Obama Movement Taps Into 'Can-Do' Spirit
The Associated Press | January 14, 2008
By Vicki Smith
On a picture-perfect college green in the Old South, framed by live oaks dripping with Spanish moss, Barack Obama is talking about pioneers and immigrants, about slaves and suffragettes, about the can-do spirit that Americans used to have.
And somewhere in a screaming sea of 4,000, Arlene Estevez is pondering a parable: When a man asked for help, she remembers, God sent a rope. Then a ladder. When both went unused, He took them back.
"The world has seemed so hopeless. It's like there was nobody there to help us up and help us out," she says. "To me, (Obama is) the rope and the ladder. It's our opportunity right now, and I'm not going to miss it."
