As a 47-year-old with a radiant smile and a humble background, Barack Obama is the first African American to make it this far in a presidential election. He is just one of the reasons that this particular election is so historic and regardless of who emerges victoriously from this tight race, the impact that Obama has had on the American public-on first-time voters especially-cannot be denied.

The child of Ann Dunham, who was born and raised in small-town Kansas, and Barack Obama Sr., a transfer student from rural Kenya, the Democratic candidate was raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. At the age of two, Barack Obama Sr. returned to Africa, leaving Dunham alone to raise young Barack. After his mother’s remarriage to the Indonesian geologist Lolo Soetoro, Obama moved to Indonesia until he reached age of ten. He then returned to Hawaii where he lived with his maternal grandparents.

After graduating from high school and moving to Los Angeles, Obama attended Occidental College for two years and later Columbia University, where he earned a B.A. in political science with a focus on international relations. After graduating in 1985, Obama moved to the South Side of Chicago where he worked as a community organizer through a church-based group. This particular job title has been the subject of adamant criticism from the Republican Party during this current election and the basis for the judgments that Obama lacks the experience necessary to govern a nation. While in Chicago’s South Side, Obama sought to improve the living conditions of residents of the crime-ridden area. Before leaving Chicago to attend Harvard Law School in 1988, Obama increased the community’s budget by $330,000 and established important job-training and college preparatory programs. After his first year of law school, Obama was selected to be the editor of the Harvard Law Review. The following year, Obama became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Following his graduation (magna cum laude) in 1991, Obama returned to Chicago where he had a summer internship at the law firms of Sidley & Austin. His mentor at Sidley & Austin happened to be his future wife, Michelle. They would eventually marry and have two children, the now ten-year-old Malia and seven-year-old Sasha.

The next year, Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School as a lecturer from 1992-1996. In addition to working as a senior lecturer from 1996-2004, Obama represented the 13th District of Illinois in the State Senate. Some of his most notable accomplishments while a part of the State Senate included sponsoring a law that increased tax-credits for low-income workers (ultimately leading to $100 million in tax cuts), increasing subsidies for childcare, leading a bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling and actively engaging with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms. Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate after being elected to the US Senate in 2004. There he passed his first law alongside Tom Coburn, which allowed Americans to visit www.USAspending.gov and see exactly where their tax dollars were going. The first federal legislation to be enacted with Obama as the primary sponsor was the Democratic Republic of Congo Relief, Security and Democracy Promotion Act.

Obama’s inspiring keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention made him famous among Democrats. After gaining valuable experience in the Senate, he announced his candidacy for President in February 2007. Obama and his camp went on to set a record for raising a whopping $58 million in the first six months of the year before the election (over $16 million of which came from small donations of under $200). For the majority of the campaign, Obama was neck and neck with his fellow Democratic candidate, Hillary R. Clinton. During the months of April and May, Obama received endorsements for more superdelegates than Hillary. After Obama became the presumptive nominee, Clinton suspended her campaign and endorsed him. Just before the beginning of the DNC in Denver, Obama announced his VP running mate, Joe Biden. Since then, he has focused his attention on the general election race against the Republican nominee John McCain.

Stance on Major Issues

Iraq: Obama has been quoted saying that should he become president he will end this war, “not because politics compels it…not because our troops cannot bear the burden…but because it is the right thing to do for our national security and it will ultimately make us safer.”

Energy and Environment: Obama’s goals with regards to the current state of the environment include: providing short term relief at the pumps, creating 5 million new jobs, saving more oil in ten years than we currently import from Venezuela and the Middle East, putting more than one million plug-in hybrid cars (150 mpg) on the road by 2015 and making sure that 10% of America’s electricity comes from renewable resources by 2012.

Education: Obama has come up with a “Zero to Five” Plan that will help states move toward voluntary, universal pre-school for children in any and all financial situations. He also hopes to reform the “No Child Left Behind” program and make math and science education a top priority.

Fun Facts

1. Barack Obama has been on the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine twice this year
2. In the early “90s, Barack and Michelle spent months in Bali, where Obama wrote the book Dreams from My Father, which was published in 1995.
3. In 2006, Barack played basketball with US soldiers stationed in Djibouti. He was on the Varsity Basketball team in high school.
4. Obama admits to having experimented with marijuana, cocaine, and alcohol as a teenager. He just recently quit smoking cigarettes due to his wife”s “ironclad demand.”