Believing Obama

A large chunk of this presidential election is shaping up to be about tone -- big change vs. little change, hope vs. experience. To see how these ideas are manifesting themselves among voters, one needs to look no further than Zazzle.com, the online site where people can design their own bumper stickers, buttons, and t-shirts.

Search for Obama and you'll find the first page of results packed with inspirational t-shirts, many with the theme of "Yes We Can." Through the first five pages of search results (as of this morning) the results are uniformly positive. There are "Yes We Can" t-shirts, bumper stickers, and buttons, "Republicans for Obama"-themed swag, "Latinos for Obama" stuff, "Barack to the Future" t-shirts, and many just with his face or the campaign's official logo. There's nothing about any other candidates. The depth and breadth of the slogans and voter-generated content is impressive.

Hillary's Zazzle page couldn't be more different. Many of the items are negative-one of the lead items is a bumper sticker with the slogan "Monica Lewinsky's ex-boyfriend's wife for President" -- and a good number of items are actually about Barack Obama. In fact, on the front page of results only approximately one-third of the items are pro-Hillary. The lead item is a t-shirt for "Billary" and the fourth and fifth items are both Obama paraphernalia.

Zazzle appears to be another solid example of how Hillary's campaign just doesn't inspire voter-generated content in the way that Obama's campaign does, which is a good proxy for grassroots fervor. Just like on YouTube, where we've seen the emergence of multiple pro-Obama viral videos without any real answer from the Clinton side.

The famed street artist Shepard Fairey, perhaps best known for his sticker of Andre of Giant, in recent weeks has released a limited edition poster with Barack Obama's face and the word "Progress." The first signed set sold out online in just 15 minutes and the posters he hung on the street in advance of the Super Tuesday primaries are now going for nearly $1,000 a piece on eBay. The second set of posters, with the word "Hope" that were scheduled to go on sale yesterday, proved so popular that his website was down for most of the day. Clearly there's something going on here that's larger than just a run-of-the-mill presidential election. Can you imagine anyone competitively bidding for a pretty poster of John Kerry in 2004 or Al Gore in 2000?

Four years ago, I was lucky enough to be on the floor of the FleetCenter in Boston to watch his keynote to the Democratic National Convention and as part of my research for a big article on Barack Obama over a year ago I watched him speak many times, and even more since then. What's been great about seeing him speak so many times is the chance to watch people react to him for the first time -- and it's in that moment that one can understand why someone would online and create t-shirts to spread the hope.

Truly great speakers offer a chance to believe -- it's the same whether you're talking about pulpit preachers, televangelists, politicians, Oprah or Dr. Phil. The interaction between the crowd and the speaker is also key -- you need the interplay between both to really create the unique environment that allows for just that second of believing.

On the Dean campaign, where I worked in 2004, one of Joe Trippi's favorite sayings was the old baseball slogan, "You Gotta Believe." It appeared at many of our rallies and one of the iconic images from the campaign is Trippi with a "You Gotta Believe" sign thrust high over his head-for a moment even Trippi believed. I remember the highlight of the campaign for me was the final rally of the Sleepless Summer Tour in summer 2003 in Bryant Park, New York, where we packed over 10,000 people into the park. As night fell and Dean took the stage, we reached the million-dollar online fundraising goal for the trip and the crowd went wild. Governor Dean's speech that night was basically the same he had given a thousand times at that moment but the play between his energy, the setting, and the crowd was magical. I never believed more in that campaign than I did at that exact moment.

What Obama does so well is offer that moment of belief -- that, dare we say, hope -- to crowds as he speaks. For just the moment of the speech, you want to believe everything he says -- that the world he describes is one that we can achieve.

As George Packer wrote in the New Yorker recently:

"Obama spoke for only 25 minutes and took no questions; he had figured out how to leave an audience at the peak of its emotion, craving more. As he was ending, I walked outside and found five hundred people standing on the sidewalk and the front steps of the opera house, listening to his last words in silence, as if news of victory in the Pacific were coming over the loudspeakers. Within minutes, I couldn't recall a single thing that he had said, and the speech dissolved into pure feeling, which stayed with me for days."

If Hillary or McCain wants to beat Obama, they need to get better at offering that magical moment of hope. Hillary offers a good story, you believe that she can make change, but by and large she's too practical to offer too much hope. She, as Packer says, represents the art of what's actually possible.

Hope, that moment of believing, is perhaps the gift of the young and the naive, but when you look back over the great speakers of American life, like JFK and Martin Luther King, Jr., few things aren't possible when you offer inspiration and energy at the level they did. The question for this election: Can enough people believe for long enough to get Barack where he needs to be?

As we read this morning that superdelegate Rep. John Lewis has joined his colleague Rep. David Scott in switching their votes to Obama, they're responding to this larger dynamic -- understanding that their constituents, who voted overwhelmingly for Obama, want this moment of hope and believing. If Barack goes on to win the nomination, as appears increasingly likely, it will be because he inspired that single moment of believing in more and more voters as the campaign has progressed. Until the race is settled, though, it's clear his supporters will keep the cause alive -- from will.i.am's YouTube video to Zazzle-made t-shirts to posters in the street. It's all about the hope.

Garrett M. Graff, now an editor at Washingtonian magazine, is the author of "The First Campaign: Globalization, the Web, and the Race for the White House."

Comments

[ariadne1]

a tad more than tone!

from the nytimes:

Unofficial Tallies in City Understated Obama Vote

www.nytimes.com/2008/02/16/nyregion/16vote.html?hp

here we go again; rove tactics... clinton style!

[Plowboy]

It is hard to believe any American politician now. How long has it been since we saw one completely trustworthy?
I can say unequivocally that it is extremely hard to believe one who claims to be anti-war but always votes to make more war more likely. It is hard to believe one who claims to support our traditions and values but voted for the so-called Patriot act. Those are just a couple of things one might consider on the subject of believing a politician. It is harder to believe one who has been proven to be deceitful than one who hasn't.
I suppose anyone reading this will know whom I support. That fact says something about the issue. I'll leave it there.

[divabunny]

"believing obama?"

great title... lets see how many people believe him after the truth comes out? the trial starts march 4th!

hold on to your seats!

www.rezcowatch.com

http://obamatruth.org/

i just HOPE its not too late!

[ozamerican]

I like the way Michelle Obama put it in her interview with Katie Couric. Basically, she said it all starts with hope. Nothing can happen without hope, a vision. And then there is hard work to do, and not all of it is easy. But if everyone's not behind it and contributing to and sacrificing for the outcomes, then what hope is there for any change at all?

This isn't a feel-good country anymore. It's a country that has a lot of very scary challenges ahead of it. Hillary Clinton misses the whole point by boiling it all down to "solutions." It's going to take a big effort on the part of every American to get through the next four years, and Obama is the only candidate running who can inspire Americans to draw upon their best to get through what could be the most difficult time in our history.

[shchartley]

I saw one of those Obey Giant "Hope" posters in the crowd at the LA Oprah rally before Super Tuesday, and it struck me I'd never seen an artist really engage with a mainstream political figure in the U.S. like that. The quality is usually more like Hillary's "Hillary 4 U and Me" video - sad, really. But those Hope and Progress posters were several notches above the rest... too bad they only had a limited printing. The very next day the few on ebay were already at $500.

If you were waiting for a candidate who can really run a campaign on people power, and therefore owe only us when he gets elected, this would be your chance.

[clsez]

CHEAP TALK is hard to buy.

So while Hillarity is denouncing Barack as all talk and cheap talk, is she doing this through a different orifice?

So when no one buys her brand of talk, does it somehow become prohibitively expensive? Emphatic yes. I say her talk has been judged overrated and her actions definitely underwhelming. See Healthcare 1.0

Also she says she is ready from day one to run a nation when her microcosm campaign is a shop of errors?

Who is still listening her vitriol?

[outnow]

The Democratic party is not going to change the rules of the game. If they were, they would have supported Kucinich or Edwards who were progressives, or in Edwards case, a man who stands on a progressive platform but who had a DLC background.

Having said that, now what's all the hype about? This is a time when a woman or an African-American could be elected president. So what, I ask? I judge a man or woman, not by the color of their skin or by their sex but by the c content of their character as MLK said.

The best indication of that is their background and their platform. Present platform, I should say, because flexibility is a sign of intelligence. Consistency on the issues is important until new information arises.

But there is another factor called "charisma." Hillary seems to exude that in private but not in public. If the voter feels that a wet blanket is being thrown on his dream, then that must be considered in the mix. The reach to the center is also important these days. I wish that were not so because the real dynamic is one of class. The bottom 80% are getting shafted. The top 1/10th of one-percent are calling the shots and profiting from every move.

Hope, hype, whatever you call it, Obama has "sex appeal" to voters. Most people aren't that bright nor educated. Older women want Hillary.

I don't have a dog in this fight. I think I'll just sit on the sidelines, see if there is a third-party challenge which would upset apple carts - not that I would vote for a third-party candidate unless it were by Bernie Sanders.

Whoever would beat a John McCain I'll vote for. Whoever is nominated by the Democratic party I will vote for; only to frustrate the Republicans. I don't believe because that means accepting something without evidence without proof and I already know these candidates well.

[eli10]

I've always found Obama's speeches to be long, boring and phony. He should make a speech just for those of us who aren't Obamabots, but might vote for him if we knew what the hell he was talking about. Leave out the Come to Jesus
parts.

[argeec]

You can hear Obama's speech in any black baptist church any sunday.
The words won't be the same, but the words don't really matter anyway - it's the cadence and tone.

[kramskoi]

he does...his new speech for non-Obamabots, as you call them, is called "vote for someone else who'll continue to peddle the politics of the past"...it would take and IQ of less than 50 not to understand the message he delivers.

I don't think that it can be dumbed down any further...you could always read both of his autobiographies if you want real insight and not tainted, ignorant, and short-sighted opinions of him...balls in your court.

[AnninCA]

I think you just need to give church a try again.

Belief in someone who says he'll agree to public campaign financing and now is taking it back?

Belief in someone who claimed not to have PACs and now is found to have donated more than 4 times what Clinton did to Super Delegates?

Belief in someone who says he's for gun control in one state and against it in another state?

Belief in someone who claims not to be playing the race card and then gets caught circulating a memo detailing how to do just that?

And that's just for starters.

There is a sucker born every minute, I hear.

I just didn't realize they'd all join up at once and chant, "Yes We Can!"

[MariaHopeful]

Just for starters? That's all you've got! And each point is debatable and even when the worst possible interpretation is applied, they all fade into insignificance when compared to what has been proven against the Clintons. We won't even talk about what is alleged against them.

Look, give it up already. This guy, this Obama is just unbelievable! He has something you can take away. He has come out of nowhere to organized the best campaign we have ever seen. He has children talking about politics. He inspires the old, the young, men, women and children. Black, white and everybody in between. Republicans, Democrats and Independents. Christian, Jews and Muslims. I am happy that I am alive to experience this. Even the most jaded are getting excited. It has reduced the vaunted Clinton machine from a Ferrari to a lemon.

[MariaHopeful]

...YOU CAN"T take away...

[basta]

to myskylark:
JFK did not do anything? He saved your unappreciative ass from nuclear war with the Russians is all he did. He knew enough not to support the Bay of Pigs, an illegal invasion of a soverign country. He started Alliance for Progress and the Peace Corp. He would have ended the Vietnam conflict if he hadn't been assassinated.

Obama has the potential to be an even greater president than Kennedy. He would be inheriting a country with graver problems. And given the sordid history of American involvement in foreign wars, Obama has learned the dictating foreign policy at the point of a gun is not working.

[trevor01]

Wow! So many great minds hoping so hard that Obama is the real deal. The only hope I can manage is that enough people will come to their senses before it's too late to take advantage of the real leadership that is on offer in this primary season.

[inthenitemare]

And who's leadership would that be?

[gcg737]

Real leadership? And that might be . . . who exactly?

There's a wonderful, subtle inversion of stereotypical characteristics in these 2 democratic candidates. Clinton operates from the mind and posits experience, work ethic, readiness, executive ability. Obama appeals to the heart, offers hope, positive possibilities, dreams, group-resp­onsiveness­, and an ideal of societal empowerment thru uniting all States, creeds, cultures in the Union.

How refreshingly reversed from the typical male/female dichotomy.

[myskylark]

And if Obama does win, what happens on the morning after? When you're drunk with exuberant hope based on an inspiring speech and you think every thing's possible, sometimes you wake up with a big hangover and the realization that maybe you've been had.

JFK is a great example of this. He was a young gifted speaker who inspired, but he didn't unite this country either before or during his presidency. That's a total myth created by the Kennedy family and a raft of revisionist politicians. He "won" one of the closest races in history by stealing it from Nixon with voter fraud in Chicago and Texas, and he was in Dallas to try to mend his Texas fences because he was afraid he might not win reelection. He was also a poor president - lots of mistakes and no great accomplishments. To the excuse that he couldn't accomplish much because he was assassinated after ONLY three years in office, please be reminded that a president's honeymoon lasts one or two years before divorce raises its ugly head.

Great presidents accomplish most of there good works before the first mid-term election, where his party usually loses seats. I loved JFK and voted for him, but my memory is not clouded by hype and Kennedy propaganda.

MLK was a truly inspired orator who didn't just speak, he led right from the beginning. He showed courage from the beginning. Barack Obama is no Martin Luther King. He tries to carbon copy the cadence , but the true leadership isn't there. He doesn't articulate what the change is or how we will get there.

I was in my 30's when JFK and MLK came into my life.

Obama is more like JFK - there's no THERE there after the pretty speeches.

Obama is not the genuine article that MLK was.

That's why I support Hillary Clinton. Give me substance over form every time.

[Seattlelite]

I know you Hillary supporters think we Obama supporters are just caught up in Senator Obama's moving speeches but let me assure you it's more than his speeches. We are not zombies following the light, we are educated people who have looked at both these candidates and determined -- both are capable HOWEVER, one has something the other does not. One has the ability to inspire and engage a public who's been asleep for decades. A candidate who's not just giving the economic plan but a vision that we can do more than politics as usual. Obama supporters understand we cannot expect any changes in this country so long as the citizens of this country are divided along party and race lines. This country has the opportunity to elect not just someone competent to be President but a competent rare talented exceptional, inspirational President who has already made this country feel better about our country and ourselves.

[clsez]

Do not try to defend it Seattle. You see, they want us to go on doing the same thing using their rationalizations. Sickos. With a chance to do something different, the fearful dare not. We do and there will be many more opportunities to go back to the stale after we try this less often repeated and empowering way.

[basta]

Imagine Bush as president in 1961. We would all have been toast. Something called the Cuban missile crisis. With Hillary in there I am not sure what would happen. She already has Putin upset with her "no soul" comment, and she being the ice lady.

[larry278]

If the old saying, "It takes one to call one.", is true-Vlad Putin is still full of shit.

[Cedman]

I think your post is well written but, I have a point for your consideration. For decades we have complained about the influence of special interest and money in our politics. Consider how Obama has impacted this race by raising money in predominantly small contributions. v. Clinton's reliance on large donations from influential people/org­anizations­. He is not pure, but it is a substantial change. Also, consider all the Clinton skeletons he could exploit but has not. This is a definite signal to how he is looking to change the tone of our politics which is desperately needed. After the last 16 years many feel that honesty and trustworthiness cannot be over valued. We have many challenges in this country that need to be addressed and, we need to work together to solve them. 51-49 splits will get the job done for a lot of issues but for the big stuff we need an American mandate. Obama offers that promise.

[ProgressiveNotLiberal]

Hillary offers the art of noise and that is all you will hear from the Right as they mobilize to beat her in November. If she could actually do something with health care, then why hasn't she in the eight years she has been in the Senate? Her own noise about her so called 35 years of experience leaps through time more than the Starship Enterprise going through a worm-hole. Her noise is just that, noise and it is not to be trusted. Her Senate voting record is the only thing one needs to listen to. It tells the truth without all the noise interfering with its interpretation.