However
this election turns out, it will dramatically advance America's
slow progress toward equality and inclusion. It took Abraham
Lincoln's extraordinary courage in the Civil War to get us here.
It took an epic battle to secure women the right to vote. It took
the perseverance of the civil rights movement. Now we have an
election in which we will choose the first African-American
president . . . or the first female vice president.
In recent weeks it has been easy to lose sight of this history in
the making. Americans are focused on the greatest threat to the
world economic system in 80 years. They feel a personal
vulnerability the likes of which they haven't experienced since
Sept. 11, 2001. It's a different kind of vulnerability. Unlike
Sept. 11, the economic threat hasn't forged a common bond in this
nation. It has fed anger, fear and mistrust.
On Nov. 4 we're going to elect a president to lead us through a
perilous time and restore in us a common sense of national
purpose.
The strongest candidate to do that is Sen. Barack Obama. The
Tribune is proud to endorse him today for president of the United
States.
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On Dec. 6, 2006, this page encouraged Obama to join
the presidential campaign. We wrote that he would celebrate our
common values instead of exaggerate our differences. We said he
would raise the tone of the campaign. We said his intellectual
depth would sharpen the policy debate. In the ensuing 22 months he
has done just that.
Many Americans say they're uneasy about Obama. He's pretty new to
them.
We can provide some assurance. We have known Obama since he
entered politics a dozen years ago. We have watched him, worked
with him, argued with him as he rose from an effective state
senator to an inspiring U.S. senator to the Democratic Party's
nominee for president.
We have tremendous confidence in his intellectual rigor, his moral
compass and his ability to make sound, thoughtful, careful
decisions. He is ready.
The change that Obama talks about so much is not simply a change
in this policy or that one. It is not fundamentally about
lobbyists or Washington insiders. Obama envisions a change in the
way we deal with one another in politics and government. His
opponents may say this is empty, abstract rhetoric. In fact, it is
hard to imagine how we are going to deal with the grave domestic
and foreign crises we face without an end to the savagery and a
return to civility in politics.
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This endorsement makes some history for the
Chicago Tribune. This is the first time the newspaper has endorsed
the Democratic Party's nominee for president.
The Tribune in its earliest days took up the abolition of slavery
and linked itself to a powerful force for that cause--the
Republican Party. The Tribune's first great leader, Joseph Medill,
was a founder of the GOP. The editorial page has been a proponent
of conservative principles. It believes that government has to
serve people honestly and efficiently.
With that in mind, in 1872 we endorsed Horace Greeley, who ran as
an independent against the corrupt administration of Republican
President Ulysses S. Grant. (Greeley was later endorsed by the
Democrats.) In 1912 we endorsed Theodore Roosevelt, who ran as the
Progressive Party candidate against Republican President William
Howard Taft.
The Tribune's decisions then were driven by outrage at inept and
corrupt business and political leaders.
We see parallels today.
The Republican Party, the party of limited government, has
lost its way. The government ran a $237 billion surplus
in 2000, the year before Bush took office -- and recorded a $455
billion deficit in 2008. The Republicans lost control of the U.S.
House and Senate in 2006 because, as we said at the time, they
gave the nation rampant spending and Capitol Hill corruption. They
abandoned their principles. They paid the price.
We might have counted on John McCain to correct his party's
course. We like McCain. We endorsed him in the Republican primary
in Illinois. In part because of his persuasion and resolve, the
U.S. stands to win an unconditional victory in Iraq.
It is, though, hard to figure John McCain these days. He argued
that President Bush's tax cuts were fiscally irresponsible, but he
now supports them. He promises a balanced budget by the end of his
first term, but his tax cut plan would add an estimated $4.2
trillion in debt over 10 years. He has responded to the economic
crisis with an angry, populist message and a misguided, $300
billion proposal to buy up bad mortgages.
McCain failed in his most important executive decision. Give him
credit for choosing a female running mate--but he passed up any
number of supremely qualified Republican women who could have
served. Having called Obama not ready to lead, McCain chose Alaska
Gov. Sarah Palin. His campaign has tried to stage-manage Palin's
exposure to the public. But it's clear she is not prepared to step
in at a moment's notice and serve as president. McCain put
his campaign before his country.
Obama chose a more experienced and more thoughtful running
mate--he put governing before politicking. Sen. Joe Biden
doesn't bring many votes to Obama, but he would help him from day
one to lead the country.
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McCain calls Obama a typical liberal politician.
Granted, it's disappointing that Obama's mix of tax cuts for most
people and increases for the wealthy would create an estimated
$2.9 trillion in federal debt. He has made more promises on
spending than McCain has. We wish one of these candidates had
given good, hard specific information on how he would bring the
federal budget into line. Neither one has.
We do, though, think Obama would govern as much more of a
pragmatic centrist than many people expect.
We know first-hand that Obama seeks out and listens carefully and
respectfully to people who disagree with him. He builds consensus.
He was most effective in the Illinois legislature when he worked
with Republicans on welfare, ethics and criminal justice reform.
He worked to expand the number of charter schools in Illinois--not
popular with some Democratic constituencies.
He took up ethics reform in the U.S. Senate--not popular with
Washington politicians.
His economic policy team is peppered with advisers who support
free trade. He has been called a 'University of Chicago
Democrat'--a reference to the famed free-market Chicago school of
economics, which puts faith in markets.
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Obama is deeply grounded in the best aspirations of
this country, and we need to return to those aspirations. He has
had the character and the will to achieve great things despite the
obstacles that he faced as an unprivileged black man in the U.S.
He has risen with his honor, grace and civility intact. He has the
intelligence to understand the grave economic and national
security risks that face us, to listen to good advice and make
careful decisions.
When Obama said at the 2004 Democratic Convention that we weren't
a nation of red states and blue states, he spoke of union the way
Abraham Lincoln did.
It may have seemed audacious for Obama to start his campaign in
Springfield, invoking Lincoln. We think, given the opportunity to
hold this nation's most powerful office, he will prove it wasn't
so audacious after all. We are proud to add Barack Obama's name to
Lincoln's in the list of people the Tribune has endorsed for
president of the United States.
