A historic moment and a reason to hope

At one point while watching the convention the other night I joked to my wife that Obama is going to find a cure for cancer and end world hunger. She joked right back and predicted that he'll achieve world peace, too. That's what you'd think from listening to speaker after speaker praise the Senator from Illinois. Hopes - and expectations - are sky high. But Obama's speech last night gives us a reason to hope, and a reason to work.

I was so proud last night. And so fired up. Obama's speech was fantastic. It had grand moments of beautiful and moving rhetoric, but for the most part it was down-to-earth and simple. And it was fiesty! He went after McCain hard, stripping away the "maverick" image and tying him to Bush policies and our current economic and foreign struggles. He got specific on his policy proposals, too, laying out what he would do to turn these around.

He reminded us that all this isn't about him. It's about us. I think that Obama is kind of a symbol of our hopes for this nation. I think last night he expressed our anger and frustration over growing inequality, a damaged international reputation, failed and short-sighted energy policy, and inattention to things like education, the environment, and more. For whatever reason, he has come along at the right moment and spoken to those frustrations and to those hopes. I think that's why he has generated the level of excitement that we're seeing.

Obama fashioned himself last night as the pragmatic progressive. He tackled tough issues like abortion, gay rights, guns, and immigration insisting that we have some common ground as Americans.

It was just fantastic and I'm still on a bit of a high from the whole thing. We have a chance to maybe turn things around a little bit in this country. But we need to elect Barack Obama.

One more thing. Minutes after the speech, I got an email from my older brother who likes Obama but had his concerns. All it said was "That was exactly what I needed to hear. He's got my vote." A bit later, he emailed again and just wrote "honest, real, and worthy."

Here's his speech:



Here's the little video that preceded his speech: