I remember reading about his 2004 speech and then watching a tape of it, and thinking to myself “Man, this guy would make a great candidate for President. Shame about his name, though, people will never vote for someone with that name.” I was happy to be wrong.
The first time I ever heard of Obama was his 2004 keynote speech. I have a friend who was working as a political reporter in downstate Illinois and asked him about Obama. He replied that as he drove through the small towns and farm country in central and southern Illinois, he saw house after house with Obama signs in the front yards. These people, he said, weren’t just going to vote for a Black Democrat from Chicago, they were telling their friends and neighbors they were going to vote for a Black Democrat from Chicago.
In the end, it was a landslide for Obama. Compare the maps of the vote for Kerry vs. Bush and the votes for Obama vs. Keyes.
It wasn’t just the speechifying Democratic leaders noticed, it was how Obama dug into the solid Republican vote in downstate Illinois.
I first became aware of Obama in the fall of 2003. I was a union organizer at the time, and was sent to work on a hospital campaign in Chicago. At a team meeting in November '03, people kept talking about this hot state senator named, what i thought was, Brock O’Bama. The union was going to be working on his U.S. Senate run which meant i was going to be knocking on doors for him on weekends though the winter.
I finally saw a photo of him and saw his name written out and realized he wasn’t an Irishman.
We had an organizing campaign event in May '04 for the hospital workers at a local church and Obama was the keynote speaker. That was the first time i met him. His name on the event flyers packed the church with workers and their families. He was already a rockstar in Chicago by this time. And showing up for a union event in the west side of Chicago only made him sexier (politically speaking).
Then the country got to know him at the convention in the summer. Then he won his senate race (which was a truly bizarre one involving a Star Trek actress, sex clubs, and Maryland resident and professional nutjob Alan Keyes).
In spring of '05 we had another organizing event, this time at McCormick Place, this time with Senator Obama as the keynote, and this time he was at full- blown rock god status in Chicago. This was the second time i met him, and let’s just say he had a lot more handlers around him than he did the previous year.
I knew he was going to be president someday (yeah, yeah i know it’s easy to say things like this now, but i did). I had never seen anyone so freaking inspiring before. I just didn’t think his announcement was going to be a short two and a half years away. I figured he wouldnt run/win until the '20s.
My biggest memory is Obama steamrolling over Hillary. She just couldn’t get past his charisma and message of hope.
McCain self-destructed after selecting Palin.Everyone was uncomfortable having her a heartbeat from the presidency.
Well doggonit if I didn’t link to the Bush-Kerry map twice. Here’s the link to Obama vs. Keyes.
Specifically, media sued to have their sealed divorce records released to the public (against the wishes of both Ryans). This was ultimately granted by the judge, and the records revealed that Jeri (who played Seven of Nine on Star Trek: Voyager) claimed Jack Ryan pressured her to engage in sex acts in front of other people at sex clubs in New York and Paris. He dropped out of the race a week later.
The first I heard of him was from my sister. I have only ever had a passing interest in politics, but she studied it as a major in college and has been a news reporter for various publications and news agencies. I am not sure, but she might have even been at the convention when he made the speech in 2004 and was sure to inform the whole family about it and him. I did not really follow him that much until the Presidential elections rolled around and actually had to stand in line to vote, something I had not seen before.
//i\\
Knowing what we have learned since about voters, I wonder if Ryan could have stayed in and perhaps even won. I suspect Obama would have beat him, but I’m sure it would have been much closer than the election turned out.
I seem to recall that in the aftermath of Kerry’s defeat, in the Democrats’ “wandering in the wilderness” phase, people were already floating Obama’s name as next on the bench. Not really knowing him, I thought it was odd that people were already hanging their hat on a freshman senator. But, lots of people know stuff that I don’t.
Edited: Searched this up on a whim. November 3, 2004, right after Kerry was defeated.
That’s the first timeframe when I personally heard his name floated as a possible Presidential candidate, but there are other posts about Obama as a potential candidate going back to July 2004.
Maybe, but the bombshell revelations and Ryan quitting the race scared big Republican donors into slamming their wallets shut. The reason Alan Keyes was picked was because the Illinois Republican party told all the potential candidates that they’d essentially have to self-fund their campaign; there was simply no way to raise the $10+ million for an effective campaign. Keyes, being a millionaire, was the only viable prospect, despite more popular possibilities like Jim Edgar (who was having health problems and concerned about the rigors of another campaign anyway) and even Mike Ditka.
I live in Illinois and never heard of Obama until he won the election.
For president?
Yep. I know I didn’t vote for McCain though. I probably sat that one out.
Just FYI: Tom Vilsack, the former governor of Iowa from 1999 to 2007. He also served as Obama’s Secretary of Agriculture, and is now serving in that capacity again for Biden.
Vilsack dropped out of the race early, in February 2007. Vilsack made an appearance on The Tonight Show and then dropped out about a week later. Afterwards, Jay Leno made several jokes on the air that he suspected Vilsack’s entire campaign was just a ploy to get a spot on his show.
I didn’t see Obama’s speech at the 2004 Democratic convention, and after the 2004 election, where the Dems put up Lurch from The Addams Family just to have him swift-boated by Karl Rove and his Merry Men, I dropped out of politics for a while. I don’t think I heard of Obama till about 2007 when the first stirrings of the primary were starting to happen. I was mildly intrigued about this guy who was running against Her Highness for the Dem nomination. I was about to write him off when I heard him speak. Damn, I thought, this could be a horse race.
A lot of my attention was on the Republican side, to be honest. This was Trump’s first attempt, IIRC, and he was quickly shut down as the class clown he was (and is). Maybe this was just my own projections from the sidelines, but it seemed that none of the candidates were eager to step up to grab the brass ring. It was as if none of them wanted to be the Republican presidential candidate in the election following the Shrub’s second term, a situation second only to being the comedy act that followed the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show. McCain went from the guy whose campaign nearly went broke to being the surprise frontrunner. I kept getting a picture of the other Repub candidates behind the curtain shoving him onstage: “Quit being a sissy and get out there!”
Mostly what resonated with me about Obama running: Leo explaining to Jed why he wants him to run for President.
He was on Hollywood’s radar by 2004 or so. The West Wing writers/producers took inspiration from him in creating the character of Matt Santos.
While I had previously heard about Barack Obama as a promising candidate, I hadn’t seen or heard him speak until one day in 2007 when he appeared on a news program for a short interview over a video feed. The only things I remember about that interview are about how he presented himself and nothing about what was actually said.
First thing I noticed was his appearance. I don’t know if it was the lighting or (lack of) makeup, but his lips were blue. Then, as he spoke, he would make these annoying “erm” sounds between sentences. My takeaway from that interview was that he needs to work on those things.
Then by the time the primaries rolled around, it became obvious that he did, in fact, improve on those things. Not only was he looking sharp wherever and however he was seen, but also the “erm” was replaced by now-trademark guttural “uh”. I still believe this work on his image was probably more important than anything else behind his victory over Hillary.