When everything that could go right did

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama seems to effortlessly shrug of all the mud thrown at him by the increasingly negative campaign waged by Republican rival John McCain.

From his name surfacing in the Rezco scandal during the primaries; on to his associations with incendiary pastor Jeremiah Wright, and 1960 radical Bill Ayers. There have been some slips-up, like the “spread the wealth around” remark that gave Mr McCain the opening to go on the assault about Mr Obama’s alleged socialist policies; and the earlier reference to “bitter” small towns Americans clinging to guns and religion.

There have been slurs about Sen Obama being a secret Muslim; the issue of his middle name, Hussein, and his untypical surname for an American, Obama; the stories about being born in Kenya and therefore not qualified to run for the US presidency.

Whatever has been thrown at him, Mr Obama has moved on with barely a pause and there has been no major blip in his ratings. Instead the more mud that Mr McCain’s camp has thrown at Mr Obama, the more the democrat has thrived. The McCain campaign itself has suffered the negative feedback, coming across as bitter, angry, vindictive and desperate.

Which makes pundits say that Mr Barack Obama might be the ultimate “Teflon Candidate” — nothing sticks to him.

Political metaphors

The teflon has been described as one of the most enduring political metaphors of modern times. In 1983, a young Democratic Congresswoman from Colorado, Pat Schroeder, said of the then President Ronald Reagan: “He has been perfecting the Teflon-coated presidency. He sees to it that nothing sticks to him.”

She explained later that she was making eggs for her children when she realised that all the accusations and scandals that came President Reagan’s way never stuck, as if he had the Teflon coating of a non-stick frying pan.

From Reagan, the Teflon President who could get into mud and come out clean, there was a worthy successor in President Bill Clinton.

Since then, the term also found its way across the Atlantic to Britain where former Prime Minister Tony Blair was often referred to as “Teflon Tony”.

Everything about the political history and the campaign that could make history by sending the First African-American to the most powerful office in the world reads like something out of a fairy tale.

Whether it is Mr Obama’s luck or his political skill, the fact is that ever since he entered the quest for high office, everything that could go right has gone right for him; and everything that could go wrong has also turned out right.

It started from the time he made his debut into big-time politics in 2004 by vying for a US Senate seat for Illinois, after having served seven years in the state legislature.

In the Democratic Party primaries, Mr Obama — then a part-time constitutional law professor at the University of Chicago — was trailing in third place in the polls. All of a sudden he overtook everybody else and became the front-runner when the leading candidate, Mr Blair Hull, was exposed for spousal abuse in divorce papers filed by his wife.

Soon afterwards, Obama was endorsed by two of the leading papers in Illinois, the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune.

Wrote the Sun-Times in a prophetic editorial: “Obama is a rising star with impressive political skills and a keen intellect. (With seven years on the State Senate) Obama has the hands-on experience that, were he elected, would shorten the time it would take for him to become a major player on the national stage… Born to a white mother from Kansas and a black father from Kenya, reared in Hawaii and Indonesia, Obama could be the man for this time and for this place.” Mr Obama went on to easily capture the nomination, pitting him up against Republican rival, Mr Jack Ryan.

In June 2004, however, Mr Ryan was forced out of the race by a sex scandal. He was accused by his divorced wife of taking her to sex clubs and trying to make her have sex with him as strangers watched.

Family values

The drama inspired this joke from comedian Jay Leno: “Aren’t Republicans the family values people? That’s the difference between Republicans and Democrats on family values. Democrat politicians cheat on their wives. Republicans cheat too — but they bring the wife along. Make it a family event!”

Mr Ryan’s withdrawal left the Republicans in disarray. In August, the party handed its ticket to ultra-conservative politician and commentator Alan Keyes.

The Illinois Senate election turned out to be a no contest as Mr Obama trounced Mr Keyes with an overwhelming majority to take his seat as the only sitting African-American member of the US Senate and only the third in US history.

He was honoured with the podium for a keynote speech at the Democratic Party convention that year, and came out with a performance that catapulted him to the national limelight.

Fast forward to 2006, and the senator’s name started cropping up as a possible presidential candidate.

Land of his father

During his 2006 visit to Kenya, the land of his father, Mr Obama had to face numerous enquiries on whether he would be running. His answer at the time was no, he was too young in big-time politics. In an exclusive interview with the Nation at the time, he did not even want the issue broached, but it was becoming clearer as the trip came to an end that the initially unequivocal ‘no’ was turning to a ‘maybe’.

Eventually, when Mr Obama decided to take the plunge, his looked like an extremely long-shot. He was still a junior senator. He had no national political reach. He had little in terms of a powerful network within the Democratic Party. The nomination seemed to be in the iron grip of New York Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton. And he was black, shared a middle name with Hussein Saddam and his surname rhymed with Osama.

It is probable that initially, Mrs Clinton and the Democratic Party machinery did not take his candidacy seriously. There was simply too much that made his bid, though interesting from a rising black politician, just too improbable.

However, as the party primaries wore on, everybody suddenly realised just how potent his candidacy was. Ignoring conventional networking and fund-raising methods, Mr Obama revolutionised the system by applying new-tech methods to reach the disregarded grassroots. E-mail, SMS, YouTube and such methods were used to reach millions of potential voters. Donations came in not from tycoons, but from hundred of thousands of ordinary people contributing amounts as low as five dollars.

Flush with cash and an army of dedicated volunteers, the Obama campaign was able to open campaign offices across the land, reaching areas where his opponents had not even thought of establishing a physical presence. By the time the front-runner, Mrs Clinton, realised that the campaign was about to deny her the nomination, it was too late.

Yet, Mr Obama had to surmount numerous hurdles. One early challenge came from the incendiary sermons of his pastor at Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, the Rev Jeremiah Wright.

Once videos were broadcast of the fiery sermons — God damn America because of its treatment of blacks and the assertion that the US brought the 9/11 terrorist attacks upon itself — the Obama campaign seemed doomed.

It seemed impossible that a candidate who had sat through the racist sermons and counted the Rev Wright as a family friend and spiritual guide would have much chance selling himself as a viable presidential candidate acceptable to the white majority.

Eventually, he overcome the storm, but shortly afterwards had to navigate himself out of another one of his own making.

In the middle of increasingly fierce Democratic Party primaries in April, Mr Obama was quoted describing residents of small-town America as bitter and therefore clinging to guns or religion.

Almost immediately, his Democratic Party rival, Mrs Clinton and Republican Party front-runner, Mr McCain, criticised him vehemently. The remarks, made before a group of potential campaign donors in California, were interpreted as arrogant and revealing elitism and contempt for ordinary and rural folk.

The Nation was present on Monday last week at a campaign rally by Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin in the small town of Leesburg, Pennsylvania, where some of signs displayed by some in the charged, mostly white, crowd read: “We cling to our guns and our religion”.

As Mr Obama neared to Democratic nomination, his wife, Michelle, also drew criticism for saying she was “proud” of her country for the” first time” in her adult life. Critics questioned why she had not been proud of her country before.

Despite these challenges, however, the controversy over the remarks died down. In the closing days of the Democratic primaries, as Mr Obama built up a strong lead, Mrs Clinton launched an aggressive campaign, like McCain is doing now, targeting the white working class in small-town and rural America by invoking racism indirectly and playing on the instinctive fear and suspicion that voters are likely to associate with an African-American president. The strategy gave her a lift in some key midwest “cowboy” states, but it was a case of too little too late.

Before taking on Mr McCain, Mr Obama first mend fences with Mrs Clinton — and her husband Bill — who enjoy the loyalty of a large swathe of the Democratic Party, particularly women and whites.

Amidst fears that unhappy Clinton supporters might throw their weight behind Mr McCain, intensive negotiations ensued to close the Democrats’ ranks behind Mr Obama. There were even suggestions of a Dream Ticket with Mrs Clinton as running mate, but that was not to be as Mr Obama settled on veteran Congressman Joe Biden.

It was when the Clinton’s eventually rallied their troops round Mr Obama that he picked up the surge that saw him overtake Mr McCain in the opinion polls.

In the last few days, the Republican campaign has also tried to exploit an Obama association with a pro-Palestinian Liberation Organisation academic Rashid Khalidi.

Sometime in 2003, Mr Obama was a guest at a farewell party for Khalidi, a colleague at the University of Chicago who was heading to New York to take over the Middle East studies programme at Columbia University.

Anti-Israel speeches were allegedly made at the party, sponsored by the Arab American Action Network; and Obama also reportedly gave a fond testimonial on Khalidi who was supposedly a close family friend.

Just a few days ago, Mr McCain started challenging the Los Angeles Times to make public a video of the party that the newspaper had received and allegedly decided to suppress.

The paper declined, citing the confidentiality under which it received the tape.

And, with voting going on today, it would appear that Senator Obama has weathered the storms in much the same way as the Teflon President, Ronald Reagan.