I was walking down my street recently and found myself looking up, for about the hundredth time, at the face of Barack Obama staring back at me.
That same face is pasted to the dorm and apartment windows of many students at UCLA, and they all offer the same one-word message: HOPE.
These posters that so plentifully line the walls and windows of UCLA students and undoubtedly many other college students around the country, demonstrate, on a small scale, just what Barack Obama has become ““ a symbol for the youth of America.
For us, Barack Obama represents more than just another presidential candidate in yet another presidential race; he is a transformational candidate, he is a generational candidate, he is our candidate.
Like it or not, we have come of age in a time of terrible uncertainty, led collectively by a president who has taken this nation and turned it upside down. An unwarranted war in Iraq has defined our foreign policy, the Patriot Act has trampled on our constitutional rights, a thirst for oil has destroyed our hopes for a sound environmental policy and now an economic crisis has brought this country to its knees.
And yet we have hope that these blunders can be reversed, that America can be reborn and that Barack Obama will be the one to fix this nation.
Obama represents a new kind of foreign policy: one that is not afraid of global partnerships and recognizes the wisdom in communicating with our friends, as well as our enemies, abroad. He embodies a farsighted environmental policy that will commit to eliminating our dependence on foreign oil within ten years and create five million new jobs. And his oratoricall abilities are exactly what this country needs to improve our image at home and around the world.
But perhaps Barack Obama’s most inspiring attribute is his idealism, a quality which is too often criticized in a deeply cynical world.
It is through this idealism that students can identify most with this man. As students, we tend to think big. Our youth allows us to see a future that is spread wide before us and within which we have time enough to accomplish almost any goal. As time passes, this vision can fade, but Obama has shown, perhaps more than any presidental candidate before him, that idealism is not naive, but is, in fact, the only way to bring about a more perfect union.
Yet as students who have taken an American politics class know, our government is extremely difficult to change dramatically. And over the past month or so, Obama has started to stray away from the soaring rhetoric of his early campaign. “Since getting nominated,” said political science professor Andrew Sabl , “(Obama) has tried to act older, be more prosaic, reliable, and paced instead of exhilarating.”
Obama is trying to support the broad ideas of his early campaign with more down-to-earth policies that are both concrete and specific.
But this raises the question, can he establish the sweeping change he has spoken so passionately about in the past with the policies he is promoting today?
Bondy Owens, a third-year world arts and cultures student, said, “I think (Obama) is going to have a hard time meeting all the goals he’s talked about in his campaign. But I do think there is something different this time … he might not get everything done, but I think he’s started something big.”
This “start” that Bondy speaks of is what really matters. Barack Obama is a beginning, and we will be the ones who see his vision, and our vision, to fruition. The question is, can we meet this challenge? Can we make these dreams a reality?
George Bernard Shaw said in a quote often recited by Robert F. Kennedy, “Some men see things as they are and say, “˜Why?’ I dream things that never were and say, “˜Why not?'” Barack Obama is undoubtedly a dreamer. He is not afraid to ask, “Why not?” And that is why Barack Obama has become a symbol for American youth. That is why he stirs up hope in so many citizens around this country, especially the idealists here at UCLA.
The word “hope” proudly proclaimed in print in the windows of so many students shows the power of his inspiration and the simplicity of his message. And while “hope” can seem like a broad generality, it holds very specific meaning for many of Obama’s supporters. It signifies the tide on which Obama will ride into office as the next president; it is a call for politics of vision and idealism; and it emphasizes the passion with which Obama supporters at UCLA and around the nation are willing to answer Obama’s call with a resounding “Yes we can!”
E-mail Fitzpatrick at cfitzpatrick@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.