Why I want Obama to win

I downloaded his audiobook "The Audacity of Hope" about one or two years ago. I didn't listen to it because I thought I might like this guy. And I didn't want to like someone who might not have a chance. So I started listening right after he won Iowa. Only a few months ago I had told a friend of mine why I had no intention of becoming politically involved. Sitting there praising like-minded people and blaming everyone who did not share my views for all the ills of the city, country or even the world just doesn't make sense to me. All of us need clean air to breathe. All of us want to go out on the weekend without being stabbed. All of us want a job without having to relocate to Poland or Asia. Holding on to an ideology and defending it, regardless of what happens in this world does not help anybody.
I belong to a generation which does not believe in revolutions (at least not in this part of the world). We know that just transferring power from one to another party will not change much. We are aware of all kinds of problems which might blow up in our faces at some time in the future.
Obama can't change all these things. He can't single-handedly fight global warming, terrorism, inequality and warfare. Nobody can.
People say he has not got enough experience. Even if that was true (I can't judge that) he could appoint brilliant people with more than enough political experience. Obama has another kind of experience: the experience of graduating from the best law school but not opting for astronomic wages at a top-firm. He decided to become a civil rights lawyer. He has the experience of what living without having a lot of money is like. He has experienced the life of troubled communities because he lived in them and later worked as an organizer while others were already housing in the suburbs. He respects other faiths and views not because liberal people have to but because he took the trouble to engage with the major religions before becoming a Christian. These things are all helpful in developing one important but mostly ignored quality: empathy.
Empathy is what holds you back if you want to interrupt your opponent. Empathy is what keeps you from being cruel, not because of other people but because it would hurt yourself. It doesn't mean that empathy can solve everything. But empathy can make the difference between walking out on someone or sticking around until you understand them. And that's what is needed: understanding. You need to understand the ones who need help. You have to understand the ones whose help you need. And you have to understand those who are fighting you in order to protect yourself and your country.
This is not, as some people want to make us believe a question of inspiration or action. It's about combining the two.
Even if he loses I'm grateful to have witnessed the events of the last two months. Hope doesn't put food on the table. True. But it might drive you to the polls, to school, to working hard, to volunteering and to the lingering thought that if he got that far without big money and but high hopes you might get that little extra courage needed to see where hope could lead you.