The man with the funny name

According to Obama, in America the biggest deliberative democracy in the world, "nobody is listening". For him politics is about having a conversation with the people.

Sense of change

For me, day one of the Convention started with a panel of journalists commenting on what makes the current presidential campaign different? Journalists from a spectrum of leading newspapers agreed that the current presidential race carries a sense of momentous change. It could well end the long era of conservative policies that started with the Reagan presidency.

Eight years ago, at the Democratic Convention in Los Angeles, Barack Obama did not get an entry pass, four years ago he held his maiden speech at the Convention in Boston and this week, in a period of only eight years, the son of a Kenyan father will become the official presidential candidate for the Democratic party.


Connecting people

He succeeded to reach this milestone not by running as an Afro American but by reaching out to a wider political platform raising the big issues within America. He not only introduces new policies but also a new approach to politics. He looks at politics as a conversation with the American people and is applying new communication technologies to its full potential. He has created a movement of 4 million connected people who are being informed about the developments in the campaign and who form the core of his campaign machinery. An impressive total of 2 million have so far contributed an unprecedented $ 400 million to his campaign. This will certainly increase in the weeks following the Convention when the real Presidential campaign will take off. Campaign observers expect that this election will cost over $ 1 billion, a new world record for elections.

In case Obama is elected, it is his intention to keep this movement informed and consulted about his policies. He wants to move away from the specific interest groups and lobbyists in Washington DC and to connect directly with the American people. His effective use of the internet may well create a new dynamic in the policy making between an Obama presidency and the new Congress and Senate. In his well written book The Audacity of Hope, Obama states "that in the biggest deliberative democracy in the world, nobody is listening". That is what he wants to change when he talks about the need for a different approach to politics.


Future First Lady

The star of the night at the Convention was Obama's wife Michelle later joined by her two little daughters. In a perfectly choreographed speech full of reconfirmation of core family and work ethos values, she relived the American dream and her love for "the man with the funny name". Her speech got the Convention on its feet and she introduced herself as a very competent future First lady. In her speech, Michelle did not forget to praise Hillary Clinton, setting the stage for the speech by Hillary at the second day of the Convention. A sizeable part of Hillary's fans (a full 20%) indicated in polls to rather vote for McCain than for Obama. To win the presidential election in November the Democratic Convention will need to succeed in rallying the Hillary followers behind the Obama-Biden ticket. The speech and acknowledgement tonight were the first steps in that direction.