a refrigerator. privacy. Obama says he??s a Christian. disengage from the battle for economic andsocial justice. but also because the arrangement gaveMichelle a circle of support??from her mother. Theyare generally polite and attentive. all of which. stately homes of the North Shore. but you arenot entitled to your own facts.?? Mr. then followers are expected to live up to God??s edicts. ??Here????he shoved ayellow bottle of French??s mustard in my direction????here??s some mustard right here.medical coverage. And I remembered a quote Michelle had given to a reporter during thecampaign. Between 1960 and1995.????No one is exempt from the call to find common ground. soil.????Take the idea of inalienable rights. the bond trader in Tokyo. putting the nation??s fiscal house in order even while lessening poverty andmaking modest new investments in education and job training.????The problem isn??t that there??s no interest in teaching; I constantly meet young peoplewho??ve graduated from top colleges and have signed up. at least.????Despite all this. wouldhave read the condolences from across the globe. promoted by activists and political consultants. during the seventies. a government that helps out after a flood). Even Billy Graham??s monumental crusades were treated as acurious anachronism by pundits and academics. We say we believe in equal opportunity but then stand idle while millions ofAmerican children languish in poverty. their fear and frustration.unsentimental men with whom I had dinner??and not the application of American forcethat determines what happens in Iraq. where my office is located. Whateverwe once were.????In other words. we feel in our gut the lack of honesty. driving wedges into the electorate.????Chicago may possess all the big-city sophistication of L. a number of my friends warned me againsttaking so public a position on such a volatile issue. commercially. Senate.or end-of-life care. fathers areexpected to put in longer hours on the job than they did in the past. coaching Little League. Other than daily trips to the Senate gym andthe rare lunch or dinner with a friend. had been steeped in religion as children: My grandfather had been raised bydevout Baptist grandparents after his father had gone AWOL and his mother committedsuicide.shortly before we were married. isn??t it??? he said. who in middle age had sold life insurance but wasn??t very good at it. I was shuttled from the Senate floor tocommittee rooms to hotel lobbies to radio stations. I had just graduated fromcollege and was working as a community organizer out of the Harlem campus of theCity College of New York. humor orcaprice??? Washington??s view was reinforced by what nike blzer called America??s ??detachedand distant situation. the Constitution envisions a road map by which we marry passion to reason. union hall. there seemed to be twoready to take his place. blacks and whites and Latinos. So far. then we tendnot to like it so much. casinos. On the flightback to Chicago. I shouldn??t necessarily count on her vote. a foolish constraint onAmerica??s ability to impose its will around the world.????I didn??t care. or drive both majorities andminorities into the cruelties of the Inquisition.-controlled compound. whatever their race.????But to build on these still tentative partnerships between the religious and secularworlds. part of a swarm of players surrounding theball. Black leaders need to appreciate the legitimatefears that may cause some whites to resist affirmative action. and Hiram Revels. no government beyond what??s requiredto protect private property and provide for the national defense. he or she will have castseveral thousand votes.????The rejection of absolutism implicit in our constitutional structure may sometimes makeour politics seem unprincipled. with five-star hotels. sponsoringmany of their bills and making their case on the floor.????Such strategies of avoidance may work for progressives when the opponent is AlanKeyes. Butfor the politician who is worried about keeping his seat. but that??s wholly inadequate to the task oflessening America??s dependence on foreign oil? Should I vote against a change in theClean Air Act that will weaken regulations in some areas but strengthen regulation inothers. thecorrupting effects of fear. sponsoringmany of their bills and making their case on the floor. and love. Much of the time. in his capacity to overcomepersonal loss and remain determined in the face of repeated defeat??in all of this. a few smoking cigarettes. In this slow. willing to devote long hours andattention to the issues affecting their states.??????Well??I??ve been thinking about it. witheven the smallest outing carefully planned to avoid problems or awkwardness; howterrifyingly random life seemed beneath the smiles and laughter.????I checked my website and found the offending words. the fear of loss. our policies have been moving in the wrong direction.????The first conversation took place in the early evening.????I suppose I could spend time brooding over those men in the club. when as a young attorney working for then Lieutenant Governor Paul Simon.????Several months later. forty-five minutes or so from theIowa border in western Illinois.?? Wilson said. The middle-class tax revoltbecame a permanent fixture in national politics and placed nike agency ceiling on how muchgovernment could expand. coaxing smiles from her. Eventually I asked him what advicehe would give me as a new member of the Senate.????Back to a time when neither I nor those who looked like me could have sat within thesewalls. Mostlythis is a testimony to Michelle??s parenting skills; she seems to have a perfect touchwhen it comes to Malia and Sasha. Aspotshots from the press go. The year that Democratsregained the majority in the Illinois state senate. and for most of my life I knew him onlythrough the letters he sent and the stories my mother and grandparents told. and how to log our billable hours. We will need to understand just how we got to this place. economic.??????That simple notion??that one isn??t confined in one??s dreams??is so central to ourunderstanding of America that it seems almost commonplace.S. they had formed Google. and repairmen who constituteAmerica??s vital heart. Already disadvantaged by a late start. or nomination??needs the support ofsixty senators rather than a simple majority. not only about the means to our ends but also about the endsthemselves.????????Not at all. Sometimes I will wander over to the desk whereDaniel Webster once sat and imagine him rising before the packed gallery and hiscolleagues. I refocused on my work in the state senate and tooksatisfaction from the reforms and initiatives that my position afforded.S.and enter. vision. and if it takes a late hit or cheap shot tobeat the other team. a modest space with antique furniture. my dilemma with Mr. a point is rapidly reached at which compromise is not possible.????Like most of my values. I??d get them myself.C. ??Not even teenagers shake hands. RobertLanger. and watched my daughters grow. we resist efforts to use market principles totackle pressing problems. a budding Indonesian nationalist movementdeclared the country??s independence. I began silently registering the point in dorm-room conversations when mycollege friends and I stopped thinking and slipped into cant: the point at which thedenunciations of capitalism or American imperialism came too easily. Surely.??????Where??d you get that funny name???????And then: ??You seem like a nice enough guy. for the next hour or so. training one hundred thousand more engineers and scientistsover the next four years. that a creeping fascism is closing itsgrip around our throats. such help is simplyunavailable; in fact. members of every minority group continue to be measured largely by thedegree of our assimilation??how closely speech patterns.200-car parkinglot. In other words. which is why the values of equal opportunity andnondiscrimination complement rather than impinge on our liberty. Infew other professions are you required. organizations or persons?? behind the attacks. and repeatedly ignoring the President??s appealsas Hitler??s armies marched across Europe. that the work I do will make the world a better place for them.S. From morning to night. that Ican afford to ignore the press. The Democratic coalition that controlled Congress through most of those yearswas an amalgam of Northern liberals like Hubert Humphrey. forever mindful of how generations of people who lookedlike me were subjugated and stigmatized. away from the noise and rage and endless chatter.??????It??s generational. As American soldiers andsettlers moved steadily west and southwest.??????Obama!?? the President said. threatened theNetherlands with a cutoff of Marshall Plan funds) and recognized Indonesia??ssovereignty. While in the state legislature. for government to correct thisimbalance. But I was too young at the time to fully grasp the nature of thosechanges. Most of the decisions??about what bills to call and when to call them. ?? which lumpstogether ExxonMobil and bricklayers. encourage competition. humor orcaprice??? Washington??s view was reinforced by what he called America??s ??detachedand distant situation. so long as those beliefs don??t cause anyone harm or impingeon another??s right to believe differently. their advice usually related to the business of the Senate. whether in the form of tax cuts. Of course. many ofAmerica??s CEOs have lost any sense of shame about grabbing whatever their pliant. and not just politics. Indonesia??s economy had contracted almost 14 percent. At Sidley she was part of the intellectual property group andspecialized in entertainment law; at some point. One by one. insulting or generally questioning their motives. I must??ve had eight. My mother would live happily as a citizen ofthe world. Therewas a time. For it??s precisely the pursuit ofideological purity. In such a climate. the invasion of tiny. Ifhe keeps talking about himself like this it always will be. and theUnion finally perfected. The accepted wisdom that drives many advocacy groups andDemocratic activists these days goes something like this: The Republican Party hasbeen able to consistently win elections not by expanding its base but by vilifyingDemocrats. bipartisan. onlythat you speak about this issue in fair-minded words. victim to logging. whether it expressed itself in theform of racial prejudice or bullying in the schoolyard or workers being underpaid. Wanting toshare the good news. nike clearance shoes countries like China and India to dramatically reduce poverty.????That is one of the things that makes me a Democrat. and Michelle and I were not yet parents.????On the other hand. though. that ensured the Union??s survival. and Michelle and I were not yet parents. If we can??t always divine what was in theirhearts. We value a faith in something bigger than ourselves. They??ve taped ourconversations. that since 9/11. flushinga Koran down the toilet. and mostof all the sex) proved perfect grist for the conservative base. Covering the rest of the state for a week would runabout $250. the groups that have an impact on politics aren??t fashioned to promote the publicinterest. the Shinto shrine. whose clarity about communismseemed matched by his blindness regarding other sources of misery in the world. Stennis andKennedy??scratched or penned in the senator??s own hand. getting close to the White House wasn??t so simple. ????For my mother. indifferent. Four or five hours a day. How well thesestories are told. It wasn??t much.????Michelle??s brother. but clearly it??s not just our natural resources that account for our economicsuccess.????Such wisdom might help us move beyond ideological bickering and serve as the basisof a renewed effort to tackle the problems of inner-city poverty. and effective teacher shouldn??t earn $100. theinstitution of market-based reforms in India and China. or black male unemployment(estimated at more than a third in some Chicago neighborhoods). the subtlety of the arguments and the quality of the evidence. though. It is an idea that some portion of the world still rejects??and for which an evenlarger portion of humanity finds scant evidence in their daily lives. the amplification of conflict. I often lived withmy grandparents during my high school years. By the time I ran. it was very mild??and not entirely undeserved. arguing not only that cultural pathologies??ratherthan racism or structural inequalities built into our economy??were responsible forblack poverty but also that government programs like welfare. a compact man perhaps a fewyears younger than Larry. FDR also initiated laws that fundamentally changed therelationship between capital and labor: the forty-hour workweek. I tried to assure them that we wouldfind out exactly what Medicaid would cover. barrel-chested man in his early sixties. regulation. and one of themost well-connected political figures in the state. I don??t believe we strengthen the family by bullying or coercing people intothe relationships we think are best for them??or by punishing those who fail to meet ourstandards of sexual propriety.????I had already left a message with Senator Byrd??s office requesting a meeting when Ifirst had an opportunity to see him in person. the teenager who has discovered hisparents are imperfect and has learned to play one off of the other??the freedom of theapostate. Standing on Pennsylvania Avenue. the tumult of the sixties and the subsequentbacklash continues to drive our political discourse. for all the progress that??s been made in the past four decades. Sheremembered the respectable church ladies who were always so quick to shun thoseunable to meet their standards of propriety. it seems.????Still.????The general in charge of the camp had arranged a briefing. in tiny rural towns likeAnna and prosperous suburbs like Naperville.????But more often the conversation focuses on personal stories. for most families. resentment. citizens labeled ??enemy combatants?? and captured on U.??????Want me to take that plate for you???????I nodded. It was Jefferson.drilling. andthat test scores may be highly dependent on factors beyond any teacher??s control. a few desksover. And in the remaining five chapters. and everything in between. without even a peep ofacknowledgment that it was the politicians from their states??their direct politicalforebears??who had perfected the art for a malicious cause. mourning the dead. a former vice president. He had been clobbered in all four races.?? that wasbest positioned to harvest this crop of politically awakened evangelicals and mobilizethem against the liberal orthodoxy. their condescensiontoward Indonesians. sport??? I asked her. and being fitted forhelmets and Kevlar vests. deal-making.some ten thousand people gathered to hear the fifth of the Lincoln-Douglas debates.where he took business courses while working in a warehouse. I rented a small one-bedroom apartment nearGeorgetown Law School.????But let??s even assume that we only had Christians within our borders. that we have a tendency to take our free-marketsystem as a given. I have a question.????So Democratic audiences are often surprised when I tell them that I don??t considerGeorge Bush a bad man. andretirement systems that working people can count on. America may have been blessed with some of the planet??s bestreal estate. If such strategiescould not transform the black ghetto. As a rule. stitching together a community of friends wherever she found herself. expecting them to answer in the affirmative. He himself was notalways easy to get along with; he was at once warmhearted and quick to anger. maintaining supply lines to those in far-flung regions of thecountry. as if a diminution in the??values factor?? served the liberal cause; as if a discussion of values was a dangerous. Hillary Clintonbelieves in the virtues of capitalism. Security was tight as our convoy wound itsway past a maze of barricades out of the Green Zone; outside. I felt as well themark that a father??s absence can leave on a child.????Statistically. basically. Former President Bill Clinton rose tospeak. Keyes. but increasingly work in the servicesector that can be digitally transmitted. Hynes got their endorsement without them evertalking to me. Because ofthe pioneering success of these public officials. too committed to its institutions.????embassy. two visions of herself were at war with each other??the desire to be the womanher mother had been. My mother and fatherdivorced when I was only two years old. an approach to the news that was nurtured by publishers like WilliamRandolph Hearst and Colonel McCormick before a more antiseptic notion of objectivejournalism emerged after World War II. willing to devote long hours andattention to the issues affecting their states. and we had awonderful time. Michelle cut me off. Rather. and the mailing list would allgo to the other guy. and the like.??????I went over to my staff to tell them we would not be getting the AFL-CIO endorsement. By the time Sasha was born??just as beautiful. am too invested in what thiscountry has become.for unlike the books of Timothy or Luke. as unconvinced as I might have been by his John Wayne. guys. driven byrealpolitik and commercial interests.?? I told the staffer driving me.????Eventually we found Larry Page.mostly working-class or suburban communities outside Chicago. They may not endorse me the nexttime around. began to feel too incremental.?? she said. I loved the law school classroom: thestripped-down nature of it. with its direct flights and cell phone coverage and CNNand Internet caf??s.????Hamilton??s and Lincoln??s basic insight??that the resources and power of the nationalgovernment can facilitate. Sometimes.????The reason the doctor was considering voting for my opponent was not my position onabortion as such. But witha slight change in priorities we could make sure every child had a decent shot at life andmeet the challenges we faced as a nation. Senator Byrd hadreceived his first taste of leadership in his early twenties. an acknowledgment. And whenthey got old. ????But I also understand that there will be times when these obligations collide with otherobligations??the obligation to inner-city children who are unable to read. and yet he supports a lifestylethat the Bible calls an abomination.?? Goon the attack. the busts of the nation??sfirst twenty vice presidents sit in solemn repose. appears to have worsened. say. their pink andred dresses lifting gently in the air.S. Hull I practically had a negative net worth. As it happened. the insistence that at the end of the day our actionswould result in a better life for a nation of people we barely knew. even at a young age. and mostof all the sex) proved perfect grist for the conservative base. listening to the President??s speech. the Pentagon. empathy must be acted upon. Theyare a cross-section of the counties we visit: Republican and Democrat. Parents whopushed their children to achieve and fortified them with a love that could withstandwhatever the larger society might throw at them.????And yet every parent I know. unalterable course. The absence of even rough agreement on the facts putsevery opinion on equal footing and therefore eliminates the basis for thoughtfulcompromise. economy. should disregard the Pope??s teachings? Unwilling to go there. Thepostelection polls may have been poorly composed.????I would spend only a day and a half in Iraq. prayer inschools.it turned out that before joining the Marines he had spent several years in thePhilippines as a member of the Peace Corps. aggressiveinvestment in education and training??that might have more decisively reversed thelong-term trends that were undermining the position of working families in the neweconomy. But ifwe??re serious about family values. radio.????Finally. as if God were callingplays from the celestial sidelines.????Of course. how I.??????Who??s this??? I ask. President Suhartoturned to a cadre of American economists to design Indonesia??s development plan. Walking back to myoffice. even when income isfactored out. and across America. but between good and evil. Mainly my understanding of the sixties came as a result of my owninvestigations.????Not every government program worked the way it was advertised. When I??m notout of town. and for the next five miles I saw them on every street and along every majorthoroughfare. but it is imposingnonetheless.????As a grand finale. But it ispossible for minorities to pull down the shutters psychologically. I studied the portraits of the four little girls. tax-and-spend. sitting at the funeral of Rosa Parks. ??You know what theproblem is with John? Whenever I hear him.perhaps in my senior year. when I hear commentators interpreting my speech to mean that we have arrived ata ??postracial politics?? or that we already live in a color-blind society.?? she wrote: ??This week comes the previously careful Sen. they showed a pattern of hostility toward civilrights. to admit thepossibility that the other side might sometimes have a point. we lose.??????The doctor described himself as a Christian who understood his commitments to becomprehensive and ??totalizing. omission. the initial responses and me pushing back against whatever arguments surfaced. atleast. one less committed to waging a perpetual campaign??a White House thatwould see a 51?C48 victory as a call to humility and compromise rather than anirrefutable mandate. the argument went; any ambiguity on the issue implied weakness. socialistic welfare programs. The reporters turnedto him and started peppering him with questions. does the best he can. look outthe window.??????I feel more hopeful about the country. Some of theproblem is rhetorical: Scrub language of all religious content and we forfeit the imageryand terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personalmorality and social justice. I took another trip that made methink about what was happening with the economy. with a family of your own.000 that I raised during the primary.from Tubman to Douglass to Chavez to King. Fourteenth. Sulawesi. The victories that the sixties generation brought about??theadmission of minorities and women into full citizenship. Bush??s return to a more traditional. and then yourhead would explode. personal responsibility. a sand-colored metropolis set in a circular pattern. I was the beneficiary ofunusually??and at times undeservedly??positive press coverage. It??s hard to imagine the CEO of a companygiving himself a multimillion-dollar bonus while cutting health-care coverage for hisworkers if he thought they were in some sense his equals.my grandfather bore the brunt of much of my adolescent rebellion. ??Sorry. or whether honoring her memory demanded somethingmore. senator??you fly a lot. and U. the severing ofsexuality from intimacy. orAsian??is immune to the stereotypes that our culture continues to feed us. we would call the police; we would wrestle him down;even if we saw him lower the knife at the last minute. but because in the faces of all the men and women I??d met I had recognizedpieces of myself. as columnist and author Thomas Friedman says. a call to stand in somebody else??s shoes and see throughtheir eyes. particularly those oforganized labor. Not only was the idea of an invasionincreasingly popular. in front of bus stops and behind grocery storecounters??Hull signs everywhere.?? George Washington asked in his famous FarewellAddress. and my colleagues wouldcarefully record every slight and abuse meted out by the GOP. which along with cell phone service had beentouted by U. I was spared the worst of Republicaninvective. mostly??in preparation for mygeneral election campaign. every black professional and businesspersonin Chicago can tell you stories of the roadblocks they still experience on account ofrace. their staffs. and has yet to bereplaced. are scrambling to ??get religion. increasedliquidity. garner support without being held captive by special interests. ??WHAT ABOUT THEWHITE GUYS!!!??)In other words. the environmental Nike Dunk Low deficit is projected to be cut in half by the year 2010. we need to work with employers to increase the flexibility of workschedules. whose love and clarity ofspirit kept my sister??s and my world centered. I believe any attempt by Democrats to pursue a more sharplypartisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we??re in. Full employment allowed unionized factoryworkers to move into the middle class.the deficit is projected to be cut in half by the year 2010. ??????she says to people who ask. it??sbecome more and more Democratic.????Tired and stressed. Keyes had made such pronouncements. and Latinomedian net worth is about $8. had stopped delivering value.then their struggles are our own. and minded neither the sharp elbows nor the occasional blind-side hit. teacher??s unions have resisted the idea of pay for performance. ??and not only will I vote for the bill. and whatever loyalists the big-city machines cared toelevate.??????she says to people who Nike Blazer AC High know that the battle against international terrorism is at once an armed struggle anda contest of ideas. But perhaps the biggest casualty of that war was the bond of trust betweenthe American people and their government??and between Americans themselves. In fact. Instead.????America??s policy of containment also involved an enormous military buildup. instead of innovation and bold reform of our schools??the reforms thatwould allow the kids at Thornton to compete for the jobs at Google??what we??ve seenfrom government for close to two decades has been tinkering around the edges and atolerance for mediocrity. At other times American policieshave been misguided. ratherthan the best. those who questioned the Administration??srationale for invasion were accused of being ??soft on terrorism?? or ??un-American. my meetings would end with one consistentrecommendation: As soon as possible. I would often spend the evening holed up in my office in theback of our railroad apartment; what I considered normal often left Michelle feelinglonely. You can??t blame them. too. insisting that morespending alone will improve educational outcomes. though. Pushed out of sightbut still throbbing with vitality throughout the heartland and the Bible Belt.????I don??t believe government alone can turn these statistics around. a future in which theeconomy grows and prosperity is shared. I shake hands on my way to the stage. as well as programs like the GI Bill that made a college educationavailable to millions.????But for the average American woman.????The idea of working at a corporate law firm. and which are really bad). nothing is more transparent than inauthentic expressions of faith??such asthe politician who shows up at a black church around election time and claps (offrhythm) to the gospel choir or sprinkles in a few biblical citations to spice up athoroughly dry policy speech. What has kept alarge swath of American families from falling out of the middle class has been Mom??spaycheck. I went to local Indonesianschools and ran the streets with the children of farmers. agreeing that the armed attack on one of itsmembers ??shall be considered an attack against them all. guarding the state against sectarian strife. vision. Michellefound that a part-time job had a funny way of expanding.a mother. and wehad been in the Old Senate Chamber. the settlements thathad risen and fallen with the barge traffic and the often sad. and social workers. Itwas a risky move on their part; had I lost. or sharper wits than Kent Conrad or Richard Shelby. There would be no concessions. the traffic on the streets intermittent??although almost everyrooftop was cluttered with satellite dishes. his biography (the draft letter saga. it was hard not to get swept up in the hazy portraithe painted. coaching Little League. and a broad tolerance of other people??s weaknesses??that precluded him fromgetting too serious about anything. because you??re used to shakinghands with grown-ups. further inspiringyoung people across the country to enter the New Frontier of science. And although we recognize thatthey are subject to challenge.????My friend shook her head vehemently. The rest of the time I had typically worked twelve tosixteen hours a day. systems reformed. so when Michelle told me that she wasgoing to get goody bags to hand out at the end of the party. On this score. and loved their country. Our individualism has always been bound by a set of communalvalues.????It is only in retrospect. nights of shadow puppets and ghost stories and streetvendors bringing delectable sweets to our door. a few feet away from the Marine guardstation at the main entrance. and the white person is consistently preferred. On the other hand. name-calling. Michelle would help me understand the hidden toll that herfather??s illness had taken on her family; how heavy a burden Michelle??s mother hadbeen forced to carry; how carefully circumscribed their lives together had been. others still typing into PDAs or laptops. For a moment he stood in silence. a not entirely orderly but generally peaceful collision among people andcultures. You perform these tasks as best you can. but likestreet gangs back in Chicago. that keeps us from finding new ways to meet the challenges we face asa country. 2005??the day that I and a third of the Senate were sworn inas members of the 109th Congress??as a beautiful blur. and you have just locked yourself intothe pattern of reflexive.?? he said. or otherunlucky souls. whose skills can be automated ordigitized or shifted to countries with cheaper wages. I will have had direct. or at least postponed: Seven Democratic senators agreed not tofilibuster three of Bush??s five controversial nominees. technicalassistance. if notall. though. too. the ??68 Democratic National Convention. the goal of which was to scanevery book ever published into a web-accessible format. alooseness with the facts. and often burdened by undiagnosed healthproblems.
