OBAMA HA LLEGADO

The first step

Jan 17th 2007 NEW YORK From Economist.com
Barack Obama begins his bid to be America's president
Reuters
BARACK OBAMA was classy enough—or canny enough—not to announce that he was running for president during his speech on America’s Martin Luther King holiday. That would have seemed crass. But the next day, Tuesday January 16th, the 45-year-old senator released a video on his website (and on YouTube, a popular video-sharing website) saying that he was forming an “exploratory committee” to look into a presidential run. He will give his decision on February 10th, but it already looks like he is in.
In his famously optimistic 2004 speech to the Democratic National Convention, Mr Obama spoke of a “righteous wind” at the country’s back. Since then a mighty wind of political hype has propelled him to the fore in American politics, a mere two years into his senate career. A compelling personal story—an absent African father; a white American mother; president of the Harvard Law Review—has helped the self-described “skinny kid with a funny name”, as have his gift for oratory and an ability to appeal across traditional political lines.

So far, Mr Obama has done almost no wrong and the Democratic faithful are sure to be ecstatic about his run. Is his relative youth a problem? Mr Obama will no doubt present himself as a fresh face in a country weary of the same-old politics. His relative inexperience? His four years in the Senate (by 2008) will compare not too unfavourably with George Bush’s six as governor of Texas. His service on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee may help in an election that will surely be influenced greatly by Iraq, terrorism, nuclear proliferation and the like.
But now that he has taken a formal step towards the White House his first challenge is seeing off other Democrats hoping for their party’s presidential nomination. The most prominent declared candidate is John Edwards, a populist former senator who has moved to the left since being chosen as John Kerry’s 2004 vice-presidential candidate. More formidable is Hillary Clinton. The former First Lady already has a big stash of money, powerful friends and a husband who is the biggest Democratic rock star of a generation. Perhaps nothing could dismay the Democrats’ fans more than the sight of Mr Obama clashing with Bill Clinton—the man whose warm ties with African-Americans led him to be dubbed America’s first black president.
Iraq may prove to be the first difficult issue. Mr Obama was an early and vocal opponent of the Iraq war, which tickles much of the party’s base. Mrs Clinton voted for the war, and would probably try to run as tougher on national security than Mr Obama. Mrs Clinton will of course also play up her relative experience—eight years (by 2008) in the Senate, and eight in the White House. The job for Mr Edwards is tougher. He renounced his vote for the Iraq war, and in other ways he resembles Mr Obama: young, telegenic, with a hopeful message and a short Senate career.
How the Republicans confront Mr Obama is clearer, because they have already tentatively begun doing so. Mr Obama, it is said, is old wine in new bottles, a traditional left-wing Democrat presented as something new. According to one ranking, by the non-partisan National Journal, he is the 18th-most left-wing of the Senate’s 100 members. But this hardly makes him a fire-breathing socialist. His rhetoric is optimistic and uniting, and for a Democrat he is unusually comfortable quoting the Bible. But on the polarising social issues, like gay marriage and abortion, Mr Obama votes reliably with his party’s left wing.
He has seen one of the biggest collective swoons ever enjoyed by an American politician. Comparisons with John Kennedy—just 43 when he became president—are inescapable. Not to mention that many Americans would love to heal much of their wounded racial past by electing their (real) first black president. But, with two years to go, there is much that can yet go wrong.