The Other Man of the Hour [BHO blast from the past 2004]

washington times ^ | July 27, 2004 | Mark Leibovich

[smokingfrog]

Barack Obama needs a nap. His flight arrived from Springfield, Ill., at 4 a.m. and he was awake at 6 to do "Meet the Press," then "Face the Nation," then CNN's "Late Edition." This is an impressive regimen for anyone, especially a little-known senator from Illinois. That would be a state senator from Illinois.

Obama has not been elected to the United States Senate. He is merely a candidate -- a dynamic, stirring and potentially historic candidate who would be the only African American in the U.S. Senate and just the third since Reconstruction. But still a candidate nonetheless.

"I'm not someone who takes hype so seriously," he says, which doesn't stop hypesters from taking Obama seriously. Or people from asking him -- with some regularity and straight faces -- when he will run for president.

It didn't stop the Kerry campaign from asking him to give tonight's keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention. And it isn't stopping delegates, senators, members of Congress, governors and mayors from mobbing him this week. This is the inevitable result of what Obama calls "being the flavor of the month, or the flavor of the week, or whatever."

With his smooth face and sheepish grin, Obama looks younger than his 42 years. He is trying to leave a brunch hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus aboard a docked cruise ship in Boston Harbor, but it's difficult for Obama to duck out of anywhere these days.

"Okay, folks, I'm gonna try to go get a nap," Obama keeps telling people to punctuate his 30-second conversations.

[smokingfrog]

The last few paragraphs are the best.

[Vendome]

Obama has done all of his scheduled TV interviews for the day and all that's left on the schedule is a reception hosted by the Illinois delegation and another one later by Gov. Rod Blagojevich. And, he boasts, "I can stagger through receptions with the best of them."

Rod who?

He runs his finger down his cheek to reveal a smudge of TV makeup. He is concerned that he looks like Michael Jackson. He looks toward his wife, Michelle, who is walking with him.

"Does anybody have any of that stuff that takes makeup off?" Obama asks. The question goes unanswered, and the most celebrated state senator in America mentions again that he needs a nap.