Illinois Expects Obama to Make a Big Impact

Little Doubt Over Who Will Win Illinois, But Can Obama Meet Expectations?



Posted by JUDY KEEN, USA TODAY on Wednesday, September 24, 2008 at 7:38:36 AM EDT
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Illinois hopeful about Sen. Barack Obama's impact but some wonder if state residents expect more than he can deliver from the Oval Office.
(Win McNamee/Getty Images)Catherine Haskins is 36 and has never bothered to vote in a presidential election. She says that will change Nov. 4 when she votes for Barack Obama.

Until now, Haskins, a single mom and small business owner in Washington Park, one of this city's poorest neighborhoods, never believed that any presidential candidate could make a difference in her life or the lives of her three sons.

In Obama, she says, she sees a politician who was raised by his own single mom and by his grandparents, a former community organizer who worked in Chicago neighborhoods much like her own. "He gets it. He's lived it," she says.

Illinois, which sent Obama to the U.S. Senate in 2004 with 70% of the vote, could help elect the USA's first African-American president. That prospect has prompted some people here to set aside cynical attitudes about politicians, says Haskins, owner of a car wash and detailing business. "I just know that he's going to make things better for people like me," she says.

Paul Green, a political science professor at Chicago's Roosevelt University, worries that people in Washington Park expect more from Obama than he can deliver — even from the Oval Office.

The community's problems are "the same old story: jobs, education, drugs," he says. "Change is not going to be done by a president. It's not going to be done by waving a wand."

People invested the same expectations in Harold Washington, a Democrat, when he became Chicago's first black mayor in 1983, Green says, and "nothing changed."

Retiree Marilyn Nash, 61, says she understands why people think Obama can improve lives here, but she isn't sure he can fulfill those hopes. "Our problems are deep and old," she says. "We need better-paying jobs, better housing, real stuff. Politicians, even Barack, mostly give us words. That's not enough."

Obama lives in a big brick home a few dozen blocks away — across the park for which the neighborhood is named — from Washington Park. His Hyde Park neighborhood is integrated and solidly middle class, home to the University of Chicago.

Hope for a community

In Washington Park, where median income in the 2000 Census was $15,160 and more than 97% of residents are black, there are scores of vacant lots where homes and businesses once stood. There are some renovated homes and new condos, but just as many boarded-up buildings.

It's not unlike the Roseland and Riverdale neighborhoods south of here, where Obama worked as an organizer in the 1980s. In Dreams from My Father, his 1995 memoir, he described "boarded-up homes, the decaying storefronts, the aging church rolls."

Some people in Washington Park say Obama represents hope for a community that has long felt alienated from politicians. Before Obama, "politicians were somebody to be tolerated, not inspired by," says Richard Tolliver, rector at St. Edmund's Episcopal Church. "That's changing."

There's little doubt about which candidate will win Illinois' 21 Electoral College votes. Obama leads John McCain in Illinois, 53%-37%, a Big Ten Battleground Poll conducted last week found.. Democrats Al Gore and John Kerry carried the state by more than 10 percentage points over George Bush in 2000 and 2004.

Finding McCain supporters in Washington Park isn't easy, but Walter Henry, 56, a mechanic, thinks the Arizona Republican might be a better choice. "He was a prisoner of war and he's been shaking things up in Washington for a long time," Henry says. "These are tough times, and Obama might not be quite ready."

April Stogner, 35, who grew up in public housing projects and works for a tax-preparation company, says she feels a connection to Obama despite his Ivy League education and political success.

"We have pretty much similar backgrounds," she says, and he understands what life is like here. "We're barely surviving," she says. If he's elected, "a lot of things are going to change."

Counting on more jobs

People in Washington Park say they are counting on an Obama administration to help bring jobs back to an area that was once filled with commerce and industry and now has little of either. They want homes and apartment buildings fixed up, but they don't want high prices and rent to force them out of the neighborhood.

"We've been neglected for so long, we need Obama in there," says FedEx employee Andre Bishop, 45. "He touches all of us — not because he's black, but because he represents change."

If Chicago's bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics succeeds, Washington Park would be home to a 90,000-seat stadium that residents hope would attract new businesses and new customers. A redevelopment corporation formed by St. Edmunds has invested $50 million in housing. Gentrification is edging south into the area.

Bishop says those signs of a better future have renewed interest in politics, thanks mostly to Obama. He sees volunteers going door to door every Saturday registering people to vote. Tolliver says his parishioners include men in their 20s who have never been involved in politics before but are taking their sons to hear Obama.

Haskins sees in Obama "the beginning of something new" here and across the country. "He's not disconnected from poor and struggling people."

Contribuindo para Democracia Mocambicana

Caros Leitores,
Mocambicanos e Mocambicanos:

A democracia Mocambicana merece uma atencao e e' muito preciso dizer qye ela ainda esta' em decadencia mesmo depois de 16 anos de paz.Os canditados Presidenciais e das eleicoes autarquicas continuam a ser selecionados ou indicados pelos seus conselhos partidarios e presidentes deixando e excluindo desta maneira a expressao legitima do povo Mocambicano. Nao quer dizer que este processo nao e' legitimo mas doutro lado falta a intervencao directa do eleitorado(povo) no processo democratico eleitoral. A dias atraz ouviu-se em todo pais e no mundo inteiro que o Presidente Guebuza foi eleito com a mais de 166 votos. O senhor Guebuza concorreu unicamente como o invencivel. Porque? Sera' que dentro do partido Frelimo nao existem mais outras pessoas que reunem condicoes academicas, liderenca e visao comunicavel com o povo Mocambicano para concorrerem contra o Sr. Guebuza? Isso tudo porque a democracia em Mocambiaque e' manipulada por um punhado de pessoas em nome do povo.

Quando a questao das eleicoes autarquicas tanto mais falando sobre o Deviz, o Edil da Beira, a situacao a mesma. O canditado para um cargo publico tais como Presidente do Municipio nao poderia ser selecionado pelo um individuo ou conselho do partido mas sim pelo povo.

Eu gostaria de sugerir que da proxima vez todos aqueles com o desejo de se canditar para e representar o seu partido durante as eleicoes Nacionais( Presidenciais) ou local(municipais) podessem concorrerem contra um aao outro no seio dos seus partidos politicos no local onde eles desejam de governar e dessa maneira o povo pertencente ao determinado partido e independentes deviam votar no canditado que gostassem para os representar (canditar) contra o adversario doutro partido. So assim a confusao devia soar democratica.

Nao deve ser o Macuacua nem o Mazanga que pode escolher um canditado para as eleicoes presidenciais e nao pode ser O guebuza e nem o Dhlakama nem os seus conselhos que pode escolher o canditado para os municipios mas sim devia ser o povo local. Deixem eles O Pereira concorrer com O Diaz e o povo escolhera' a quem eles querem. Deixem O Guebuza concorrer com o Nihia, Chipande, Luiza Diogo e o povo pertencente a Frelimo escolheria quem eles quereem que os governa.

Deixem, eu digo deixem o Dhlakama concorrer com Diaz Simango, Mazanga, Mulembue e outros e o povo pertencente a Renamo podera' ter a oportinidade de escolher a quem merece de lhes representar nas eleicoes Presidenciais. So assim a confusao acabara!

Obrigado

Daviz Simango pode ser expulso da Renamo

A decisão tomada pelo engº. Daviz Simango de concorrer como independente à sua própria sucessão no cargo de presidente do município da cidade da Beira, pode vir a valer-lhe o afastamento da Renamo, partido de que o edil de Chiveve é membro sénior.
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Segundo o `Canal de Moçambique´, está em preparação uma reunião do Conselho Nacional da Renamo para a próxima sexta-feira em Quelimane e que nesse encontro se possa vir a concretizar a decisão de expulsar o eng.º Daviz Simango do partido, à semelhança do que aconteceu com Raul Domingos, um histórico que foi expulso depois das eleições gerais de 1999 e que viria a constituir o PDD a que presentemente preside.

O mesmo membro do Conselho Nacional que nos disse que Daviz Simango poderá ser expulso do partido ainda esta semana, adiantou que ao apresentar a sua candidatura como independente, `Daviz Simango mostra que está no partido somente para assumir posições de liderança, o que contraria os princípios do Partido´.

O membro do Conselho Nacional da Renamo que prestou estas declarações, afirma que o Edil da Beira, engenheiro Daviz Simango, virou um adversário da Renamo, na medida em que este concorre à ocupação do mesmo cargo com o candidato indicado oficialmente pelo partido da Perdiz, e neste contexto, não podia continuar no seio do partido.

Convidado a pronunciar-se sobre a informação segundo a qual Daviz Simango podia ser expulso da Renamo por ter decidido apresentar a sua candidatura como independente para o cargo de edil da Beira, Fernando Mazanga, porta-voz da Renamo não confirmou nem refutou a informação, tendo apenas pedido para se aguardar até que os órgãos competentes tomem posição oficial acerca deste caso.

`Aguardem pelas decisões da Comissão Política e/ou do Conselho Nacional, que irão se reunir brevemente exactamente para discutirem este assunto´- afirmou Mazanga, porta-voz da Renamo.

Questionado se há a possibilidade de a Renamo abdicar de ter como seu membro David Simango, na sequência dos acontecimentos recentes da Beira, Mazanga não respondeu directamente à nossa pergunta mas disse: `Ao se candidatar como independente ele (Daviz) mostrou falta de respeito, daí que o partido deve tomar alguma medida´, afirmou a terminar Mazanga, deixando em aberto a possibilidade de o edil vir a ser expulso do Partido.

Entretanto, no último sábado na Beira, o engenheiro Daviz Simango promoveu um comício de apresentação da sua candidatura independente no campo municipal no populoso Bairro da Munhava.

Estiveram presentes milhares de munícipes que se acotovelavam numa manifestação há muito não vista naquele local, mesmo em ocasiões dirigidas por Afonso Dhlakama, presidente da Renamo.

No referido comício, Daviz Simango exortou os presentes a votarem na Renamo nas próximas eleições autárquicas continuando a dar vivas efusivos ao presidente Afonso Dhlakama.

A ameaça de expulsão da Renamo que começa a pairar sobre a figura do engenheiro Daviz Simango é vista já por alguns observadores como algo que poderá vir a afectar `mais do que já está´ o prestígio de Afonso Dhlakama que admitem poderá terminar esta sua odisseia como a figura mais prejudicada no contexto que ele próprio criou ao candidatar Manuel Pereira a Edil da Beira em vez de promover a candidatura de Daviz Simango à sua própria sucessão.

São crescentes as vozes de militantes da Renamo em apoio a Daviz Simango em todo o país e, em privado, vários membros do partido próximos de Afonso Dhlakama estão a revelar-se preocupados com o processo suscitado pelo líder histórico com a decisão de excluir o actual edil da Beira como candidato do partido.

Figuras próximas de Daviz Simango admitem que o Edil da Beira e candidato independente à sua própria sucessão mesmo que venha a ser expulso do partido pelo Conselho Nacional da Renamo continuará a apelar para que o eleitorado dê o seu voto à Renamo para que o partido que continua a afirmar ser o seu `com quotas pagas e em dia´, possa constituir-se como bancada maioritária na Assembleia Municipal.

Da Beira também nos chegam informações segundo as quais o candidato oficial da Renamo a Edil da capital de Sofala, Manuel Pereira, já se encontra na cidade, de regresso de Maputo, não tendo ainda empreendido qualquer iniciativa que permita aferir as simpatias do eleitorado local pela sua candidatura.

Dessa forma estão sujeitas a melhor avaliação as reais hipóteses que Manuel Pereira possa reunir para superar o candidato independente Daviz Simango, sabido desde já que ambos poderão fazer campanha a favor da Renamo para a assembleia municipal.

Fontes da Beira admitem que só depois do candidato oficial da Renamo à presidência do Município da Beira se expor ao eleitorado será possível avaliar quais as reais possibilidades de cada um para vencerem o pleito a que também concorrem Lourenço Bulha, actual secretário provincial do Partido Frelimo em Sofala e presentemente oposição naquele município, o Chico Romão, pelo PDD.

fonte: Canal de Moçambique

Barack Obama: A meteoric rise

CNN) -- When Sen. Barack Obama accepts his party's presidential nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado, he will have experienced one of the most rapid -- and unexpected -- ascents in American political history.


Barack Obama entered politics in 1996, when he was elected unopposed to the Illinois state Senate.

more photos » Obama, an Illinois Democrat, burst onto the national stage in 2004, when he electrified the convention with a keynote address that called for the end of the divisive politics that have pitted Americans against each other.

"There's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there is the United States of America. There's not a black America and a white America and Latino America and Asian America; there is the United States of America," Obama told the delegates.

It was a message Obama may have been uniquely able to deliver, because he has straddled divisions his entire life. Born in Hawaii in 1961, Obama is the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. When Obama was 2, his father left Hawaii to pursue a degree at Harvard University and later returned to Kenya; Obama saw him only once when he was growing up. See Obama timeline »


Candidates ‘Revealed’
See for yourself who the presidential candidates really are… in two special, back-to-back documentaries.
Wednesday, beginning 8 p.m. ET

see full schedule »
"All my life, I had carried a single image of my father, one that I had sometimes rebelled against but had never questioned, one that I had later tried to take as my own. The brilliant scholar, the generous friend, the upstanding leader -- my father had been all those things," Obama said in his 1995 autobiography, "Dreams from My Father." Test your knowledge of Obama »

"All those things and more, because except for that one brief visit in Hawaii, he had never been present to foil the image, because I hadn't seen what perhaps most men see at some point in their lives: their father's body shrinking, their father's best hopes dashed, their father's face lined with grief and regret."

Obama later lived with his mother and stepfather in Indonesia until age 10, when he moved back to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents. In his autobiography, Obama describes a troubled adolescence in which he struggled with his biracial identity. He acknowledges that he used marijuana and cocaine.

Don't Miss
In Depth: Revealed
CNN Election Center 2008
Young Obama frustrated by slow change
After high school, Obama attended college in Los Angeles, California, and New York before working as a community organizer on the south side of Chicago, Illinois, from 1985 to 1988.

He attended Harvard Law School, where he became the first black president of the prestigious Harvard Law Review, and returned to Chicago after graduating in 1991 to work as a civil rights lawyer and teach constitutional law. There he met his future wife, Michelle Robinson, a Chicago native. Watch Michelle Obama talk about her husband's style »

Obama's career as a politician began in 1996, when he was elected unopposed to the Illinois state Senate. While in office, he helped pass welfare reform legislation, a state earned-income tax credit, ethics reform and a bill requiring the videotaping of police interrogations and confessions in murder cases.

Obama first took a stab at national politics when he challenged Rep. Bobby Rush, a Chicago Democrat and a former Black Panther, in 2000. Obama lost badly to Rush in the Democratic primary, but, four years later, he made a second attempt to be elected to Congress, running as the Democratic candidate from Illinois for the U.S. Senate. See Obama on the campaign trail »

After his speech at the national convention and scandals involving his Republican challenger, Obama won by a wide margin and arrived in Washington with national prominence, a rarity for a freshman senator. He was often mentioned as a future presidential nominee.

That White House bid came much sooner than many had expected. After just three years in the Senate, Obama formed a presidential exploratory committee in January 2007 and one month later launched his presidential campaign on the steps of the old Statehouse in Springfield, Illinois.

At the time, Obama's chances of winning the Democratic presidential nomination appeared to be a long shot. Hillary Clinton, the senator from New York and former first lady, was viewed as the candidate to beat, and many more experienced contenders -- including fellow senators Joe Biden of Delaware and Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, former Sen. John Edwards and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson -- were running to be the "un-Hillary" candidate.

Although Clinton continued to enjoy a large lead throughout 2007, Obama emerged as her main challenger and slowly began to erode her lead in the polls.

Clinton's "inevitable" status cracked when Obama won the Iowa caucuses in January. She came in a surprising third, with 29 percent, just behind Edwards, who had 30 percent.

The New York senator was able to become the latest "comeback kid" in the Clinton family when she won the New Hampshire primary three days later, and the race essentially turned into a two-person contest that latest throughout the spring.

After Obama won the South Carolina primary and the two candidates split the Super Tuesday contests -- Clinton won large states like California and New York, but Obama won more states -- Obama won 13 straight contests in February and built a sizeable lead in pledged delegates.

After Obama's winning streak, some within the party began calling for Clinton to drop out of the race, but she kept her campaign alive by winning in Pennsylvania, Texas and Ohio.

Throughout the primary season, Obama fought constant rumors that were circulated via anonymous e-mail messages and Web sites, including rumors that he was a Muslim (he is a Christian) and that he was educated at a madrassa when he lived in Indonesia.

CNN and other media organizations debunked the madrassa rumor by traveling to Indonesia and finding that the school Obama attended was a secular institution that taught the Koran as part of a basic religious class.

As the protracted primary fight headed into March, Obama's relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, his onetime pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, came under scrutiny after video of Wright's sermon's circulated on the Internet. In one of the most controversial clips, Wright says blacks should sing "God damn America" rather than "God Bless America" after the attacks of September 11.

Although many viewed the media scrutiny of Wright's sermons as an attack on the black church, Obama repudiated Wright's comments and made a major speech on race. He eventually left Trinity, the church where he was married and where his two daughters were baptized.

In April, before the Pennsylvania primary, comments Obama made at a private fundraiser in San Francisco, California, drew further criticism. He said that many Americans in small towns in Pennsylvania and across the Midwest were "bitter" because of their declining economic situation, which, he suggested, caused them to "cling to guns or religion."

The comments, posted on the Huffington Post Web site, drew charges that Obama was an "elitist" from Clinton and his conservative critics. The criticisms echoed those made when Michelle Obama said during an appearance in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in February, that "for the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country."


Despite Obama's stumbles, Clinton was not able to overcome his lead in the pledged delegate count, although the Democratic contest continued until the final contests in Montana and South Dakota on June 3. That night, Obama, before a raucous crowd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, declared that he would be the Democratic nominee, and in an emotional speech, Clinton conceded the race and threw her support to Obama four days later.

It was an outcome that few would have predicted when the voting began in January, and, as the Democrats gather in Denver, they will be making history by naming Obama the first African-American nominee of a major party.
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Editorial: African neighbors key to saving Zimbabwe

Defiant Mugabe must go to end nation's suffering.

Last update: June 25, 2008 - 7:00 PM


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"Regional [African] bodies have tremendous influence. There are so many things that could be brought to bear, that could have a tremendous, immediate impact on Zimbabwe.''

JAMES MCGEE,

U.S. ambassador to Zimbabwe


It sounds like an epic tragedy. A man of the people helps free his own from oppression, then rises to become king. But later he slides from hero to dictator. Once a respected leader/liberator, he descends into murderous, power-crazed madness -- and takes his country with him.

On stage, it would be compelling drama. But it's today's reality for the poor people of Zimbabwe, the central African nation that is suffering under the brutal tyranny of President Robert Mugabe. Now the country's desperate plight demands that the international community isolate the 84-year-old leader and refuse to recognize his administration. More importantly, African nations should do all they can to force the strongman out the door -- up to and including military intervention.

Government policies have turned the once agriculturally self-sufficient nation into an economic disaster. Unemployment is about 80 percent, and the currency is practically worthless. An estimated quarter of the 12 million citizens have fled to other countries.

His nation in shambles, Mugabe rejected election results that voted him out and called for a runoff presidential election on Friday. He defiantly declared that "only God'' can remove him from office and that he'll wage war to stay put.

His security forces have murdered nearly 100 political opponents, and thousands have been beaten, tortured and intimidated. The brutality is so widespread that opposition leader and presidential opponent Morgan Tsvangirai pulled out of the race this week to help stop the killing. Fearing for his own life, he sought refuge in a foreign embassy and has asked the United Nations and African leaders to help restore conditions for free and fair elections.

That is key to saving the nation -- neighboring nations must keep the economic, trade and travel pressure on for change as only they can do. Refugees are pouring across their borders, giving them a vested interest in resolving the crisis. South Africa can be particularly influential because it supplies electricity to Zimbabwe and provides vital port access.

In addition, organizations of African nations have developed a record of cooperating to solve serious problems in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and most recently, Kenya.

Sadly, like despots before him in Africa and other parts of the world, Mugabe's egomaniacal hunger for power has nearly ruined his country. Zimbabweans have tried using the ballot to make change, but it's clear that they cannot end their national tragedy alone. Other African neighbors, with support from the international community, must help.