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Below is a list of Barack Obama’s friends and roommates who knew him in high school and college. * Robert McCrary a former classmate at Occidental College. McCrary is now a general manager of a contract sewing company. He saw Obama as "cocky, sometimes arrogant...and not open to others." * Paul Carpenter Obama's freshman roommate at Occidental and now a Los Angeles lawyer. Carpenter recalls Obama being a "a good bodysurfer", "an athletic guy", and "superbright". * Margot Mifflin, a friend from Occidental who is now a journalism professor at New York's Lehman College. * Jon K. Mitchell a friend...

Obama spent the six years between 1979 and 1985 in Los Angeles at Occidental College and then in New York at Columbia University and in the workplace. His memoir, "Dreams From My Father," talks about this time but not in great detail; Siddiqi, for example, is identified only as "Sadik" — "a short, well-built Pakistani" who smoked marijuana, snorted cocaine and liked to party. Obama's campaign wouldn't identify "Sadik," but The Associated Press located him in Seattle, where he raises money for a community theater. Together, the recollections of Siddiqi and other friends and acquaintances from Obama's college years paint...

In his best-selling autobiography, "Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance," presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., writes movingly about his high school best friend, whom he calls "Ray." Ray's real name is Keith Kakugawa. And Kakugawa's life could not have veered more starkly from that of his old friend, the presidential candidate. Kakugawa is currently homeless in Los Angeles, sleeping in the beat-up Mazda of his friend Jason Myles. He has been in and out of prison for the past few decades, mostly on charges related to cocaine possession and dealing. "To be honest with you,...

Two Delaware residents are giving new meaning to the term "pushing" Obama, according to criminal drug charges filed Thursday. Fifty-two bags of heroin in bags stamped both with letters spelling out OBAMA and an image in the likeness of Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama were confiscated following a routine car stop on Interstate 95 in Upper Chichester, according to Pennsylvania State Police.

Compensation figures for his legislative staff reveal that Obama pays women just 83 cents for every dollar his men make. Obama’s average male employee earned $54,397 Obama’s female employees [earned] $45,152, on average. McCain’s male staffers averaging $53,936. His female employees averaged $55,878.

With 15 electoral votes up for grabs in New Jersey, 47 percent of registered voters in the state said they support Sen. Barack Obama for president while 40 percent said they back Sen. John McCain in the presidential race, according to a new Marist College Institute for Public Opinion poll. (Snip) However, Obama’s lead shrinks when looking at likely voters, including those who are leaning toward a specific candidate.

According to a new Marist poll: NJ Poll LV's: 48-45 Obama

CNN Transcript, 09/12/2008: KOCH: Plucky is a compliment but when I say she [Palin] scares the hell out of me, I use one illustration. There are others. Of her allegedly, according to "The New York Times," it's in dispute but "The Times" has not retracted, that she went to the library in the town of which she was mayor and she told the librarian she'd like to have certain books censured. COSTELLO: I think that has been disputed and we have found it's not true. KOCH: No. It's been disputed - COSTELLO: It's not true. KOCH: But "The New York...

"'Barack Obama supports teaching sex education to kindergarteners,'" said Obama mimicking Keyes' distinctive style of speech. "Which -- I didn’t know what to tell him (laughter)." "But it’s the right thing to do," Obama continued, "to provide age-appropriate sex education, science-based sex education in schools."

LEBANON, Virginia - What's the difference between the presidential campaign before and after the national political conventions? Lipstick. The colorful cosmetic has become a political buzzword, thanks to Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's joke in her acceptance speech that lipstick is the only thing that separates a hockey mom like her from a pit bull, an aggressive dog breed. Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama told an audience Tuesday that his Republican opponent John McCain says he'll change Washington, but he's just like President Bush. "You can put lipstick on a pig," he said to an outbreak of laughter, shouts...

In an election for President of the United States in North Carolina Tuesday, Republican John McCain suddenly and breathtakingly surges to a 20-point win over Democrat Barack Obama, 58% to 38%, according to this latest exclusive SurveyUSA election poll conducted for ABC11-WTVD.

A fired-up Sen. Barack Obama: "We may think this is Mohammed the terrorist, it might be Mohammed the cab driver. You may think it’s Barack the bomb thrower, but it might be Barack the guy running for president"

Obama, the former constitutional law professor argued, "what I have also said is this: that when you suspend habeas corpus which says very simply if the government grabs you, then you have the right to at least ask, 'Why was I grabbed?', and say, 'Maybe you’ve got the wrong person.' "The reason you have that safeguard," he said, "is because we don't always have the right person. We don’t always catch the right person. We may think this is Mohammed the terrorist, it might be Mohammed the cab driver. You may think it’s Barack the bomb thrower, but it might...

Sarah Palin’s baby shower included a surprise guest: her own baby. He had arrived in the world a month early, so on a sunny May day, Ms. Palin, the governor of Alaska, rocked her newborn as her closest friends, sisters, even her obstetrician presented her with a potluck meal, presents and blue-and-white cake. Most had learned that Ms. Palin was pregnant only a few weeks before. Struggling to accept that her child would be born with Down syndrome and fearful of public criticism of a governor’s pregnancy, Ms. Palin had concealed the news that she was expecting even from her...

Democratic vice presidential nominee Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., his wife, Jill, center, and Michelle Obama, wife of Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., applaud during talk on the final night at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Thursday, Aug. 28, 2008. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

If John McCain becomes the nation's 44th president, it may be thanks to Michigan -- a prize the Republicans think they can claim for the first time in nearly 20 years.Sen. Obama is the one who might face an uphill battle. For starters, he chose not to participate in Michigan's primary in January -- a decision that now deprives his campaign of a ready-made network of supporters. (Michigan held its primary earlier than the national Democratic Party wanted, so Sen. Obama and several others stayed off the ballot in solidarity with the party.) At the same time, Sen. McCain plays...

ST. PAUL — Senator Barack Obama will increasingly lean on prominent Democratic women to undercut Gov. Sarah Palin and Senator John McCain, dispatching Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to Florida on Monday and bolstering his plan to deploy female surrogates to battleground states, Obama advisers said Thursday.Advisers to Mrs. Clinton said that she stood ready to help the Obama-Biden ticket, but they urged the campaign not to overestimate the impact Mrs. Clinton could have, noting that she had other commitments this fall, like campaigning and raising money for Senate candidates. Obama aides said the Clinton trip had been in the works...

NBC talking head Chris Matthews has confirmed to former Reagan White House Speechwriter Peggy Noonan that he will challenge Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter in 2010 because he believes Specter will be too old to be effective. Matthews told Noonan that Pennsylvania voters view him as a "local guy." Chris Matthews may look in the mirror and see a US Senator but I see nothing other than a self important windbag. Matthews, known best for slagging his fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton and his abusive nature with underlings at MSNBC, has also been known to comb his hair for hours before his...

Barney Frank, one of two openly gay members of Congress and a prominent voice on gay rights, told the Associated Press that it's okay to go after kids in a political campaign

WASHINGTON - Rep. Barney Frank is among the first Democrats to publicly say Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s family background, including the pregnancy of her unwed teenage daughter, should be fair game for campaign discussion. "They’re the ones that made an issue of her family," Frank, D-Mass., said Tuesday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.