presidential race with a nerve-wracking awareness that the
stakes have rarely been higher. With no sitting president or
vice president in contention, all the cards were in the air. The
election season began unusually early in 2007 and was marked
by the emergence of history-making rivals for the Democratic
presidential nomination. New York senator and former first
lady Hillary Rodham Clinton was the first woman to have a
real shot at the Democratic nomination. She proved a formida-
ble competitor in what quickly became a contest between her
and the first serious African American contender, Illinois sena-
tor Barack Obama. First hailed as presidential material by
Oprah Winfrey, Obama gave a reputation-making speech at
the 2004 Democratic convention and distinguished himself
from most Democratic political figures by his prescient opposi-
tion to the war in Iraq.
Obama was a phenomenon as well as a candidate, able to fill
Yankee Stadium with his supporters, many of them voting for
the first time. A sea of 100,000 people stretched before him at a
campaign rally in St. Louis. When Obama went abroad to
meet with world leaders, presidents and sheiks grinned like
teenagers as they shook his hand. Perpetually poised and un-
flappable, Obama was endorsed early by Ted and Caroline
Kennedy and later by former secretary of state Colin Powell.
At the annual benefit dinner named for Al Smith, the first
Catholic nominee for the presidency, Obama made fun of his
cult-like following: “Contrary to the rumors you’ve heard, I
wasn’t born in a manger,” he joked. For many, Obama embod-
ied the promise of a postracial America in which candidates
were judged “not by the color of their skin, but by the content
of their character.” But at the same benefit, Obama alluded
with a light touch to the unknown effect on his chances of his
On Becoming a Leader