Obama Turning Passive Supporters into True Believers

The buzz around the candidacy of Senator Barack Obama for the presidency may not fade away anytime soon, as his passive supporters are now turning into believers. Yesterday, under the steamy heat of San Antonio Texas, a lady named Sally and her husband of 35 years celebrated their wedding anniversary by volunteering for Senator Obama's "San Antonio Kickoff" event.

The event which is estimated to have a whopping audience of over 1,000, dutifully stood under the humid heat just to hear from a presidential candidate that they so believe in.

They were not disappointed as Mr. Obama fired them up with his trademarked message of uniting, turning the page, bringing the government back to the people, ending the war in Iraq and ending the unwarranted divide in the country.

Sally and her husband participated fully in making sure the senator received a warm welcome. They are both members of a group called "Alamobama," a group in South Texas that are not staffed by the Obama campaign, but are coordinating the Obama movement in San Antonio.

Both Sally and her husband stood under the steamy heat directing cars to their respective parking areas. They were both pleased by the messianic message of Senator Obama. In the word of Sally, "We worked as volunteers at the event with AlamObama. It was our 35^th wedding anniversary, but nevertheless, we decided that this event and our participation in it, was more important than a fancy dinner out, or anything else." She continued: "He gave us great hope for the future...we will continue to work for the campaign, hot weather or not. We need a man in office who sees hope."

Many pundits in Washington are saying that the buzz around Obama's candidacy may soon fade away, but throughout the country-from Washington to Texas, the buzz is even turning into multitude of believers, who may no longer be persuaded from supporting the man they see as their savior. It is not easy for a couple of 35 years to forfeit their wedding anniversary and stand under a humid heat for a presidential candidate. But that was the situation in San Antonio yesterday.

During Mr. Obama's speech at the United Church of Christ Synod in Hartford, after his message titled "God is still Speaking," he shows his sense of humanity by first thanking the sign language translator and acknowledges the deaf members in the audience-character that may not be seen by most of the politicians.

At yesterday kickoff event in San Antonio, Mr. Obama humanly congratulates Sally and her husband on their 35^th anniversary. In the word of Sally, "He spent time talking to us and shaking hands. In the process, when I told him that we felt honored to spend our 35^th wedding anniversary with him, he signed my shirt and congratulated us on our 35 years of marriage."

Yes, sometime politicians do whatever it takes to get the attention of voters, but Obama is not one of those mindless and robotic politicians that are familiar to us today. He is such a peculiar and decent politician that may end be the needed hope for America.

Sally and her husband were not alone, there were hundreds of others who attended the event that shares the same hope and comfort in the man they so love. Pollsters and members of the elites media compared his aura at this early stage of the campaign with that of Howard Dean, but they don't know that during the 2004 election, the Republicans were good at using patriotism as a weapon against anyone that question the war in Iraq-the media and the Democrats consciously or unconsciously bought into the plan-a strategy that ended Howard Dean's campaign.

In this year election, many voters are hungering for change. They want to be hopeful and not fearful as it was in 2004. This presidential election is about change-moving past self-complacency to inspired compassion.

Senator Obama in his speech to the hungering crowd, pledged to work side-by-side with the rest of the world on issues like poverty, economic development in Latin America, nuclear proliferation and the genocidal violence in Darfur.

He also spoke about the war in Iraq. Obama said, "There is one thing that we can still get right in the Iraq war-to bring our young brave men and women home. They have done every single thing that we asked of them, with bravery and valor, they should not have to beg when they come home to get the services they need."

The crowd went crazy-encoring their supports-by thunderous applauses.