Obamania (or Obamamania for the Syllablephilic)

Tomorrow's the big day. (Actually, it's today--I started writing before midnight but didn't finish until after.) You can watch the live stream of his announcement from his Website. Even though I'm still not convinced it's not too soon (he's barely been a national figure for two and a half years), I'll shut up about that from now on (probably). He's getting in for better or worse, so instead of being perceived as sniping from the sidelines, I'll just watch and let things play out.

He's done well in a couple of possible dust ups, essentially ignoring the Washington Post front-page story on his admission (from more than a decade ago) that he'd used drugs in the past, thus not encouraging it to get any traction, and forcefully responding to the ridiculous charges that he was some sort of radical Muslim sleeper agent, making Insight and FOX News look ridiculous for hyping the unsubstantiated charges. The claim even has its own page at Snopes.com as an urban legend.

I expect that this isn't the last we'll hear of the radical Muslim innuendo, and it may present a bit of a challenge to Obama to credibly rebut the charges without slipping into an implication that he's distancing himself from Islam itself. The dangerous charge is that he went to a Madrassa as a child and has thus been trained in anti-Americanism. In and of itself, it's not a dangerous charge that he was ever raised as a Muslim, although it's not true. The problem comes in the fact that to some people (though not people who were ever likely to vote for Obama or someone like him in the first place) equate the two, being Muslim means being anti-American. That's the mud his opponents are trying to sling at him. I've been impressed so far, and I'm curious to see how this develops.

If you're ready to jump right in, you can start getting your Obama merch right here. And don't forget, he's got the Joe Biden Seal of Approval for his cleanliness.