“A state senate seat in the area where I lived opened up and some people I knew in the community got involved and asked me if I’d be interested. I did what every black man does when confronted with a major decision like that: I prayed on it, and I asked my wife.” (Laughter.) “And after consulting those two higher powers I did what every first-time candidate does, which is to talk to anyone who will listen to you. I’d go to PTA meetings, I’d go to the barbershop, I’d go to softball games, and everywhere I went I’d get the same two questions. First question: Where’d you get that funny name, Barack Obama? Although people would mispronounce it. They would call me Alabama, they called me Yo’ Mama.” (Laughter.) “But the second question was what led me to run for President. People would ask me, ‘You seem like a nice guy, you have a fancy law degree, you make a lot of money, you’ve got a beautiful, churchgoing family, why would you want to go into something dirty and nasty like politics?’” -- Barack Obama, speaking at Algona High School in Algona, Iowa in April 2007
Sources
New Yorker, May 7, 2007, p. 56
