One of the catalysts for Obama Baton was a growing concern that this election would become about the little things. That is, over the final month of the race, this country would get caught up, bogged down, and sucked into the specifics. At best, I thought, we’d watch debates on small parts of policies (”$18B in earmarks” of the $438B deficit) and at worst we’d be distracted by poor word choices (”that one” from last night). And not that those details don’t matter but I worried that it would be easy to lose sight of the bigger picture:
We have one candidate that has re-energized the American people around our future. He has certainly built interest in politics, but more importantly, he has moved us to take responsibility and action.
So in a sense, this election is about the little things. But not the policy specifics or nuances of speech; rather, all the little acts and achievements of individuals and groups of people throughout the U.S.
It will be easy to trivialize this. The same way you can trivialize the artists he has inspired to make posters and t-shirts, the designers he has inspired to make websites, the citizens he has inspired to vote for the first time, the community organizers…
Yet the fact is Barack Obama has inspired me to do something just like he’s inspired many others to contribute to changing our world for the better. That’s why I am (now we are) running with a blue baton instead of empty-handed.