Obama - Too Good To Be True? I Think Not

Last night, I read an article in The New Yorker by Nicholas Lemann, titled "Worlds Apart, Obama, McCain, and the future of foreign policy". I won't take you through the whole piece ( and aren't you glad?); it's long, and it's there at the link if you'd like to read it. What struck me in the article is the description of Obama offered by Robert Danzig, a Secretary of the Navy in the Clinton administration, who is now among Obama's foreign policy advisers. He said this about Obama:

“There is a degree of self-reflection, self-awareness, and psychological wholeness he arrived at after going through a period of working through his identity as the son of a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas”.... “Having worked for two Presidents and with many Presidential candidates during the last thirty years, I have not seen one as psychologically well balanced, and as good about not injecting his ego into a problem.”

That's how I now see Obama. He was not my first choice as the Democratic candidate, because I agreed nearly 100% with Dennis Kucinich's policies. Dennis was my first love, and he will always be my love, but he didn't make the cut. Then, I moved on from Dennis to next best, and I was not completely happy with any of the others. I'd go back and forth, but in my heart, I never really settled upon any of the others, while, at the same time, believing that any of them would be better than a Republican. For heaven's sake, we've had enough of them! Begone!!!

I don't embrace all of Obama's policies: for instance, I'd much prefer a single-payer health care system run by the federal government than Obama's plan. I differ with him on other policies, but laying aside our differences, as I tried to settle on a candidate, Obama seemed a little too good to be true. But as I have observed him over the months since he has been the candidate of choice, I've come to admire him more and more, and I believe him to be the man that he appears to be. He possesses a coolness, a command of himself, and a dignity that I believe is real. And black men growing up in the US, certainly get enough training in staying cool, don't they? If an African-American man wants to succeed, he must never be seen as "the angry black man". That is so absolutely scary to many in the US. Of course, angry white men, which McCain certainly seemed to be last night, put themselves at less at risk when they show anger.

Probably not too many folks changed their minds about whom they will vote for as they watched the debate last night, but, to me, the contrast is stark, and the choice is easy. What puzzles me is the number of undecided voters at this stage of the game.