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.

Heeeeere's Valerie

The big blog herewith announces that Post writer Valerie Strauss, no stranger to these electrons, will once again take on substitute Raw duties, starting Monday, presenting her pearls of wisdom and provoking all manner of debate and discussion in these parts. Valerie is an education writer here in the Newsroom of the Future, but she has done it all--working the Foreign Desk, covering everything under the sun here and on the wires, where she served as congressional correspondent, national security editor and in various other capacities. Valerie has been a substitute columnist over in Bob Levey's Washington and she's bailed me out here on the Raw board at least a couple of times. I know you'll be kind to her and get into whatever comes our way. I'll be back in a couple o' weeks.

washingtonpost.com Fri, 03 Aug 2007 17:41:02 EDT

Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/08/03/BL2007080301619.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns
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55 million for candidates he supports and his own 2010 re-election fund. However, Ryan withdrew from the race in June 2004, following public disclosure of child custody divorce records containing sexual allegations by Ryan's ex-wife, actress Jeri Ryan. The book's last chapters describe his first visit to Kenya, a journey to connect with his Luo family and heritage. Through three televised debates, Obama and Keyes expressed opposing views on stem cell research, abortion, gun control, school vouchers, and tax cuts. The family moved to Jakarta in 1967, where Obama attended local schools from ages 6 to 10. Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention while still an Illinois state legislator. If elected, Obama would become the first non-white U.S. president. His mother married Lolo Soetoro, an Indonesian foreign student, with whom she had one daughter, Maya. Together with Warren and Brownback, Obama took an HIV test, as he had done in Kenya less than four months earlier. Questioning the Bush administration's management of the Iraq War, Obama spoke of an enlisted Marine, Corporal Seamus Ahern from East Moline, Illinois, asking, "Are we serving Seamus as well as he is serving us?" He continued: When we send our young men and women into harm's way, we have a solemn obligation not to fudge the numbers or shade the truth about why they're going, to care for their families while they're gone, to tend to the soldiers upon their return, and to never, ever go to war without enough troops to win the war, secure the peace, and earn the respect of the world. 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.