Obama - A Promise of Change Part 7

Obamaas careful language was in stark contrast to the anger and frustration vented by black leaders of older generations. The Superdome became a temporary home to tens of thousands of storm evacuees who were stranded without supplies for days. Princeton University scholar Cornel West (ironically a hero of Obamaas) said caustically, aFrom slave s.h.i.+ps to the Superdome was not that big a journey.a The Reverend Jesse Jackson likened the Superdome in New Orleans to the ahull of a slave s.h.i.+p.a Jackson was a close friend and supporter of Obamaas, so I asked him what he thought about their different approaches toward race. The question clearly irritated him. He said he worried that the careful language of younger black leaders would cede ground that had been acquired in the long struggle to equalize the playing field for blacks and whites. (In short, he meant that many of his own crusades for racial justice might be undone.) aEvery speaker has the right to use his own style and try to a.s.sess his own angle,a Jackson said. aBut I was on I-90 in New Orleans when we saw people by the thousands and they were dying in peopleas arms. They were putting people in buses by blocks, women here and children there. And I said it looked like the hull of a slave s.h.i.+p. And it did.a Jackson was particularly perturbed by an editorial in the editorially conservative Chicago Tribune that compared the words of Obama and Jackson. The newspaper harshly criticized Jackson for viewing the tragedy in racial terms while Obama saw the issue not as entirely racial but as a matter of social justice among all economic cla.s.ses. Jacksonas aracism charge is simplistic and ridiculous,a the newspaper said. aBut it also could prove dangerous if it fosters the impression that government emergency plans arenat whatas really in need of fixinga. What played out in New Orleans was more about economic cla.s.s than race. The Senateas only African-American understands the distinctiona"and the need for the nation to address it with more than inflammatory rhetoric.a Thinking back on the editorial agitated Jackson, who shuffled his feet and wriggled in his chair. Obama asaid he didnat see race, he saw cla.s.s. I saw race because I was there. It was impossible not to see race if you were there,a Jackson said, his tone growing almost defensive. aThe Tribune editorial board took the position that an enlightened young guy saw cla.s.s, but an old guy saw race. But the whole world saw what it was. It was poor cla.s.s and black race in the hull of a Louisiana s.h.i.+p.a Jackson then worried that young blacks who had not gone through a tumultuous racial past might be more immune from seeing racism when it was before them. He also said that the conservative bent of the country since the Reagan era gave black politicians less ability to talk boldly about racial injustice. aI was jailed [for] trying to use the public library. I remember blacks being drafted for World War II and you couldnat vote,a Jackson said. aI think Barack chooses to walk a very delicate balance, but sometimes it is not your walking that is the issue, it is what is beneath your feet. The right wing radically s.h.i.+fted the earth. It isacontract compliance and affirmative action that has made [Obama] possible. When the laws of the last fifty-one, fifty-two years that made his advance possibleathey are taken away, you have to fight.a Jacksonas racial anger and Obamaas conciliatory tone represented the debate within the black community about how to approach modern race relations. As Jerry Kellman pointed out, there is no cause that Obama felt more deeply about in his heart than advancing the situation of African Americans. So far, Obamaas political ac.u.men has placed him in the perfect niche of white and black appeal that has eluded almost every black politician before him. Historically, black officials hewing too closely to so-called black issues, such as safeguarding government programs for the poor and challenging the Republican Party commitment to a fairer society, often found themselves losing support among whites. Conversely, black politicians reticent about venting racial anger and who challenge African Americans to study and correct their own deficiencies often lose support in their own community. Obama has followed both of these paths and thrived nonetheless. Thus, in political terms, Obama has struck gold when it comes to race. Instead of being torn asunder trying to please each racial camp, he has strung a tightrope between the two and walked it with precision. Obama shrugged his shoulders when I offered this theory to him at the end of 2005: I think there is a generational s.h.i.+ft taking place in how core values that are important to the African-American community are expressed in a way that builds bridges with other communities. I think thereas a majority in the African-American community who recognize that we have a multiplicity of voices, and not everybodyas going to serve the same rolea"that Reverend Jackson or Reverend [Al] Sharpton is going to have a different role to play than someone like myself, whoas representing all sorts of people. I just think that I am the most prominent of a new generation of African-American voicesa[and] I actually have felt very comfortable speaking on issues that are of particular importance to the African-American community, without losing focus on my primary task, which is to represent all the people of Illinois. And I havenat felt contradictions in that process. I think that on every issue, whether itas a racially tinged issue or a foreign policy issue or a social issue, if Iam speaking honestly, if Iam speaking what I think, then usually things turn out all right.

CHAPTER.

23.

South Africa.

It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

a"ROBERT F. KENNEDY, aDAY OF AFFIRMATIONa SPEECH, CAPE TOWN, JUNE 1966.

I realize that I offer these words of hope at a time when hope seems to have gone from many parts of the world. As we speak, there is slaughter in Darfur. There is war in Iraqa. And I have to admit, it makes me wonder sometimes whether men are in fact capable of learning from history, whether we progress from one stage to the next in an upward course, or whether we just ride the cycles of boom and bust, war and peace, ascent and declinea. And then I thought that if a black man of African descent would return to his ancestorsa homeland as a United States Senator, and would speak to a crowd of black and white South Africans who shared the same freedoms and the same rightsathen I thought: things do change, and history does move forward.

a"BARACK OBAMA, aA COMMON HUMANITY THROUGH COMMON SECURITYa SPEECH, CAPE TOWN, AUGUST 2006.

Barack Obamaas journey to Africa had been planned since early 2005, shortly after he took the oath of office for the U.S. Senate. Scheduled for August 2006, it was one of the final pieces of The Plan, the two-year outline to keep Obamaas star rising and his political power at its highest ebb. As with The Plan, the trip was devised by his top political mindsa"Chief of Staff Pete Rouse, media consultant David Axelrod, Communications Director Robert Gibbs and Obama himself. The acongressional delegationa trip, or CODEL in the official parlance of Was.h.i.+ngton, was designed to be various things: a fact-finding mission for the new senator, a family visit to his paternal relatives in rural Kenya and, perhaps most important, a public relations splash. The hope among Obamaas team: to raise the senatoras profile nationally and internationally; to solidify his support among a key const.i.tuency, African Americans; and to bulk up his foreign policy credentials.

Obamaas trip, in many ways, would echo the excursions of two other iconic Democrats, both of whom took high-profile trips to Africa and reaped political benefits in the African-American community back home. President Bill Clinton, still beloved among blacks in the United States, was greeted deliriously over his twelve-day trip to Africa in 1998. And, in particular, Senator Robert Kennedyas 1966 journey to South Africa, where he forcefully denounced apartheid, sent a clear message to blacks in the United States. Kennedyas trip is the venture that Obamaas most resembleda"two young, charismatic, idealistic senators with presidential aspirations reaching out to desperately poor blacks on the globeas most often ignored continent. Images of Kennedy being mobbed by African blacks were beamed back to America through newspaper and television. aI believe there will be progress,a Kennedy told residents of Soweto. aHate and bigotry will end in South Africa one day. I believe your children will have a better opportunity than you did.a And Kennedyas aripple of hopea speech (actually t.i.tled aDay of Affirmationa) is considered by some RFK biographers to be his best.

Because of the trappings that accompanied Obamaas incredible star power, the African enterprise was much more successful as a major media hit than as a mission to imbue a first-term senator with greater knowledge about Africa. The trip took on a special fascination among the press because of the astounding market success of Dreams from My Father, of which a large portion was devoted to Obama traveling to Kenya in his early thirties to study his paternal African heritage and connect with his Kenyan relatives. In August 2006, the national media and various segments of the American public were enthralled with Obamaas life story, and this was another way for them to explore his history and, consequently, another way for Obama and his aides to advance the rapidly growing legend around that unique ancestry. Thus, the trip became the focus of enormous media attention. Needless to say, with a swarm of Kenyan, American and international reporters doc.u.menting his every public move, it proved difficult for Obama to have anything close to a anormala CODEL.

This is not to say that Obamaas goal in traveling to Africa was not rooted in a certain idealism. Even before he was elected, he had visions of visiting that continent as a senator. In addition, conversations I had with Obama along the 2004 campaign trail made it abundantly clear that the atrocities of Darfuras civil war were a deep source of concern for him. In those conversations, Obama was hesitant to prescribe a specific solution for the civil war, but he believed that the African conflict deserved greater attention in U.S. foreign policy. As such, he also told a roundtable of journalists at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004 that the two places he would most certainly visit after his election were the Middle East and Africa. Also, as a senator, Obama was successful in pa.s.sing an amendment to a 2006 Iraqi spending bill that increased aid to the Republic of Congo, one of his few legislative accomplishments as a new member of the minority party.

So in charting Obamaas first two years in office, Obama and his advisers carved the Africa trip in stone. The idea, Gibbs told me in March 2005, just a few months into Obamaas term, was to send the senator into the 2007a"2008 national election cycle with his public image as strong as ahumanly possible.a Gibbs was not specific about whether that meant readying Obama for a presidential run or as a viable vice-presidential selection for whomever the 2008 Democratic Party nominee turned out to be. Gibbs was not specific because, in early 2005, Obamaas long-term political fortunes as a senator remained a mystery, and at that point it would have been viewed as arrogant to have 2008 presidential aspirations, even if that was the case for Obama, Gibbs or other advisers. Furthermore, if a presidential run was the ultimate hope, there was no way to gauge if Obamaas celebrity would remain strong enough to make a 2008 bid for the White House politically viable. But his advisers certainly were charting a bold course to strengthen and expand Obamaas national reputation quickly, and those larger career decisions would come as events unfolded, all dependent on the execution and outcome of The Plan.

aKenya will just be crazya"the media, the people, everything will be insane,a Gibbs told me over a breakfast plate of eggs Benedict in a Chicago restaurant back in March 2005, a year and a half before the trip. As usual, his instinct was dead on the mark. The fifteen-day trip was organized to include visits to five countries, but the bulk of the journey was to be spent in South Africa and then Kenya. After Kenya, Obama had planned brief visits to the Congo, Djibouti and the Darfur region of Sudan, site of the b.l.o.o.d.y conflict that was killing thousands of Sudanese a month and displacing millions more. But Kenya, the homeland of his father, was the physical and emotional centerpiece of the CODEL. Since Obamaas election to the U.S. Senate, Kenyans had adopted him as one of their own, and his rapid ascent to political power in the United States had made him a living folk hero in the East African nation, especially among his fatheras native tribe, the Luo. A beer named for Obama had gone on the Kenyan market after his 2004 convention speech (Senator beer); a school in rural Kenya was named in his honor; and a play based on his Dreams memoir had been staged earlier in 2006 at the Kenyan National Theater. Thus, Obamaas brain trust expected large, enthusiastic crowds once he reached Kenya. And they were not to be disappointed.

On my way to Africa, I encountered Obama in a bookstore in the Amsterdam airport on the layover between my flight from Chicago, his from Was.h.i.+ngton and our connecting flight to South Africa. He wore his typical uniform designed for anonymitya"a light charcoal gray synthetic jacket and a Chicago White Sox baseball cap fixed low over his eyes. We exchanged greetings and I did not try to engage him in a long conversation, realizing that we would be seeing each other every day for the next two weeks. Instead, I went into my campaign posture of giving him s.p.a.ce, largely because of what I had seen awaiting him at the gate for the plane: nearly a dozen journalists, a handful of them toting video equipment. The media insanity was about to ensue. For the next couple of weeks, it would seem, Obamaas every utterance and mannerism would be captured on video or audio.

OBAMAaS AFRICAN ADVENTURE BEGAN IN CAPE TOWN, THE PICTURESQUE city at the far southern tip of the continent. His first morning opened rather inauspiciously. At our hotel, the Table Baya"a modern, upscale facility that anch.o.r.ed a sprawling mall complex on the Cape Town harbora"an emba.s.sy official greeted him by asking if he had ventured out the night before with some of the media and other members of his CODEL. aI canat hang with these guys in their twenties and thirties,a a tired-looking and raspy-voiced Obama answered somewhat tersely. By then, Obama had completed his second book, The Audacity of Hope. But a year filled with late nights of writing, a day job as a senator and weekend duties as a husband and father had taken its toll on him physically. Now, after another night in a faraway hotel at the end of a seemingly endless plane ride (actually, it was twenty-two hours), Obama tried to suppress his routine morning grumpiness. In any case, Obama no longer drank and was never one to grab a beer in the hotel lobby while on the road. At the end of the day, he would disappear into his hotel room and watch ESPN or touch up his speech for the next day or, more likely, both.

That morning, the reporters and videographers in the entourage got their first taste of the lack of organization behind the media end of the trip. The American-based reporting gaggle was already about a dozen deep, including several magazine writers, two doc.u.mentary film crews and newspaper reporters from the Tribune and Sun-Times in Chicago and the Post-Dispatch in St. Louis. Yet despite all these inquiring minds, there was no physically produced schedule for the dayas events. A couple of reporters openly groused about this state of affairs, and it was obvious that Gibbs had no clear idea how to control or appease all of us. He explained the night before that Obama had been permitted by Senate ethics officials to bring along only two Senate staff members on the CODELa"himself and Mark Lippert, Obamaas foreign policy adviser. The lack of advance planning would soon wear on all involved, including Gibbs. But this was another example of Obamaas lack of real power in Was.h.i.+ngton. Democrats were in the minority, and he had no leverage to convince the Republican administration that his trip was different from that of the rest and that he would need additional staffing, particularly to handle the media. Axelrod suggested that he hire a professional public relations firm from campaign funds to help organize the trip. aBut the lawyers wouldnat let us do it,a complained Axelrod, who was not on the trip. The result was that Gibbs told the reporting entourage in scattershot fas.h.i.+on what would be happening next.

The first event that day was the most significant: a cruise to Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela spent eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison. This would be a day of symbolisma"a black American politician visiting the solemn site where Mandela was incarcerated for leading, and ultimately winning, the fight against an unjust, virulently racist society in South Africa. If Obama were lucky, this story line would play across the globe on major networks and in major journalistic publications. And to this point in his Senate career, Obama had not been short on luck.

As the ferry pushed off from the Cape Town harbor, Obama settled into a seat next to his guide for the day, Ahmed Kathrada, an apartheid-era African National Congress leader who was jailed for eighteen years on Robben Island, much of that time alongside his friend Mandela. Kathradaas current appearance belied his youth as a rebel. He was slight of stature, bespectacled and wore white Nike running shoes and a maroon fleece jacket, which gave him the look of an innocuous tourist rather than a retired antiapartheid activist. As the low morning suns.h.i.+ne illuminated Kathrada and Obama in a yellowish glow, still photographers snapped pictures and doc.u.mentary film crews scurried about. Furry boom microphones hovered overhead as Kathrada provided Obama with a historical overview of the prison site. Obama initially shot a wary glance at the big microphones but soon went about his business as just another celebrity tourist to the island, a place that had been visited by such luminaries as Bill Clinton and Oprah Winfrey. Over the course of the day, Kathrada would tell Obama that guards kept the roughly fifteen hundred prisoners in nearly complete societal isolation, refusing, for example, to tell them that Americans had landed on the moon. They were permitted only to send out one five-hundred-word letter every six months. Obama also learned that a caste system based on the shade of oneas skin had been in place in the prison. Lighter-skinned prisoners of Asian heritage like Kathrada, who were called aAsiatics,a were treated slightly better than darker-skinned African blacks.

Once the boat docked, Obama and Kathrada led the march of media and other interested parties up to the uninhabited prison about fifty yards away. The spotlessly clean facility was constructed of gray stone, quarried on the island by the former prisoners, and had been slightly renovated into a museumlike showpiece. The two men stepped down the narrow hallways and quickly reached Mandelaas cramped prison cell. Photographers and reporters pushed together outside the door to doc.u.ment the moment inside, hoping to hear anything that Obama might utter and grab a clear photo of him inside the cell. Just then, Pete Souza, the veteran Chicago Tribune photographer, with a keen eye for the dramatic, scrambled away from the pack and into the prison yard, where he hopped up on a gray wooden bench just outside the small, barred window to Mandelaas cell. Souza later explained that he had remembered a famous photo of Clinton visiting the cell that had been shot from that external vantage point, and he sensed that the same image of Obama would be perfect. Several others followed Souzaas lead and ran after him in hot pursuit. A photographer inside the cell mentioned the Clinton shot to Obama, prompting the senator to respond with aOh, really?a Talking with Kathrada, Obama had already taken clear notice of the history behind hima"and now he suddenly took notice of the historic media opportunity before him. With Souza outside shooting through the window, Obama straightened his shoulders, pushed his jaw forward and squinted his eyes into a serious gaze. Souzaas photo in the Tribune the next day, which ran across the globe on wire services, offered a pensive-looking Obama peering out the window from behind the steel bars. Several other photographers filed a similar captivating image. Though there were several more hours of public appearances, with that serious pose, Obamaas work for this day had been done.

His second day in Cape Town again revealed his deft political touch, although it was more cerebral and less theatrical in nature. He visited a community health center that mostly treated AIDS patients, consulted with an outspoken AIDS activist and shared a private moment with a beloved global figure, n.o.bel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu.

In 2006, South Africa was suffering through one of the most severe AIDS epidemics in the world, with one in five people in the nationa"nearly five milliona"infected with the virus, according to the United Nations. South Africaas leaders had come under heavy criticism for promoting its spread through unsound public statements that flew in the face of scientific evidence. A former South Africa vice president, for example, had recently conceded that he had unprotected s.e.x with a woman suffering from AIDS. And not only that, the politician claimed that a shower afterward would reduce his risk of infection.

The health center was located in Khayelitsha, a poor towns.h.i.+p amid miles and miles of tin-roofed shantytown shacks in stark contrast with the modernity of Cape Town. Outside the clinic, Obama was pressed by reporters to speak about South Africaas AIDS crisis and what should be done to quell it. Obama had been seeking a meeting with the countryas president, Thabo Mbeki, who was one of the politicians who seemed least concerned about the deadly impact of AIDS on his const.i.tuents. Mbeki had publicly questioned whether the HIV infection led to AIDS, a scientific fact known the world over. Here, Obama was caught in something of a dilemma. How broadly should he criticize the current government and risk scuttling his potential meeting with Mbeki?

Obama chose to come out swinging. He charged that the government was in adeniala about the crisis, and he advocated a asense of urgency and an almost clinical truth-tellinga about the spread of the disease. aItas not an issue of Western science versus African science,a he said. aItas just science, and itas not right.a He then dropped that dayas major headline: He would take an AIDS test when he reached Kenya in hopes of erasing the stigma behind the disease among Africans. AIDS is spread primarily by heteros.e.xual s.e.x in Africa, yet most Africans choose to die rather than be tested. With these controversial proclamations, it now looked unlikely that Obama would meet with Mbeki to lobby him to address the AIDS crisis. Yet however ephemeral his statements were that morning, Obama gave voice to a crisis that was killing hundreds of South Africans per day. Few world leaders had spoken out so vigorously on the handling of the crisis by the South African government. aIt sends this message of political leaders.h.i.+p, of being prepared to be open about HIV,a said Zackie Achmat, one of South Africaas most notable AIDS activists. aWe wish more politicians were that honest.a The afternoon meeting with Desmond Tutu was a low-key affair. It was held in Tutuas office inside a rather prosaic stretch of two-story, yellow-brick commercial buildings that looked as if they would fit comfortably into a nondescript office park in suburban middle America. Tutu wore a gray cardigan sweater and gray pants. In a brief appearance before reporters, he lavished praise on his celebrity visitor. He told Obama, aYouare going to be a very credible presidential candidate.a To this, Obama replied with his aAw, shucksa demeanor, although he didnat seem at all rattled by such a prominent figure envisioning great things for him. Tutu joked, aI hope that I would be equally nice to a young white senator.a After a chuckle from Obama, Tutu added: aBut I am glad you are black.a Back in Cape Town that evening, Obama delivered a fairly noncontroversial forty-three-minute address before an attentive audience culled by a progressive think tank. Gibbs handed reporters a copy of the speech, but as he often did, Obama deviated from the prepared remarks almost immediately. aWell, he stayed with it through the first ten words,a Gibbs said to me with a roll of his eyes.

In this speech, t.i.tled aA Common Humanity through Common Security,a Obama stressed his familiar theme of an interconnected humanity. But here in South Africa, the common bond was not just among good-hearted Americans but among well-meaning people stretching across borders and across continents. He cited Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther Kingas influence on the antiapartheid movement in South Africa, and how that movement, in turn, spurred activism back in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s. He said modern threats such as AIDS, nuclear proliferation, terrorism and environmental degradation should bind people together across the globe, not divide them. He offered few specifics as to how that should occur, but a.s.serted that there should be an aoverarching strategya to coordinate cooperation among nations, with the United States playing a leading role. He called on America and South Africa to partner to help weaker nations abuild a vibrant civil society.a His penultimate moment came when he observed that his very presence in Africa provided living proof that humanity was moving forward. He closed with that favorite quote from Reverend King about the arc of the moral universe slowly bending toward justice.

Obama was still fatigued, and consequently he walked fairly dryly and slowly through the well-written text. A magazine writer asked me later if I had ever seen Obama look this tired, and thinking back to that commencement address when he was so sleep-deprived that his knee buckled onstage, as well as other such occasions, I replied that I had. But as is often the case, his energy level spiked when he finished with the prepared speech and took audience questions. At the conclusion, audience members, many of whom had never heard of Obama, showered him with hearty applause. Several attendees whom I interviewed said they were in full agreement with his hopeful message, but one noted that it fell well within a conventional political framework. aIt was very interesting and he is very level-headed. I certainly think he is a very good amba.s.sador, a very able politician,a said David Wheeler, a retired university instructor. aHe put across the position of the United States as being beneficial to the rest of the world.a It was also worth noting that Obamaas underlying message was that a black politician from the United States who had African roots might just be beneficial to the rest of the world as well.

BY THE THIRD DAY, FATIGUE WAS SETTLING OVER THE MEDIA ENTOURAGE, and frayed nerves were evident from even the most patient individuals in the group. Immediately following Obamaas speech the night before, we had left Cape Town and driven a couple of hours to Pretoria. The next morning, after a short nightas rest, reporters gathered in the Pretoria hotel lobby and readied themselves to be hauled off to that dayas events, which at this point were unknown to them. This fact had already irritated several reporters, who had wanted to know how to prepare for the day. As the media grumbled, an emba.s.sy official appeared. He informed us that Obama had no public events scheduled for that day. This did not shock me or anger me, since Gibbs had told me before we departed that there would be adown days.a But it did come without fair warning. The news particularly unsettled several newspaper reporters, whose editors most likely were expecting a story to be filed every day. What were they to file today?

Patience with Gibbs and the lack of advance work was now extremely thin. It did not go unnoticed that he did not deliver this unwelcome news himself, but sent an emba.s.sy official to face the media. aHeas a total obfuscator,a a doc.u.mentary filmmaker said of Gibbs. (One doc.u.mentary film crew had been hired by Axelrod. The second was on contract with Hollywood actor Edward Nortonas production company.) Not only had precise scheduling been absent, but there had been virtually no access to Obama in private moments. Unstaged moments often make the most tantalizing scenes of a doc.u.mentary. But as I had learned two years before in the Senate campaign, Obama intensely guards his personal time, what precious little of it there is. And in his weary state, he certainly would not agree to cameras invading his hotel room or his traveling vehicle. Nor would he countenance a writer sitting next to him and gauging his private moods. My long-standing relations.h.i.+p with Obama perhaps gave me the best opportunity for direct access to the senator, but ever since Gibbs appeared on the scene in the general election campaign and began his long, tightly controlled reign over media relations, I had learned to live with greatly restricted access compared with the early Senate campaign days. And by now, I had also reconciled myself to the fact that no amount of pus.h.i.+ng Gibbs would change this reality. Indeed, even the doc.u.mentary crew most sympathetic to Obamaa"the group hired by his own media consultant to produce flattering footage that would be used as campaign materiala"was irritated about the lack of private access to the senator.

Fortunately for the newspaper reporters, the day soon provided some real newsa"none of it good for Obama. He learned that, indeed, President Mbeki would not meet with him. The official reason: an Iranian delegation was in Johannesburg for a summit to discuss their countryas decision to move forward with a uranium enrichment program. aIt would look inappropriate if the president were to meet with Obama with the Iranians here,a an official with the U.S. Emba.s.sy said. Obama later speculated that his harsh words about the government on the AIDS crisis did not help his cause. The second bit of bad news was that Obama was forced to cancel his visit to the Congo because of violence surrounding a presidential runoff election. These events occurring in tandem emphasized that, despite the media glorification of this trip, Obama had no actual power to affect global policy. Indeed, even if he were a senator idolized by Americaas progressives and canonized in the media, he really was not a major player on the world stage. At least not yet.

To satiate the unfed American reporters, who hadnat seen the senator all day, Gibbs made Obama available for a news conference in our Pretoria hotel in the early evening. Obama arrived in black suit jacket and white s.h.i.+rt, but quickly noticed that the a.s.sembled reporters were dressed down. We had been tourists most of the day, after all. To fit in with the reporters, Obama slipped off his suit coat and dropped into a soft chair in his stock white dress s.h.i.+rt. He slowly rolled up his sleeves to look even more casual. And for the first time on the trip, he looked fresh and physically rejuvenated. He certainly had gotten some badly needed rest that day, as well as a badly desired visit to the gym. I learned later that he had worked out and followed it with a long nap, two things that Gibbs most likely did not want reported back in the American newspapers. One could envision that headline: aObama Lands in Pretoria, Takes Nap, Hits Gym.a Obama was his typically collected and well-spoken self during the news conference. Nevertheless, he tightened considerably when questioned by the two reporters who had covered him most aggressively back in Was.h.i.+ngtona"Lynn Sweet of the Sun-Times and Jeff Zeleny, then of the Tribune. Since arriving on the continent, these two fiercely compet.i.tive journalists had been in a fitful contest to send home the most scintillating tidbits about Obamaas adventure, and both had been working and cajoling Gibbs mercilessly. Sweet was constantly in his face, while Zeleny plied him with drinks at the bar late into the evening. Sweet was pulling multimedia duty and was a perpetual ball of chaos. She not only filed daily stories but auth.o.r.ed a blog for the Sun-Times website and sent back both video and still photography. Not being trained in television media, she produced video dispatches that had the feel of narrated vacation footage. Moreover, her constant battles with the wobbly tripod that held her video camera provided amus.e.m.e.nt to all around. The thirtyish Zeleny penned daily stories and, along with Souza, compiled several handsome audio-video packages for the Tribune website. Sweet, a veteran Was.h.i.+ngton reporter whose demanding manner could border on abrasive, had long tested the nerves of Obama. He had once hung up on her in a phone interview. And Zeleny, in addition to pus.h.i.+ng Gibbs for information, was not shy about stepping up to Obama whenever a pertinent question struck him. The often imperious senator seemed to maintain a level of respect for Zelenyas professional dedication, but at the same time it was apparent that he preferred to own his personal s.p.a.ce at all times, and Zeleny did not mind invading it. For all of this tension, Obamaas Africa visit received mostly positive and nearly play-by-play coverage on the websites of both newspapers, leading his critics to charge in web postings, quite incorrectly, that Zeleny and Sweet were, in fact, media toadies for the senator.

In the press briefing, Obama told reporters that he had been careful not to criticize the United States too harshly while he traveled abroad, but said he could feel in South Africa asome negative impressions outside our borders that weare going to have to deal with.a He said Americaas decision to invade Iraq was responsible for that. aI think the perception is that not only did we act unilaterally, but that we have essentially determined that our interests and concerns and viewpoints are the only ones that are relevant,a he said. aYou hear a lot of discussion that the United States dictates its foreign policy as opposed to cooperating with other nations. So I think there is a lot of work that weare going to have to do in the coming years to recover the levels of legitimacy that I think we had.a He also addressed questions about how he felt bringing a media circus with him to visit his Kenyan relatives. He had last visited Kenya fourteen years before while researching his Dreams memoir, and he had come alone. He was far from alone now. aIam going there as a United States Senator, but this gives me an opportunity to reconnect and find out whatas going on and find out what folks need,a he said, sidestepping the question. aMy antic.i.p.ation is that I will be able to help in the future in terms of projects and ideas that they want to pursue. But no matter what happens, there is always going to be some level of discomfort just because there is this huge gulf between life in the United States and life in Kenya.a Obama also said that he worried that his visit would be ahijackeda for political gain by some Kenyan politicians, particularly the Luo tribe, to which his father belonged. This, as it would turn out, was a legitimate fear.

Day Four in Africa jumped headfirst into activity. We drove to Soweto, a Johannesburg suburb that gained international attention in June 1976 with the Soweto Uprising, ma.s.s riots spurred by the white governmentas decision to force black students to be educated in the Afrikaans language rather than in English. Soweto is now a middle-cla.s.s suburb of blacks that houses a museum dedicated to the uprising and its most famous victim, Hector Pieterson, a thirteen-year-old killed when police opened fire on protesting students. With Hectoras sister Antoinette as his guide, Obama toured the Pieterson museum, which is largely ignored by the locals but draws a good number of tourists. A few American tourists who patronized the museum recognized Obama, shook his hand and asked for autographs. The museum workers, meanwhile, asked reporters who he was.

With media crews buzzing around them, Antoinette solemnly walked Obama along the museumas exhibits. They gazed at photographs of Mandela and other images from the antiapartheid movement. When they reached the most dramatic moment of the tour, Obama knew exactly what to do. The two stopped in front of a wall-sized print of the iconic photo of the lifeless body of Antoinetteas younger brother as he was carried from the protest scene in the arms of another young man. The riveting image, taken by a news photographer, was publicized around the world and helped to galvanize the international community against apartheid. Though the focus of the photo is on the limp dead teen, the vieweras eyes also wander to seventeen-year-old Antoinette running alongside the young man holding her dead brother. Her mouth is agape and her right hand is raised helplessly into the air. In a afeel-your-paina moment reminiscent of Bill Clinton, Obama slid his long slender arm across Antoinetteas shoulders and pulled her against his thin torso. She reached around his waist and pulled him tighter. The two lingered in front of the huge photo as flashbulbs feverishly flickered behind them. aThat was the shot there, man,a the Tribuneas Souza observed. aJust a great shot, and Obama knew it.a Outside, through a light rain, Obama offered a short speech as he stood with Antoinette before a memorial to her slain brother. Obama often pays tribute to the leaders of the civil rights movement in the United States by saying that their efforts paved the way for his success. Here in Johannesburg, he did much the same, noting that his first political activism came in college when he protested apartheid and advocated divestment of American funds from South Africa. aIf it wasnat for some of the activities here I might not have been involved in politics,a he said.

The next quick stop was a museum in Soweto dedicated to Rosa Parks, the black seamstress who helped launch the civil rights movement in the United States by refusing to give up her seat to a white person on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Obama glad-handed the curious onlookers throughout the museum, which truly resembled a small library, and then ran across something that prefaced events to come later in the tripa"a framed black-and-white photograph of Robert F. Kennedy during his seminal trip to South Africa in June 1966. Kennedy, standing atop the roof of a car amid a sea of black South Africans, was leaning forward and extending a hand to the enthused crowd. In the coming days, there would be scenes similar to this one for Obamaa"only they would play out in his homeland of Kenya. Here in South Africa, he was barely recognized. Seeing the photograph, Obama could not help himself. He glanced down at the image and a half smile grew from a corner of his mouth. aYou know,a he said to a person in the entourage, amy desk in the Senate is the same desk that Robert Kennedy had.a Whether Obama had meant to draw a parallel or not, the image was drawn.

CHAPTER.

24.

Nairobi.

This is where he belongs. He just goes there to work [in America], but he should and will come back home to be one of our own.

a"A KENYAN WOMAN.

Obamaas arrival at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi the next day bespoke the utter madness that was to mark Obamaas six-day Kenyan adventure.

The difference between the cultures of South Africa and Kenya was immediately evident. Nairobi is a city of more than three million people, but the first thing one notices after arriving at the airport from South Africa is the lack of white people. And the whites who were there, like me, were immediately approached aggressively by any number of smiling Kenyans and offered a.s.sistance, by carrying a bag or giving directions or supplying a taxi. This a.s.sistance was for a fee, of course.

Another noticeable difference in Nairobi was the ubiquitous presence of uniformed police officers, many of them toting a.s.sault-style rifles. The atmosphere was far less Western-oriented, more fragile and clearly more dangerous than in Cape Town. Nairobi might be Kenyaas capital and the center of culture, business and politics in all of East Africa, but it had been pushed into becoming a modern urban mecca far too fast. In the early 1960s, the cityas infrastructure had exploded into place after Kenyans won independence from colonialist Britain. This had resulted in some neighborhoods appearing completely modern, and even middle-cla.s.s or better, by Western standards. But not far away were sprawling slums without potable water, indoor plumbing or electricity. Roads curved for no apparent reason, and traffic lights seemed to barely contain the autos speeding along the streets. Paved sidewalks were nonexistent, with pedestrians walking along uneven red-dirt paths in close proximity to moving traffic.

Kenya was a functioning democracy, but it still operated heavily on a tribal caste system. Political parties were divided along the various ethnic tribal lines. Bitter rivalries existed among these tribes, and the resultant political warfare had severely hindered economic and civic growth. Obamaas father hailed from the Luo tribe, which made up about 13 percent of the countryas population and had a strong farming background, mostly in the western region.

Only a few minutes after my arrival at the airport, I noticed that certain crimes were either overlooked or, perhaps, encouraged. Once I claimed my luggage, I went to confirm my flight reservations to ensure that arrangements for my departure six days later were in order. As I waited in line, two white European men in their fifties talked with a tall, lithe Kenyan woman who appeared to be in her early twenties. The men squeezed the attractive young womanas behind, ran their hands up and down her thighs and then offered her a small wad of money, which she stuffed into a pocket in her tight white jeans. The men looked as if they were measuring cattle, but she didnat seem the least bit offended and, ultimately, walked away arm in arm with each of them. To be sure, such a transaction might occur in airports in any number of cities around the globe. But what was most revealing: This one went down just several feet from a cl.u.s.ter of uniformed police officers in berets, dark uniforms and with a.s.sault weapons in their hands.

The senator had traveled from South Africa on a U.S. government jet, and by good fortune or bad luck, some of us in the media were at the airport when he landed. Obamaas staff had hoped to keep his entrance a secret, but of course Kenyan politicians had tipped favored reporters to his evening arrival time. Most of the American reporting gaggle would have missed it too if it had not been for an unsettling occurrence. Axelrodas camera crew was held up at the baggage entrance trying to get its video equipment through security. Kenyaas reputation for rampant corruption was well known, and back in the States, the leader of the doc.u.mentary crew, Bob Hercules, had sent money ahead to a Kenyan afixera to ensure that their equipment would make it through the customs agents. Nevertheless, Hercules soon found that the paymenta"a bribe, if you willa"had not secured safe pa.s.sage. (Another media crew from Chicago also paid a bribe to get its equipment through. Together, the bribes equaled about eighteen hundred dollars in U.S. currency.) As Hercules and his crew haggled with airport officials to get their equipment released, the environment outside the terminal suddenly changed. An eerie silence washed over the evening dusk and about a hundred people started gathering in small groups along the roadway and in the medians. They were strangely quiet, expressed little emotion and were all looking toward a building in the front of the airport where a couple of dozen security personnel had gathered. In a hushed voice, a man explained, aObama is here.a Ah yes, the young prince was returning to his fatheras homeland.

A moment later, Gibbs popped out of the building, quickly surveyed the scene and disappeared back inside. So I headed toward the building, where a clutch of media and police had ama.s.sed, and soon grew aware that being white might actually be a plusa"it might get me through the thicket of bodies that had been cordoned off by police. What else could a white man with a notepad and camera be other than a Western-based news reporter? Sure enough, police allowed me and a magazine reporter past the first media barricade.

With Gibbsas help, we wended our way through the mob of people inside the building before Gibbs put a hand on my upper back and pushed me into a small back room where Obama was enduring a quick photo aspraya with select Kenyan media. The media hit had been thrown together on the spot, and it showed. There was no focus to it. Obama had only agreed to sit down for the shot when the foreign minister told him that he wanted to atake care of my guys in the press,a Gibbs later explained. aBarack didnat want to say no, so we sat down and did it. It wasnat our idea.a The photo spray lasted all of two or three minutes. Some people carried cameras and some did not. It was difficult to distinguish the journalists from the onlookers, the plainclothes authorities from the civilians. People without the proper clout were physically escorted out of the room. Those with journalistic clout, including myself and a couple of other American journalists in the Obama entourage, were permitted to stay. Dressed in one of his navy blue suits and a light blue s.h.i.+rt, Obama was sitting on a chair with the Kenyan deputy foreign minister. Cameras whirled all around. Obama smiled and tried to look relaxed, but I could see by his rigid jaw that his Hawaiian calm was eluding him. When Gibbs abruptly announced that the spray was ending, Obama tried to ease the tense and chaotic atmosphere by telling the a.s.sorted gathering, aYouall be tired of me by the end of the week.a Outside, another hundred or so people had gathered along the streets leading up to the various terminal buildings. They stood under palm trees and along curbs and one man hoisted a little girl onto his shoulders. I stepped across the small street from the building and watched as Obama made his first public appearance as a U.S. senator in his fatheras homeland. To my surprise, when he came through the doors, the crowd reacted with near silence. They simply stood and watched in quiet reverence. Obama, with a government official at his side, stepped quickly toward an awaiting white Ford Explorer parked at the curb just a few steps from the building. Gibbs had instructed him not to stop and take questions, or even acknowledge the cameras and gathering crowd. But Obama walked up to the vehicle and could not help but look out to the people. Discarding Gibbsas advice, he seemed to realize that it might appear impolite to altogether ignore the crowd around him. Besides, as a skillful politician, it is deeply ingrained in Obamaas psyche to acknowledge an audience ama.s.sed for his benefit. Finally, one photographer yelled at him, aWave!a So Obama raised a crooked arm and waved stiffly, like a wiper across a caras winds.h.i.+eld, or like the infamous Richard Nixonas bon voyage wave as he stepped onto the plane after resigning the presidency. Obama then flashed a forced smile and ducked into the SUV. The vehicle burned rubber as it sped away, with a twelve-car convoy piloted by emba.s.sy officials and police in tow. The scene more befitted a visiting head of state than a junior member of a foreign countryas legislature. I breathed a heavy sigh and felt the adrenaline rush begin to subside. This was clearly not going to be the same laid-back atmosphere as in South Africa, where our subject could roam the streets in relative anonymity and events seemed more orchestrated than organic.

Obama moved swiftly to the hotel in the speeding caravan, but the rest of rush-hour traffic was stymied, thanks to Kenyaas widely acclaimed guest. The bus carrying my grouping of the media gaggle took an hour to reach the Nairobi Serena Hotel, even though it was just a few miles away. Roads were closed all through downtown to allow Obamaas motorcade easy access, and this severely jammed up traffic. At the hotel that evening, the first order of business for Obama: interviews for the Chicago TV media. Each of Chicagoas major network-affiliated stations had sent a reporting and camera crew to cover the Kenya visit. International press, including writers for Time and Newsweek magazines, had also arrived. David Axelrodas old media chum Mike Flannery from Chicagoas Channel 2, a CBS affiliate, headed Obamaas interview list. The relations.h.i.+p between Flannery and Obama extended back to at least the Senate campaign, when Flanneryas coverage of Blair Hullas marriage files and drug use contributed to the burial of Hullas candidacy. aHowas it going so far, Robert?a Flannery asked Gibbs upon spotting him in the hotel lobby. aOh,a replied a harried Gibbs, aIam like a one-legged man in an a.s.s-kicking contest.a Gibbs, endeavoring to bring a sense of order to the chaos, held a 9:15 p.m. briefing for reporters in a casual meeting room on the hotelas ground floor. The vibrant aroma of after-dinner coffee, one of Kenyaas primary crops, emanated from the restaurant area of the hotel. Reporters filled a long table, some couches and a handful of chairs. Gibbs finally had preprinted daily schedules for us. There were a number of new faces in the press corps, including international wire services and, most notably, the Chicago crews. Gibbs warned that a frenetic atmosphere would be the norm. aIam not sure if you folks were at the airport,a he said. aBut weare going to find that even when things are not advertised, some Kenyans will gather.a Some Kenyansa"that would prove the understatement of the week. aWhat we learned todaya"expect the unexpected,a Gibbs said in concluding the briefing. aNow the fun begins.a OBAMAaS FIRST OFFICIAL KENYAN FUNCTION OPENED THE NEXT morning, and it highlighted the deified nature of his presence to many Kenyans. Mich.e.l.le and their two daughters had arrived the evening before, and the family appeared at the Nairobi State House for a morning ceremony welcoming the senator. The event was held outside the State House under a tent. Dozens of emba.s.sy employees, both black and white, wore orange-and-yellow T-s.h.i.+rts with obama in the house emblazoned on the front. Songs had been composed for Obamaas visit, and a group of clapping and finger-snapping Kenyans harmonized over these lyrics: aWhen you see Obama has come to Kenya, this day is blessed.a As Obama opened his speech, he was interrupted by a friendly, but misplaced voice. Eight-year-old Malia shouted to her father, aDaddy, Daddy, look at me!a No one could have been more pleased to see Obama, yet felt less blessed, than Christopher Wills, an a.s.sociated Press reporter based in Illinois. Wills had covered Obama when he was still in the state legislature and the burgeoning Obama phenomenon was still relatively confined to progressives and blacks in the United States. Thus, the AP honchos in New York and London made no objection to Wills being the lead reporter on the trip to Africa. Wills promised his editors in Illinois that he would write a couple of newsy feature stories from Kenya. By the time Wills arrived in Nairobi, however, the dynamics had s.h.i.+fted greatly within the AP. The wire serviceas London bureau had finally recognized the significant media buzz that Obamaas journey was drawing worldwide. As a consequence, the APas Nairobi bureau chief was nagging Wills by cell phone to supply half-hour updates on Obamaas every move, giving Wills a severe case of the jitters. This unexpected turn of events came after Wills had undergone an agonizing experience with the Kenyan emba.s.sy in the United States to attain the proper travel credentials. Obama is always mindful to cultivate friendly relations.h.i.+ps with the reporters who cover him, and he is happy when there are a good number of them around. He is happiest, though, when they are kept at a safe distance. So when Obama spotted Wills amid the media gaggle, he made sure to acknowledge him. Or perhaps, less cynically speaking, Obama simply spotted a familiar face and it comforted him. With Obama, as with many of the best politicians, it is never perfectly clear whether he is being politic or merely human. In either case, in contrast to the regal nature of the proceedings around him, Obama yelled out from his crowd of Kenyan government dignitaries, aChris Wills! You made it! You got your visa!a A slightly bewildered Wills didnat seem to know how to react to the unexpected shout-out. He responded: aUh, yes, Senator. Thank you.a Obama met that morning at the State House with senior government officials, including Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki. After triumphing in the December 2002 elections, Kibakias National Rainbow Coalition (nicknamed Narc) took control of the government in 2003, ending nearly four decades of rule by Kanu, the Kenyan African National Union. Kanu was widely viewed as corrupt and had been accused of land-grabbing and raiding public coffers for private enrichment. Kibaki won the office on a pledge to rid the countryas inst.i.tutions of corruption and revitalize its economy. But more than three years later, corruption persisted, the economy was largely stagnant, and Kenyans who had been optimistic at Narcas electoral success were again pessimistic about the direction of their country and its inst.i.tutional leaders.h.i.+p. aPeople have just kind of given up on the government,a a veteran Kenyan journalist, Dennis Onyango, told me. aThey feel weall never get what we want.a Obama, in his meeting with Kibaki, discussed with the president the importance of clean government. The American senator maintained that investment from overseas would never arrive if Kenyaas government and business communities remain soaked in graft. He cited the airport bribes paid by Chicago media crews as evidence that corruption remained pervasive, that it was a corrosive element in everyday society and that it negatively impacted Kenyaas international image. Kibaki replied that he was working to stamp out corruption and promised to look into the airport bribes.

Obamaas next stop was a meeting with government officials and business leaders at a restaurant secured in a plaza behind huge wrought-iron gates. Judging by the secluded design of the restaurant, which made it easy to protect with a couple of guards at the closed gates, I a.s.sumed that it was the site of many high-level lunches among top Kenyan politicians.

It was here that we would first witness the intensity of emotion that Kenyans felt toward Obama, the emotion we had read about beforehand in various media accounts. Those news stories had not been overblown. Outside the restaurant, workers of many pursuits, all hungry for a glimpse of their American hero, had left their jobs to crowd atop balconies, huddle in doorways and press against the iron fences. Obama met privately for lunch with local officials and, as we waited, reporters fanned out to interview the Kenyans ama.s.sing outside the gates. The interviews bore out the state of idolatry surrounding Obama among the Kenyans.

To some, he was a native son who had risen to great power in the worldas most influential nation, and because of this he gave them hope that they or their children could persevere and succeed in their own daily lives. To others, he was an all-powerful political figure who could put Kenya on the worldwide radar. To still others, he was nearly a deity, an ethereal figure who would bring riches and all good things to Kenya from the promised land of America. This last group believed that Obama truly belonged in Kenya, not America.

A forty-year-old woman named Catherine Oganda maintained that Obama ultimately would choose to leave America and live in Kenya: aThis is where he belongs. He just goes there to work [in America], but he should and will come back home to be one of our own.a I asked why she believed that, and she continued: aBecause the father is a Kenyan. You know, your father is your bloodline; itas not your mothera"it is your father. So you belong where your father comes from, in your fatherland. Kenya is in his blood.a A fifty-year-old man named John Nyambalo had a slightly different take, but one that was no less divorced from reality. He saw Obama as a living representation that the United States had overcome racial intolerance. aIf the Americans can select a senator like Obama,a he said, athat means that Americans embrace the whole world and they are true democrats. There is no racism there.a After lunch, our caravan headed to the memorial that had been erected at the former site of the U.S. Emba.s.sy, which had been car-bombed in 1998, killing nearly two hundred and fifty souls. The deadly bombing, later linked to the Islamic fundamentalist terror movement that struck the United States on September 11, 2001, had helped to create a bond between the United States and Kenya. Both countries suffered from the attack. Dozens of people stood at the entrance of the memorial site waiting for Obama, with Mich.e.l.le and their two young daughters among them. Obama shook the hands of a long row of current emba.s.sy staff on his way up toward the site, with Mich.e.l.le nearly last in line. The last few introduced themselves to Obama, and then Mich.e.l.le smiled and held out her hand and offered the same, as if she were just another member of the greeting party. aIam your wife, welcome,a she said with a warm smile. ah.e.l.lo, Wife,a Obama said with a playful grin.

Gleaming in a brilliant sun, the memorial itself stood at the far end of a plaza just beyond a small fountain. It was rather una.s.suming, giving the appearance of an elongated headstone on a burial plota"a concrete block in the shape of a half-moon rising from the plazaas bricked surface. Its facade was a sheet of brown marble with the names of the deceased etched in it, as well as the following epitaph: aMay the innocent victims of this tragic event rest in the knowledge that it has strengthened our resolve to work for a world in which man is able to live alongside his brother in peace.a A couple dozen photographers and TV reporters were a.s.sembled at the far end of the plaza, readied for the shot of Obama at the memorial. Through the trees that guarded the memorial site, located in the heart of Nairobi, I could see a large crowd a.s.sembling in the streetsa"more Kenyans with hopes of catching just a pa.s.sing glimpse of Obama. Also witnessing the scene were workers in a seven-story office building that overlooked the park. They leaned out of big steel-framed windows and peered down on the proceedings with rapt attention. With his right arm wrapped around Maliaas waist and Sasha standing at his left elbow, Obama sat down at a white-clothed table and signed an official guest book before heading over to the memorial with his family in tow. He carried a wreath and laid it gently at the foot of the tombstone. Then he turned to a small group of officials huddled to his right as photo and video crews knelt and stood not far to his left, their cameras clicking away.

Scanning the epitaph, Obama bowed his head and offered his own words of consolation and remembrance: aThe tragedy that happened here is a reminder that, ultimately, all of us suffer from conflict and, ultimately, all of us suffer from terrorism. But we have to redouble our resolve, as the memorial says, to find ways to live in peace and to find ways to resolve our conflicts in a way that does not result in the kind of tragedy that occurred here. We will not forget whatas happened here. We want to make sure that all of us are vigilant in terms of preventing it from ever happening again.a After the brief ceremony, Obama was taken inside a nearby building to chat with emba.s.sy and other government officials. Malia and Sasha, dressed in bright pink tops and white skirts, were set loose to play in the memorial area that doubled as a small corner park. I hadnat bothered a tired-looking Mich.e.l.le when she first arrived at the hotel the day before, so this seemed like a good opportunity to reconnect. She was strolling around, shaking hands and eyeing her daughters as they ran about happily. But our chat was cut short. Immediately after we exchanged greetings, a roar erupted from beyond the trees. Its sheer volume startled Mich.e.l.le. She leaned her upper torso far backward and a stunned look crossed her face. aOh my goodness! What was that?!a she exclaimed. aThat,a I said, ais for your husband. He must have come out.a The wondrous look slightly receding from her face, she replied innocently, aOh, my! For Barack?a Clearly, Mich.e.l.le was in no way prepared for this overheated response to her celebrity husband.

We both headed for the narrow exit to the memorial and Mich.e.l.le was gobbled up into a pack of security personnel. The crowd in the streets, consisting mostly of men, had reached a state of euphoria. They were cheering in full throat, standing atop cars, dancing, whistling and screaming and waving their arms wildly. Police had established a perimeter at the edge of the street. Yet even though the crowd seemed wild and uncontrollable, no one had stepped a single foot past the Kenyan officers, as if an invisible wall held them in check. The people were chanting in unison: aObama, come to us! Obama, come to us!a I looked for the senator and spotted him to the right along the perimeter with several security officers packed around him for protection. He was feverishly shaking hands with members of the fawning crowd in a surreal press-the-flesh moment. With each step he took toward the street, closer to the frenzied ma.s.s of people, the chanting rose a notch in volume. aObama, come to us! Obama, come to us!a I watched the senator from a safe zone inside the perimeter about ten paces behind him. Incredibly, the scene was growing ever more chaotic as Obama worked his way closer to the belly of the throng. A horse carrying a police officer, spooked by the noise and instability of the crowd, bucked his front legs into the air and nearly kicked me in the head before the officer reined him in. aBe careful! Donat get yourself trampled!a warned a perpetually tense Jennifer Barnes, the emba.s.syas media liaison. As I wandered closer to the edge of the perimeter, within a few feet of the first row of people, a woman from the crowd suddenly lunged toward me and grabbed my left bicep. Before I could pull away, an officer swung his black billy club and cracked the woman square on her forearm. Her arm fell limply to her side and the officer pushed her back into the sea of people with his club, swiping his club casually, like a chef pus.h.i.+ng a pile of crushed onions across a cutting board. I decided that I better keep a safer distance from the crowd. The scene was so full of heightened emotion that even the most innocent acts became hyperreality. Bill Lambrecht, a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, handed a woman a piece of paper from the emba.s.sy that contained background information on Obamaas visit. Lambrecht figured she could have it as a souvenir. Five men immediately jumped the woman and successfully ripped the paper from her hands. Lambrecht shook his head in discouragement upon seeing what his nice gesture had wrought.

Just then, as I turned backward and took a few steps, I saw Obama heading in my direction. It became apparent that I was about to be sandwiched between two surging walls of humanitya"the crowd before me and the crowd behind Obama. Unfortunately, I had no security detail guarding me from harm. To escape the fate of trampling, I galloped sideways to an opening. Standing in this safe spot was B