So what is going on in the Democratic primary in Iowa and New Hampshire? Is Senator Barack going to upset Senator Hillary? Will he be the nominee? If so can he get elected? All very good questions and ones that need to be answered. Having been involved in several political campaigns with African-American candidates running against Anglos I know just how hard it is to poll folks who do not want to tell you they will vote against a candidate due to the color of his skin, but who in the privacy of the ballot box do just that. Perhaps the U.S. will vote for a person due to his character and not his skin color but I have my doubts.

Having said that I am impressed with Senator Obamas campaign and his using change as a campaign theme. I think voters are ready for a change and of course Barack would be change in a big way, not only here at home but abroad. That is why this interview with Roger Cohen in the N.Y. Times is so interesting. It clearly spells out a change in the way our nation related with other nations and perhaps even with one another here at home.

Here is the article:

Oamas American Idea By ROGER COHEN I asked Senator Barack Obama if hes tough enough for a dangerous world. Sometimes the Democratic candidate treads so carefully, and looks so vulnerable to a gust of wind, that the question of whether his legal mind can get lethal arises. Yes, Im tough enough, he responded during a half-hour conversation. What Ive always found is people who talk about how tough they are arent the tough ones. Im less interested in beating my chest and rattling my saber and more in making decisions that build a safer and more secure world. Obama, speaking less than a month before the Iowa caucus on Jan. 3, continued: We can and should lead the world, but we have to apply wisdom and judgment. Part of our capacity to lead is linked to our capacity to show restraint. That was striking: an enduring belief in U.S. leadership coupled with a commitment to, as he also put it, acting with a sense of humility. Skepticism about the American idea and American global stewardship has grown fast during the Bush years. There are many reasons: the failures in Iraq; the abyss between U.S. principle and practice (Abu Ghraib); the rise of other nations (China); startling displays of American incoherence (Iran); economic vulnerability (the dollar as declining store of value); and general resentments stirred by any near hegemonic power. All this has led some to conclude that the world would be better off if America slunk home. As Joyce Carol Oates wrote in The Atlantic: How heartily sick the world has grown, in the first seven years of the 21st century, of the American idea! It has become a cruel joke. If a global survey were taken, that might prove to be a minority opinion, but I doubt it. Still, Obama stands by the universality of the American proposition: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness under a constitutional government of limited powers. I believe in American exceptionalism, he told me, but not one based on our military prowess or our economic dominance. Rather, he insisted, our exceptionalism must be based on our Constitution, our principles, our values and our ideals. We are at our best when we are speaking in a voice that captures the aspirations of people across the globe. It is dangerous, of course, to speak of being exceptional; people tend to resent it. If the United States said its ambition was to be normal, few would object. But Obama is right to retain a belief in Americas capacity to inspire; it remains unique. And I still see no credible stabilizing alternative to the far-flung American garrisons that act as the offsetting power to old rivalries in Asia and Europe. Pax Americana, being neither perfect nor peaceful, is not popular. Only its absence would convince its detractors of its worth. Obamas main Democratic rivals, Senator Hillary Clinton and former Senator John Edwards, have joined him in calling for a shift from fear, militarism and unilateralism toward interaction, including with enemies. But Obamas global engagement seems visceral in unusual ways. If, as president, I travel to a poor country to talk to leaders there, they will know I have a grandmother in a small village in Africa without running water, devastated by malaria and AIDS, he said. What that allows me to do is talk honestly not only about our need to help them, but about poor countries obligation to help themselves. There are cousins of mine in Kenya who cant get a job without paying an exorbitant bribe to some midlevel functionary. I can talk about that. Referring to the time he spent in Indonesia, Obama said: I have lived in the most populous Muslim country in the world, had relatives who practiced Islam. I am a Christian, but I can say I understand your worldview, although I may not agree with how Islam has evolved. I can speak forcefully about the need for Muslim countries to reconcile themselves to modernity in ways they have failed to do. Al Qaeda attacked the West in Kenya, Bali and New York. Obamas father was Kenyan. The senator was schooled partly in Indonesia. He attended college in New York. The parallels are strange. They can also be a source of the toughness married to intuition for which he still seeks complete expression. Nowhere in American history has the gulf between ideals and sordid practice been greater than on questions of race. It is precisely the gulf between high principle not least habeas corpus and unprincipled actions that has done the most damage to Americas image in recent years. Once again, Obama appears to bridge and reconcile. We cant entirely remake the world, he told me. What we can do is lead by example.

–0-1471829439-1197391565=:58995