From Illinois to Hawai'i

There's a fascinating Times look at Barack Obama's time growing up in Hawai'i, A Search for Self in Obama’s Hawaii Childhood, that gives you a glimpse into why he's so at ease with America circa 2007, in contrast with all the white male Americas running around as if it's 1957.

Unlike those carefully-constructed empty suits, Obama is an absolutely natural politician, totally relaxed in front of people and able to communicate his ideas and principles in a straightforward, understandable style. He has the gift of distilling the complex down to its essentials without patronizing his audience or himself.

Yet for all his ease with his fellow Americans, he's a uniquely complicated person--the more I find out, the more amazed I am at all the interesting little items in his background. His path has been harder and more meandering than I expected, based on his golden boy public image that's quickly taken on aspects of the mythic.

In a very specific way he reminds me of Lincoln--the optimism about America, intertwined with a dead seriousness about his personal mission; that same quick wit and easy sense of humor, overlaying both a prodigious intellect and a deeper, darker strain that comes from atypical levels of thought and personal experiences.

And, like Lincoln, shaped by the frontier, Obama, shaped by Hawai'i, knows America needs everyone.

Jennifer Steinhauer: To his high school classmates, Barack Obama was a pleasant if undistinguished student, the guy who seemed happiest on the basketball court, the first to dive into the pumpkin carving at Halloween, the one whose oratorical prowess was largely limited to out-debating classmates over the relative qualities of point guards.

But Mr. Obama’s family here in Hawaii saw a more complex young man, a person whose racial confusion and feelings of alienation were matched with equal parts ambition, disquietude and lofty notions about where his internal struggles might lead.

“There was always a joke between my mom and Barack that he would be the first black president,” his sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, said in an interview over tea. “So there were intimations of all this early on. He has always been restless. There was always somewhere else he needed to go.”

It was his early search for a cultural identity on this plumeria-scented island populated with people of diverse origins, but relatively few blacks, that presaged his current political persona, his sister suggested.

“He couldn’t sit back and wait for the answers to come to him,” said Ms. Soetoro-Ng, the child of Mr. Obama’s mother from another marriage, who remains close to him. “He had to pursue those answers actively. People from very far-away places collide here, and cultures collide, and there is a blending and negotiation that is constant.”

She continued, “I think Hawaii gave him a sense that a lot of different voices and textures can sort of live together, however imperfectly, and he would walk in many worlds and feel a level of comfort.”

The political narrative of Mr. Obama was written about 4,500 miles and a cultural universe away from here, largely in Illinois. But the seeds of his racial consciousness, its attendant alienation and political curiosity appear to have been planted in Hawaii.

There was, by the description of his classmates, coaches and teachers, their Barry, the one who still looks remarkably like the picture in his yearbook, smiling under his Afro, or posing somewhat stiffly with other children under a sign “Mixed Races of America.”

That Barry had a confident gait, a cheerful smile and a B average.

“He had the same exact mannerisms then as he does now,” said Eric Kusunoki, Mr. Obama’s homeroom teacher at the Punahou School. “When he walked up to give that speech at the Democratic convention, we recognized him right away by the way he walked. He was well liked by everybody, a very charismatic guy.”

You wonder how different George Bush would've been, had he grown up in the multicultural paradise that is our 50th state.

Heck, or even Hillary Clinton, who lest we forget was a Goldwater girl growing up in Illinois, that sudden fount of politicians again (any chance Obama-Clinton can bring out the best in each other and one day resonate like Lincoln-Douglas?)

Clinton Campaign Accused of Snub to Ethnic Media Reporters
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign barred reporters with prominent Chinese-language news organizations from a fundraiser last week, angering some journalists who serve this city's sizable Asian-American community.

Reporters from at least two Chinese-language newspapers and a crew from a Chinese-language TV station were denied admission to the event Friday when they arrived after a Secret Service-imposed cutoff time, according to the journalists and the New York senator's campaign.

The Chinese-language newspapers and others had not been included on the e-mail list from the campaign telling journalists to check in by 11:45 a.m. Friday, Clinton campaign spokesman Mo Elleithee said Tuesday.

A reporter with a Russian-language newspaper and a crew from a network television affiliate also were denied admission because of the deadline.

"We're sorry for the misunderstanding, and we're going to take steps so that all news outlets know about the Secret Service's requirements in advance next time so we don't have this kind of incident happen again," Elleithee said.

Reporter Portia Li of the World Journal - a Chinese-language paper run independently from offices in San Francisco and other North American cities - said she arrived about five minutes late. When Li showed her business card, the staffer asked for two forms of identification, which Li said she found insulting because she never had to do so at similar events.

"She kept saying this is only open for local media, not foreign press," Li said. "I told her, I'm not foreign press. I'm local media."

"It's not about myself, it's about how the mainstream looks at Chinese (people) as a whole. Why do they call us foreigners, even they we have a local address on our business card?" she added.

I do really do feel bad for Hillary; she's given her life to serving others, pretty uncynically in my opinion, if not always prettily.

Yet she lacks the light touch of her husand or Obama; and now, after paying her dues, she finds herself running against history even as she tries to make her own. She must sometimes at night curse her lack of luck, wondering why these larger-than-life men always seem to loom over her own light.

And loom Obama does; it's in his nature to light up the room, as evident in a New Yorker profile of Obama from May of 2004, The Candidate: How the son of a Kenyan economist became an Illinois Everyman, when he was a relatively unknown state legislator running for an open Senate seat in Illionis. There are a lot of little observations made by William Finnegan in the piece, many centering around how universal and at times surprising Obama's charisma can be.

If you look at the poll numbers, the fundraising totals, the buzz, the New York times bestseller list (Obama has both the current #1 nonfiction book, as well as the #5 nonfiction paperback) it all testifies to how far this son of Illinois has come in such a brief time. Just a little way farther, and he'll truly have a chance to live up to the legacy of his fellow Illini.

Jan Schakowsky told me about a recent visit she had made to the White House with a congressional delegation. On her way out, she said, President Bush noticed her “obama” button. “He jumped back, almost literally,” she said. “And I knew what he was thinking. So I reassured him it was Obama, with a ‘b.’ And I explained who he was. The President said, ‘Well, I don’t know him.’ So I just said, ‘You will.’ ”

Uncredited AP photo via the Times.