Greetings from Denver International Airport. I’ve spent the last two hours reading the first 100 pages of Barack Obama’s Dreams From my Father. As a political scientist (and junkie), I was reading the book picturing the bio pic they will run during the Democratic Convention. I’m obviously not the first person this has occurred to, but this is one heck of a life story to have to contend with. The McCain people are going to have quite a time putting him in the traditional democratic boxes that worked so well against Al Gore and John Kerry. This current democratic candidate has spend a lifetime moving in and out of boxes. This is why he can speak to conservatives and progressives alike and seem so compelling. He’s had a lot of practice.

This is also why the attacks heretofore have been so muddled and strange. The “Obama is a celebrity theme” is not only a strange attack, but one that I think the Republicans might look back on in regret. It reinforces the idea of Obama as extraordinary, almost mythic. The arc of his story is going to make for an interesting convention Thursday (The grasping Kansas grandfather, boxing with his Indonesian stepfather, a Christmas rebuke from his absent Kenyan grandfater, etc.). Why the Republicans want to reinforce this is beyond me.

Update: I’m starting to think the mocking celebrity approach might be having an effect. Perhaps it is a riff on the Daily Show style of skewering politicians that has become normalized. The gap is closing in the campaign, so maybe these attacks aren’t so muddled after all.