This is just another example of Obama being flexible with timelines and other pesky things. I think he was unopposed for re-election in 2002 but I had trouble verifying that quickly. In 2002 he was starting to talk to his backers about possibly running for the Senate in 2004; in reality, he was "running" for federal office before he was even in the IL state senate. I have an article that discusses his early ambition from one of the Chicago papers, I think from 2004.

I really fear that Obama will blow up in our faces before November and then lose to McCain. Obama's compelling life story is too often a misleading work of fiction. I started noticing the many problems when I tried to reconcile the versions he presents in his books and elsewhere with the versions reported elsewhere. While many candidates attempt some version of the "log cabin to the white house" narrative for their life, an epic struggle of how through their hard work, family sacrifice, and the grace of God, they were able to overcome enormous obstacles and prove the doubters wrong.

Over the last 5-6 months there have been a number of MSM articles interviewing his and his parents other relatives, classmates, business associates, etc. from around the world. With these articles as starting points, I tried to independently verify points that seemed to conflict with other versions. I now have a timeline that seems relatively consistent with regard to the different versions, with the discrepancies mostly limited to the versions from Obama. I am working on a journal article documenting all this as starting point in sorting all this out.

Almost every article I read contradicts some key item in the generally-accepted life story. For example, his mother has morphed from "a white woman who grew up in Kansas and left there to attend college in Hawaii where she met and married Obama's father" into "a self-proclaimed marxist and atheist who grew up near Seattle and, after high school, moved with her parents to Hawaii and attended college there, meeting and becoming pregnant by Barack Sr. while she was still 17".


In all this mess are several things that look substantial and could be at least as damaging as Rev. Wright. While nearly everyone seems caught up in gotchas, insults, and believing the worst RW attacks on fellow Dems, we are not focusing on really learning about Obama and where his problems might be while we still have time. Sept or Oct is too late. Do your own homework and see if you can disprove the growing list of RW allegations. Visit a few of the sites rabidly RW to learn what they are using in their attacks. Do not get too smug and dismissive of their points; there might just enough to backup their allegations and to keep the attacks alive.


For a little fun, I have thought of doing "How well do you know your Obama" test. Some things are just trivia, other more important. An example of trivia in the category "Where's Obama?" and with the date February 1962. PM if you think you can document this.