Barack Obama is best positioned to unite our country to address the common challenges that we face.  In his 11 years in the Illinois and United States Senate, Mr. Obama has fought to make government responsive to regular people: taking power away from lobbyists, achieving greater transparency in government spending,, saying no to racial profiling,,000 women and children, and passing tax cuts for working families.  limiting nuclear proliferation as a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee expanding early childhood education and healthcare coverage to more-than 150,000 women and children, and passing tax cuts for working families. 

He has persuaded stakeholders from all backgrounds and political stripes to join him—from the IllinoisU.S. senators in DC, Tom Coburn, who partnered with Obama to pass legislation promoting government transparency and disclosure of earmarks. Unlike his opponents, he doesn’t take money from Washington lobbyists or Political-Action Committees—a policy that makes it more convincing that we can trust him to be a voice for ordinary people instead of wealthy special interests.  police officers who at first opposed and then unanimously backed taping confessions of criminal suspects to one of the most-conservative

We deserve a leader who will be honest with us about where he stands.  From early opposition to the war in Iraq to speaking up for gay rights in churches in the Deep South, Mr. Barack’s positions do not change with the polls or the audience.  He refuses to scapegoat immigrants for our country's economic woes.  He championed Illinois' successful DREAM Act to provide higher education opportunities to all students,, supported the U.S. Senate version, and advocated for California's version of the law.  He did not back away from drivers’ licenses for undocumented immigrants even when the issue became a political hot potato because it’s the smartest policy for public safety.  And when controversy erupted over his pastor, he did not hide from the issue of racial tension, but showed the strength of his leadership when he faced the American people and spoke to us intelligently and clearly about the bridges we must build to heal the racial wounds of our past and build a united future. regardless of their immigration status

And then it’s hard to overlook the tidal wave of “hope” that has ignited a fire among the broad range of his supporters—including my 62-year-old Filipino parents. Hope is not blind optimism but a powerful force to drum up the will to get things done.

Very important for the Filipino-American community, Senator Barack has stood up time and again for working people and lived out his commitment to social justice values, which is a cornerstone of Christian teaching. He turned down lucrative jobs to spend 20+ years putting his nose to the grindstone to help change ordinary people’s lives. He worked with churches to organize those who had been laid off from their jobs on the South Side of Chicago. Rather than cashing in on his success after graduating law school as the Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Law Review, he went to a civil-rights law firm to represent women and people of color to combat discrimination. And then he became a public servant and constitutional-law professor—both strong testaments to his abiding love for his country.

When controversy erupted over his pastor, Mr. Obama did not evade the issue of racial tension, but showed the strength of his leadership when he faced the people and spoke intelligently and clearly about the bridges for healing the racial wounds of our past and building a united future.

 He is also the only candidate with immigrant roots, who lived in Asia and is the product of a multicultural family with Asian Americans in its fold and relatives who follow the election from Hawaii and a rural town in developing Kenya. Raised by a young single mother, he succeeded against mighty odds, earning scholarships to a prestigious high school in Hawaii. In addition to being a committed public servant, he is a devoted husband and father.

And then it’s hard to overlook the tidal wave of “hope” that has ignited a fire among the broad range of his supporters—including my 62-year-old Filipino parents. Hope is not blind optimism but a powerful force to drum up the will to get things done. Hope unites the 18-year-old Chinese-American cashier in San Francisco and the 18-year-old Filipina American in New Jersey, who cast their first votes for Obama this primary season, and the 72-year-old Indian immigrant in Atlanta who says that she sees in Barack a son and is out stomping the pavement for him. These are people I have met in this journey to make Obama our next President. Hope stirs all of us to action—to take back our country. How great it is to have a candidate who can excite such a broad base of people to take action. 

How wonderful it is to believe again not just in a political leader's ability to change the ways of our government, but in our own. # # #