if you're gonna build a house
make it a home
if you're gonna pull some weight
pull your own
if you're gonna help
reach out your hand
if you're getting up
then take a stand

-Ben Harper, Fight for your Mind

Last night, Barack Obama again gave one of the most stirring speeches I've ever witnessed. They put it well at Truthdig when they wrote:

The full effect of Barack Obama’s transcendent victory speech in South Carolina has yet to be felt, but his historically stirring and inspirational words have already generated praise from around the country and even across the political aisle. Whether this speech proves to be the turning point in this election, we don’t know. What we do know is that Obama has made Hillary Clinton’s contention that words don’t matter seem so very small and suspect.

While I have my reservations about all of the candidates, I know I want a candidate who calls all of us to take part in this country and makes us believe that we, not they, are working for what is right and that we can make a difference in our country and the world.

Though I may have doubts about certain aspects of his platform, I don't question in the least the sheer force of a society that is unified in the common belief that it can make things better, and I believe that Barack Obama may be the only candidate who can offer that to us. While Sen. Obama may not be able to give us the quick fixes we so desire, he can give us ourselves. He seems to have the power to raise us up and get us out the door to make the change for ourselves. I'm beginning to think that electing Obama is, in a sense, electing everyone around the country.

And, trust me, I hate myself for say this. I've been mulling over this for some time, asking myself if I'm fostering a false sense of movement, like that first moment sitting on a train when the train next to you starts to move and you're not sure which train is moving.

But, that cliché quote that I've heard all my life, suddenly has meaning.

Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.

And the JFK comparison certainly bears new meaning this morning as Caroline Kennedy writes:

OVER the years, I’ve been deeply moved by the people who’ve told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama.

My reasons are patriotic, political and personal, and the three are intertwined. All my life, people have told me that my father changed their lives, that they got involved in public service or politics because he asked them to. And the generation he inspired has passed that spirit on to its children. I meet young people who were born long after John F. Kennedy was president, yet who ask me how to live out his ideals.

Sometimes it takes a while to recognize that someone has a special ability to get us to believe in ourselves, to tie that belief to our highest ideals and imagine that together we can do great things. In those rare moments, when such a person comes along, we need to put aside our plans and reach for what we know is possible.

We have that kind of opportunity with Senator Obama.

Here is last night's speech:

As we leave this great state, with a new wind at our backs, and we take this journey across this great country, a country we love with a message we carry from the plains of Iowa to the hills of New Hampshire, from the Nevada desert to the South Carolina coast. The same message we had when we were up and when we were down, that out of many we are one, that while we breath, we will hope.* And where we are met with cynicism and doubt and fear and those who tell us that we can't, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of the American people in three simple words: Yes, we can.

After the speech, Fanfan looked at me and said, "He's your new Ben Harper, isn't he." Not of course that I believe Harper could croon his way into the White House, or should (it would be cool to have a president who could play a mean slide guitar, though), but that he has a special talent for putting complex realities about life and the world into simple phrases that make you think about the things you do and the choices you make. It's inspiring and thought-provoking. That quality in a presidential candidate is easy to mock ("They're just words."). God knows we've been lied to for a long time now, and it's easy to forget how important hope is. Yet, it's the people's hope the keeps the stock markets rising.

* Recognize those? E pluribus unum and Dum spiro spero. The latter is the state motto of South Carolina.