Barack Obama:

With their words today, George Bush and John McCain called for staying the course with an endless war in Iraq and a failed policy of not talking to leaders we don’t like, but Americans of all political persuasions are calling for change. The American people aren’t looking for tough talk about fighting for 100 years in Iraq, because they know we need to end this war, finish the job in Afghanistan, and take the fight to al Qaeda. The American people aren’t looking for more of a do-nothing Cuba policy that has failed to secure the release of dissidents, failed to bring democracy to the island, and failed to advance freedom for fifty years, because they know we need to pursue new opportunities to achieve liberty for the Cuban people. If I am the Democratic nominee, I will offer the clearest contrast to John McCain’s call for four more years of George Bush’s policies, because I want to fundamentally change our foreign policy to secure the American people and restore our standing in the world.

Zachary Ellison was on BarackObama.com at around 11:50 PM (Hawaii time) when he decided to donate to the campaign.

"I looked at the counter, and it was very close to a million," says Zach, a student at University of Hawaii who works at a grocery store to help pay the bills. "I don't have much money, but I decided I wanted to be a part of this."

After the 2004 elections, Zach says he was deeply disappointed by the state of our politics. "But I discovered Obama and thought he was a really straight shooter, someone who was honest and realistic," Zach remembers. "After the DNC speech, I started following him. I read The Audacity of Hope and was really impressed with his intellect and substance."

Zach says he is most impressed by the fact that Obama stood against the war in Iraq from the beginning, before it was popular. He's also deeply concerned with student debt, and appreciates Obama's strong efforts to make college affordable.

Having attended a private college before U of Hawaii, Zach says he is nearly $90,000 in debt. "My parents are both retired and my family is not particularly well to do," says Zach, "and I'm drowning in debt."

"While other politicians have been dismissive of my generation," says Zach. "I feel like Obama speaks directly to my generation." 

When we called Zach and let him that he was the one millionth person to donate to the campaign, he said he "was shaking with excitement." Zach says he's proud to be a part of this historic achievement: "This campaign showed me that you can run a campaign in a completely different way than campaigns are tradionally run. Small donations matter. People can really get together, get organized, and get it done."

Here is Senator Obama's statement on reaching one million donors:

When I announced my candidacy a little over a year ago, I knew we wouldn't be able to compete unless hundreds of thousands of ordinary people got involved and took a personal stake in this campaign. As of today, over one million people have donated -- an extraordinary outpouring that has exceeded everybody's expectations.

There is a palpable hunger for something new in this country -- a politics that isn't accountable to K Street, but to Main Street, a politics the prioritizes the concerns of ordinary people over the clout of corporate lobbyists. One million people with one voice have registered their desire for change -- and that's a voice that can no longer be ignored.

I'm humbled by this historic total, and I'm proud of the fact that 90% of our contributions have come in amounts of $100 or less, and that we haven't taken a dime from Washington lobbyists or special interest PACs.

But what I'm humbled by most is that in this campaign, we're seeing that with each new day, someone else cares.  With each new day, somebody else believes in the possibility of change.  With each new day, someone who never thought they'd ever get active in the political process participates. Because so many ordinary people are participating this time, each day our improbable goal becomes more and more probable.    

Thanks to everybody who has been one of the million. Let's keep building this movement -- let's go change America and let's go change the world. 

Chicago, IL – Today, United States Congressman John Barrow (GA-12) endorsed Barack Obama, citing his success in the Georgia primary and his proven track record of bringing change that matters to working families.

Congressman Barrow said, “The voters in the 12th District of Georgia spoke on February 5, and the message came in loud and clear: They want Senator Barack Obama to be the next President of the United States, and I agree with them.  Senator Obama has demonstrated that he can work with folks on all sides of an issue to find solutions that make sense for working families.  That's what I've tried to do since I took office in 2005, and that's why I'm supporting him."

Senator Obama said, “I am grateful for Congressman Barrow’s support. Congressman Barrow knows through his years in local government and now representing the people of the 12th District what it takes to bring about real change in the lives of ordinary Americans. He has fought to make college more affordable and bring tax relief to working families. And I’m proud to stand with Congressman Barrow as we fight to bring about change all across our country."

For five days, Ohioans dedicated countless hours of their time to make calls for Barack. The calls were part of a contest held for Ohio residents: make the calls and meet Barack.

The top ten callers made a total of over 7,000 calls to potential Obama supporters. Using our phonebanking script and an easy-to-follow training guide, callers across the state were spreading enthusiasm about Barack and his plans for change.

The top ten callers include: Justin from Blacklick, John from Cincinnati, Martin from New Philadelphia, Tom from Stow, Rebekkah from Bexley, David from Mentor, James from Kettering, Richard from Canton, Jordan from Columbus, and Emily from Cincinnati.

The winners met Barack yesterday after the rally in Columbus, excited to help be a part of "rebuilding the country for the future."

Referred to as "the stars of the show" by Barack, each caller told the Senator why they are voting for him. Martin, a 20-year Republican who lost his cousin in Iraq, appreciates Barack's plan to withdraw from Iraq.

A first time voter, Rebekkah used her meeting as an opportunity to give Barack a letter from her fifth grade neighbor and tell him that she supports his health care plan. "My mom used to help pay for people's medications because they couldn't afford the prescriptions," she said.

Check out this video of Barack meeting with the contest winners!



Even though the contest is over, we still need your help calling Ohio voters! Help us make our goal of making one million calls by March 4th.

Make sure to vote early! Find your early voting location here.

Yesterday, we hit our goal of one million donors -- a truly historic achievement.

Now it's time to make history by meeting another another improbable goal: making one million calls by March 4th...

We set this goal less than five days ago and you have already made over 502,000 calls...

Let's get on the phones, echo Barack's message of forward-thinking solutions for America and share the hope that Barack has inspired in us with people across this country.

Pick up the phone and make some calls today. Set a personal goal for how many calls you'll make by March 4th. Consider throwing a house party with friends and family to make calls together.

Barack can't win this thing alone. Barack won't change the country by himself -- the country will change because of us. If all of us get involved, we can overcome the petty attacks and divisive distractions that have torn apart our country for far too long. We don't have to settle for the world as it is -- together, we can build the world as we envision it.

My.BarackObama.com/call

Pick up the phone and let's get to work. We can make one million calls by March 4th. Let's try to make it halfway there by tomorrow.

Yes. We. Can. 

Barack will appear on Ellen today... Check out the preview below and check your local listings...

The Toledo Blade has endorsed Barack Obama for president... 

Obama, for change

THE Blade has a long-established principle of seldom endorsing a candidate in any primary election. It's easy to see, however, that this isn't a typical year. For the first time in history, the outcome of the Ohio primary may well determine the Democratic nominee for president of the United States.

We are not yet ready to say who we will endorse in November. But we wholeheartedly agree with something our editorial board heard on Sunday: 'We have to have a government that works for ordinary people. We've got to be able to bring the country together so we have a working majority for change. We have to break down some of the ideologically driven polarization that prevents us from taking practical steps to make the country more competitive and to get opportunity to people.'

We urge Ohio Democrats to vote on Tuesday for the man who spoke those words, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois. It has become clear during the year-long primary campaign that he eclipses Sen. Hillary Clinton as the strong­est possible candidate to run in the general election against the presumptive Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain.

Moreover, we believe that Mr. Obama's inspiring life story, keen intellect, strong but quiet confidence, ready grasp of public policy issues, and his fresh and optimistic world view are what America needs after eight years of an administration that repeatedly has shown open contempt for the American people and for the Constitution.

Mr. Obama offers a breath of fresh air and new hope at a depressing time in the life of this nation. His selection would send an unmistakable signal to the world that America really may be living up to its promise of a just and truly pluralistic society.

The offspring of a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas, young Obama grew up partly in Hawaii, partly in Indonesia. Were he to become president, we have no doubt that he would be seen — more than any previous occupant of the White House — as someone who is comfortably at home in the wider world. Yet his is the quintessential American story, that of the self-made man.

Those who object that he is too young overlook that he would, at 47, be a year older than Bill Clinton was when he was elected, and four years older than John F. Kennedy. Those who say that he is inexperienced in international affairs overlook that he sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The last two Democratic presidents, Mr. Clinton and Jimmy Carter, didn't have a day's service in Congress, much less foreign policy, before they took office, and it certainly hurt them.

Additionally, Mr. Obama, a younger and more physically vigorous man, will be in a far better position to push Americans into solving one of the biggest problems we face: that of an unhealthy, morbidly obese generation of young people, a health crisis that is costing the nation billions. We applaud the fact that, urged by his talented wife, Michelle, he has quit smoking. That alone should be an inspiration to millions.

There are those who resent Mr. Obama's relatively rapid rise on the national scene and link his growing support to ingrained bias against putting a woman in the Oval Office. Certainly there may be some misguided prejudice against women. But that isn't what is going on this year. We agree the nation is more than ready for a female president. But Hillary Clinton is handicapped by her own baggage, and it has to do with her character, not her gender.

Voters during this primary process have come to know the real Hillary Clinton, and many have not liked what they've seen. Try as she might to project a warm personal image, she has come across mostly as a coldly calculating individual.

Moreover, her candidacy reminds voters of how the Clintons in effect looted the White House of expensive china, furniture, and other items when they left in January, 2001. And, if that weren't enough, they set up a gift registry to furnish their new home in New York. In contrast to such political royalism, Mr. Obama, his wife, and their two daughters live much closer to the reality of ordinary people.

America is badly in need of something new. We need this election to mark, at last, the end of the Vietnam period. Hillary Clinton is a product of that era and is, in a sense, still fighting its battles.

Barack Obama would be, figuratively if not literally, the first president of the 21st Century, much as John F. Kennedy was the first president born in the 20th century — each necessary to his time, and each able to see the world with a fresh, clear view.

Again, this endorsement does not mark our final verdict for November. John McCain, the all-but-certain GOP nominee, is a far more admirable figure than George W. Bush, although his policies on the war and the economy merely mimic those of the incumbent.

We will be scrutinizing the candidates very carefully as the general election campaign progresses. But at this point we feel free to break with tradition and enthusiastically recommend that on Tuesday, Ohio Democrats cast their primary ballots for Barack Obama.

The AP reports that another Houston superdelegate state Rep. Senfronia Thompson is now supporing Obama...

AUSTIN -— Democratic superdelegate and state Rep. Senfronia Thompson, of Houston, defected from Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential candidate Wednesday and joined a growing list of superdelegates to endorse Sen. Barack Obama for president, according to his campaign.

"I'm honored to have earned the support of Representative Thompson and am pleased that she'll play an important role in advancing our grassroots movement for change in Houston and across Texas," Obama said in a statement. "Throughout her three decades in the Legislature, she's been a tireless advocate for working families and when I'm president we'll work together to put the American dream within reach of every child in Texas and across our country."

Thompson, one of the longest serving Democrats in the state House, is one of the party insiders who, as a superdelegate, help choose the Democratic nominee at the national convention this summer in Denver.

Her defection was the second loss of the day for Clinton: Civil rights leader and Atlanta congressman John Lewis, a Democratic congressman from Atlanta, is the most prominent black leader to defect from Clinton's campaign in the face of recent near-unanimous black support for Obama.

Obama has won 11 straight primaries and caucuses since Super Tuesday, increased his advantage in the all-important delegate count and has attracted the support of his congressional colleagues.

In recent weeks, more than two dozen superdelegates have climbed aboard Obama's campaign.

Here's some video from Barack's appearance in Duncanville, Texas yesterday...

Click here to make calls into Texas and help meet our goal of 1,000,000 calls! 

From the New York Post:

Barack Obama reached a fund-raising milestone yesterday with the 1 millionth donor to his campaign - an eye-popping number that has him on the road to a record in political moneymaking.

"He has more donors now than the Democratic National Committee had in the 2000 election," said Anthony Corrado, a political-science expert at Colby College in Maine. "

... Michael Malbin, of the Campaign Finance Institute, said other candidates had reached the million-donor mark in past elections, but it was "remarkable to have done it so early."

From the New York Times:

Senator Barack Obama on Wednesday accepted the endorsement of Representative John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and longtime African-American political leader, who switched his support from the presidential candidacy of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

"John Lewis is an American hero and a giant of the civil rights movement," Mr. Obama said in a statement issued after he arrived here for a campaign stop. "I am deeply honored to have his support."

... In a statement on Wednesday, the congressman confirmed his switch to Mr. Obama.

"I think the candidacy of Senator Obama represents the beginning of a new movement in American political history that began in the hearts and minds of the people of this nation," he said. "And I want to be on the side of the people."

From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

Obama continued campaigning in Ohio after their debate Tuesday night at Cleveland State University. McCain, the likely GOP nominee, used a campaign stop in Tyler, Texas, to jump on a comment Obama made about the Iraq war during the debate.

Obama, who opposes the war, said he would withdraw U.S. troops and take further action in Iraq if al-Qaida is forming a base in Iraq.

"I have some news. Al-Qaida is in Iraq. Its called al-Qaida in Iraq," McCain told a crowd,

At a rally at Ohio State University, Obama told more than 8,000 cheering supporters he had heard about McCain's comment.

..."But I have some news for John McCain. There was no such thing as al-Qaida in Iraq until George Bush and John McCain decided to invade Iraq," Obama said, drawing his largest cheer of the day. "I've been paying attention, John McCain," Obama continued. "That's the news. "

... Obama said McCain followed Bush into a misguided war and that instead of starting a war in Iraq in 2003, the president should have sought out terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"I respect John McCain, but he's tied to the policies of the past," Obama said. "We're about policies of the future."

From the Associated Press:

Early voting in urban areas being targeted by Barack Obama has swelled to record numbers in Texas...

... Voters have flooded early balloting locations in places like grocery stores, Kmarts and recreation centers across the state, overwhelming county election officials unaccustomed to handling such turnout. Some 512,000 people in the state's 15 largest counties have already cast votes in the Democratic contest, more than four times the level of turnout seen in 2004.

... "Texas is on the leading edge of early voting in this country - they have a lot more locations available and are more creative about putting them in places where people actually go," said Paul Gronke, a political scientist at Oregon's Reed College who studies early voting.

... "Early voting is easy voting. I wanted to get it out of the way so that if something comes up on election day, I'm set and ready to go," said Robin Schneider, 47, after casting her ballot outside an HEB grocery store in Austin. "I definitely want to show up at my polling place Tuesday night for the caucus, but that's after work. So this gets the voting part out of the way."

From the Associated Press:

Barack Obama is closing in on Hillary Clinton's once-16-percentage-point lead in Pennsylvania, which votes April 22, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.

Two weeks ago, Clinton led in the survey by 52 percent to 36 percent. The latest poll indicates that her lead was 49 percent to 43 percent.

Voters younger than 45 have gone in two weeks from favoring Clinton by 11 percentage points to preferring Obama by 17 points.

From the Columbus Dispatch:

The wind chill was in single digits when Joseph and Zenza Laws arrived outside St. John Arena around 4:30 a.m. yesterday after riding the bus all night from Chicago.

Already, about 10 people were ahead of them in line.

By the time the doors opened four hours later, the crowd to see Sen. Barack Obama stretched a couple of hundred yards across the parking lot to the bridge over the Olentangy River. ... "It's history in the making, and I wanted to be part of it," said Mr. Laws, 53, a parks supervisor in Chicago whose son works in the Obama campaign.

... Ersell Jeffers, 74, of Columbus, waited in line 11/2 hours: "I was so excited I didn't know I was cold until I got inside."

Not since taking a day off work in 1961 to watch John F. Kennedy's inauguration has Jeffers been more excited about a political candidate. ..."I think these kinds of crowds in primary season, this kind of passion and intensity is just unheard of in recent times," said Herb Asher, a Democratic political scientist at Ohio State University.

"His message of a new kind of politics and the eloquent way in which he delivers that message is really something new for a lot of voters"

... Bethelchem Mengstu, a junior biology major at Ohio State, said younger voters feel a connection with Obama.

"He makes us feel like we can make a difference," she said at yesterday's rally.