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I have had this book for a couple of years, having received it for Christmas from my husband's grandmother who, like me, was an Obama champion after his rousing 2004 speech at the DNC convention got our undivided attention. After receiving the book, I put it on the growing stack of "To-Reads" that eventually had a dozen other books stacked on it as the months went by. It was only when the Primary season heated up that I unburied the book and placed it on my nightstand, determined to start pouring over it... five months ago. Then I moved. Then Friday, as I was unpacking in my new place, I uncovered Obama's face yet again and said to myself "I WILL READ YOU!!" So that's what I started doing. Sitting on the floor, surrounded by scores of books and unpacked boxes, I started reading the prologue. By the time I realized my feet were numb from sitting cross-legged for too long, and my daughter came strolling in from school in the late afternoon, I had made it about halfway through Obama's book and I found myself wondering one thing:
WHY did I wait so long??
The thing is, I didn't need this book to know Obama was the real deal. I've seen enough of him throughout his campaign, have gotten more than enough of a sense of his beliefs, his class, his politics and how they starkly contrast with his competition. But this book... wow. If ever I needed something to galvanize my conviction that this is the man who should be leading this country, I need look no further. Here is a man who is not only prodigiously intelligent, but is so damned elegant, wise, and articulate in his explanations of what is right with America and what has divided it. And he has carried every ounce of that intellectual integrity throughout his campaign, proving to me that the Barack on the campaign trail is not putting on an act. This is a man who has his values intact, and who has managed to translate them into a political philosophy that hearkens to America's glory days while having a perspective contemporary enough to move this country forward.
In this book is the reason why this man can draw crowds of thousands, why he has prevailed in spite of the odds, and why this man is going to be our next President.
I loved Barack Obama before I read his book, but I am now officially an Obamabot and proud.
In case you couldn't tell, I am HIGHLY recommending this book. That is if I'm not the only person on this board who hasn't read it. lol
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