Barack Obama

Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii to Barack Obama, Sr. (born in Nyanza Province, Kenya) and Ann Dunham (born in Wichita, Kansas). Barack Hussein Obama (born August 4, 1961) is the junior United States Senator from Illinois and a member of the Democratic Party.

Obama grew up in culturally diverse surroundings. He spent most of his childhood in the majority-minority U.S. state of Hawaii and lived for four years in Indonesia. Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention while still an Illinois state legislator. Since announcing his candidacy in February 2007, Obama has emphasized ending the Iraq War and implementing universal health care as campaign themes.

As a member of the Democratic minority in the 109th Congress, Obama co-sponsored the enactment of conventional weapons control and transparency legislation, and made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Obama's parents separated when he was two years old and later divorced. His father went to Harvard University to pursue Ph.D. studies, then returned to Kenya, where he died in an auto accident when the younger Obama was twenty-one years old.

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Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/31/AR2007073100578.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns
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His father went to Harvard University to pursue Ph.D. studies, then returned to Kenya, where he died in an auto accident when the younger Obama was twenty-one years old. Also during the first month of the 110th Congress, Obama introduced the "Iraq War De-Escalation Act," a bill that caps troop levels in Iraq at January 10, 2007 levels, begins phased redeployment on May 1, 2007, and removes all combat brigades from Iraq by March 31, 2008. Obama has divested US$180,000 in personal holdings of Sudan-related stock, and he has urged divestment from companies doing business in Iran. Obama was sworn in as a Senator on January 4, 2005. In early May 2007, the U.S. Secret Service announced that Obama had been placed under their protection.

Partnering first with Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN), and then with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), Obama successfully introduced two initiatives bearing his name. " In January 2007, Obama spoke at an event organized by Families USA, a health care advocacy group. In 2000, he made an unsuccessful Democratic primary run for the U.S. House of Representatives seat held by four-term incumbent candidate Bobby Rush. In a June 2006 podcast, Obama expressed support for telecommunications legislation to protect network neutrality on the Internet, saying: "It is because the Internet is a neutral platform that I can put out this podcast and transmit it over the Internet without having to go through any corporate media middleman. But in a December 2006 Wall Street Journal editorial headlined "The Man from Nowhere," former Ronald Reagan speech writer Peggy Noonan advised Will and other "establishment" commentators to get "down from your tippy toes" and avoid becoming too quickly excited about Obama's still early political career. Obama's fundraising prowess was affirmed again in the second quarter of 2007, when his campaign raised an additional $32.5 million, the most ever raised by a Democratic Presidential candidate in a single quarter. An October 2005 article in the British journal New Statesman listed Obama as one of "10 people who could change the world. Obama encouraged "others in public life to do the same" to show "there is no shame in going for an HIV test. The first such poll, taken in November 2006, ranked Obama in second place with 17% support among Democrats after Sen. Obama's parents separated when he was two years old and later divorced. Agreeing with Obama's own assessment that "people project their hopes on him," Noonan attributed some of Obama's popularity to "a certain unknowability." In 2000, he made an unsuccessful Democratic primary run for the U.S. House of Representatives seat held by four-term incumbent candidate Bobby Rush. In September 2006, he was the featured speaker at Iowa Senator Tom Harkin's annual steak fry, an event traditionally attended by presidential hopefuls in the lead-up to the Iowa caucus. In Dreams from My Father, he ties his maternal family history to possible Native American ancestors and distant relatives of Jefferson Davis, president of the southern Confederacy during the American Civil War.