The Oregonian Endorses Obama!

Obama for President
by The Editorial Board
Saturday October 18, 2008, 9:01 PM
The Democrat brings a new hope to a country that badly needs it


The Oregonian
Barack Obama speaking to more than 70,000 people on the Portland waterfront.
In the century and a half that Oregon and The Oregonian have been making presidential choices, there has rarely been a time when the nation so desperately needed a sharp change in direction.

To provide that change, The Oregonian strongly urges voters to support Barack Obama.

Obama has the best chance, and the best abilities, to rebuild an American economy that has grown dangerously unstable, with government, consumers and the nation itself spiraling deeply into debt and selling off the national future to pay for daily expenses. He is the best choice to rebuild the American position in the world, to restore our ties with traditional allies, to re-make the American argument to the rest of the world.


AP
Barack ObamaCrucially, Barack Obama can recall the United States to its own highest principles and priorities. He can change course after an administration that has often cut constitutional and legal corners, and frequently stumbled into policy and philosophical embarassment.

Over his career, and over his candidacy, Obama has shown a powerful ability to reach people, especially the young, who have become indifferent or despairing about the American future. He has also conducted a long, massive, impressively orchestrated campaign that displayed his ability to remain poised, focused and organized under pressure.

That ability brought him from a longshot with a relatively slim resume to the Democratic nomination, and now the brink of the presidency.

Obama's historic role in this campaign -- the first African-American major party nominee for president -- may well strengthen his ability to make those connections. His identity and his attitude will clearly change the image that the United States presents to the rest of the world, at a time when that change is desperately needed.

The conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer, of all people, recently concluded that Barack Obama had both a first-class intellect and a first-class temperament. The next president will badly need both.