dictate.
Are you talking about me here layla? Cuz if you are than you can go to hell.
| | 8/5/2008 9:51:51 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
1pinkstar
Omaha, NE
age: 55
| Take your battles to some other playground, please. 
[Edited 8/5/2008 9:53:23 PM]
| | 8/5/2008 9:53:19 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
jmk83
Florissant, MO
age: 25
| Not unless you are a girl. Are you even reading these posts or are you aching for an argument?
i was talkin about layla can you read. She mentioned something about a he.
| | 8/5/2008 9:56:51 PM | Barack the Sojourner | |
1pinkstar
Omaha, NE
age: 55
| No, I cannot read.
 Down, boy, Chill, cuz every now and then you do have something interesting to add to the topics. Your opinions can be refreshing. Sometimes.
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