It’s all about altruism, S, service to others, and CHANGE!
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What Makes Obama Run?
Lawyer, teacher, philanthropist, and author Barack Obama doesn’t need another career. But he’s entering politics to get back to his true passion–community organization.
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“Now all of this may be good political advice,” Obama said, “but it’s all so superficial. I am surprised at how many elected officials–even the good ones–spend so much time talking about the mechanics of politics and not matters of substance. They have this poker chip mentality, this overriding interest in retaining their seats or in moving their careers forward, and the business and game of politics, the political horse race, is all they talk about. Even those who are on the same page as me on the issues never seem to want to talk about them. Politics is regarded as little more than a career.”

Obama doesn’t need another career. As a civil rights lawyer, teacher, philanthropist, and author, he already has no trouble working 12-hour days. He says he is drawn to politics, despite its superficialities, as a means to advance his real passion and calling: community organization.

Obama thinks elected officials could do much to overcome the political paralysis of the nation’s black communities. He thinks they could lead their communities out of twin culs-de-sac: the unrealistic politics of integrationist assimilation–which helps a few upwardly mobile blacks to “move up, get rich, and move out”–and the equally impractical politics of black rage and black nationalism–which exhorts but does not organize ordinary folks or create realistic agendas for change.