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Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.

Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. (born August 4, 1961) is the junior United States Senator from Illinois and a candidate for the Democratic Party's nomination in the 2008 U.S. presidential election. He married in 1992 and has two daughters. Obama has written two books: a memoir of his youth titled Dreams from My Father, and a personal commentary on U.S. politics titled The Audacity of Hope.

Born to a Kenyan father and an American mother, he spent most of his childhood and adolescent years in Honolulu, Hawaii. At age six, he moved to Jakarta, where he lived with his mother and Indonesian stepfather for four years. A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, Obama worked as a community organizer, university lecturer, and lawyer before serving in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004.

Following an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2000, he announced his campaign for U.S. Senate in January 2003. After winning a landslide primary victory in March 2004 to become the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, Obama delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in November 2004 with 70% of the vote.

As a member of the Democratic minority in the 109th Congress, he cosponsored legislation to control conventional weapons and to promote greater public accountability in the use of federal funds. He also made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. In the current 110th Congress, he has sponsored legislation regarding lobbying and electoral fraud, climate change, nuclear terrorism, and care for returned U.S. military personnel. Since announcing his presidential campaign in February 2007, Obama has emphasized ending the war in Iraq, increasing energy independence, and providing universal health care as top national priorities.

Personal life

Obama is married to Michelle Obama, nee Robinson. The couple's first daughter, Malia Ann, was born in 1998, followed by a second daughter, Natasha ("Sasha"), in 2001.

Obama rebounding the ball during a basketball game with U.S. military from CJTF–HOA during his visit at Camp Lemonier, Djibouti, on August 31, 2006

Obama rebounding the ball during a basketball game with U.S. military from CJTF–HOA during his visit at Camp Lemonier, Djibouti, on August 31, 2006

Applying the proceeds of a $2 million book deal, the family paid off debts in 2005 and moved from a Hyde Park, Chicago condominium to their current $1.6 million house in neighboring Kenwood. The land adjacent to their house was simultaneously sold to the wife of well-connected developer, and Obama supporter, Tony Rezko, provoking continued media scrutiny of Obama and his relationship with Rezko. In December 2007, Money magazine estimated the Obama family's net worth at $1.3 million. Their 2007 tax return showed a household income of $4.2 million, up from about $1 million in 2006 and $1.6 million in 2005, mostly from sales of his books.

Obama plays basketball, a sport he participated in as a member of his high school's varsity team. Before announcing his presidential candidacy, he began a well-publicized effort to quit smoking. "I've never been a heavy smoker," Obama told the Chicago Tribune. "I've quit periodically over the last several years. I've got an ironclad demand from my wife that in the stresses of the campaign I do not succumb. I've been chewing Nicorette strenuously." Replying to an Associated Press survey of 2008 presidential candidates' personal tastes, he specified "architect" as his alternate career choice and "chili" as his favorite meal to cook. Asked to name a "hidden talent," Obama answered: "I'm a pretty good poker player."

In The Audacity of Hope, Obama writes that he "was not raised in a religious household." He describes his mother, raised by non-religious parents, as detached from religion, yet "in many ways the most spiritually awakened person that I have ever known." He describes his Kenyan father as "raised a Muslim," but a "confirmed atheist" by the time his parents met, and his Indonesian stepfather as "a man who saw religion as not particularly useful." In the book, Obama explains how, through working with black churches as a community organizer while in his twenties, he came to understand "the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change." He has been a member of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ since 1992.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Obama.