Why hasn't OBAMA expanded on his achievements and successes as a COMMUNITY ORGANIZER?

Question

Maybe I just missed it - but I haven't heard the details of what he achieved as a community organizer. I think people would take this career step a little more seriously if he gave us a little more details.

If he has already done this, feel free to point me in that direction....

Answer 1

In 1985, freshly graduated from Columbia University and working for a New York business consultant, Barack Obama decided to become a community organizer. Though he liked the idea, he didn't understand what the job involved, and his inquiries turned up few opportunities.

Then he got a call from Jerry Kellman, an organizer working on Chicago's far South Side for a community group based in the churches of the region, an expanse of white, black and Latino blue-collar neighborhoods that were reeling from the steel-mill closings. Kellman was looking for an organizer for the new Developing Communities Project (DCP), which would focus on black city neighborhoods.

Obama, only 24, struck board members as "awesome" and "extremely impressive," and they quickly hired him, at $13,000 a year, plus $2,000 for a car--a beat-up blue Honda Civic, which Obama drove for the next three years organizing more than twenty congregations to change their neighborhoods.

Despite some meaningful victories, the work of Obama--and hundreds of other organizers--did not transform the South Side or restore lost industries. But it did change the young man who became the junior senator from Illinois in 2004, and it provides clues to his worldview as he bids for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Do some research. The answers are not so hard to find.

Answer 2

Like the Republicans said, community organizers suck.

Answer 3

Since he's a hard line socialist and worked as a socialist organizer in a "redistribution" of the wealth campaign..he doesn't want you to know about his work as a youth. Take it from the people who earned it and give to the people who have a hand out. And I'm not talking about the elite rich giving to those who are "less" fortunate. It's about people like me who have worked since I wa 15 giving a hand out to those who wouldn't work.  

Answer 4

h**l who knows and what the h**l is a community organizer

Answer 5

Well...he probably didn't because then the GOP would be able to fire back about it.  But, taking Obama out of the equation, I actually respect community organizers.  Their job, in a nutshell, is to bring local politics closer to the local community.  Lobbyists do this, but of course, they have their own agenda.  The whole point of a community organizer is to get the people's voice heard in the government.  I'm not actually sure how strenuous it is, I'm sure governing an entire state is MUCH more work.  But, on the same note, I don't believe he should be knocked on for being a community organizer...I was going to look into it, but it was too time consuming.  However much it sounds like Obama just prepared bake sales in Chicago...that wasn't exactly what his responsibilities were.

Answer 6

from: http://www.time-blog.com/swampland/2008/...

    Catholic Democrats is expressing surprise and shock that Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's acceptance speech tonight mocked her opponent's work in the 1980s for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development.  She belittled Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's experience as a community organizer in Catholic parishes on the South Side of Chicago, work he undertook instead of pursuing a lucrative career on Wall Street.  In her acceptance speech, Ms. Palin said, "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities."  Community organizing is at the heart of Catholic Social Teaching to end poverty and promote social justice.  

So here is what Giuliani and Palin didn't know: Obama was working for a group of churches that were concerned about their parishioners, many of whom had been laid off when the steel mills closed on the south side of Chicago. They hired Obama to help those stunned people recover and get the services they needed--job training, help with housing and so forth--from the local government. It was, dare I say it, the Lord's work--the sort of mission Jesus preached (as opposed to the war in Iraq, which Palin described as a "task from God.")

This is what Palin and Giuliani were mocking. They were making fun of a young man's decision "to serve a cause greater than himself," in the words of John McCain. They were, therefore, mocking one of their candidate's favorite messages. Obama served the poor for three years, then went to law school. To describe this service--the first thing he did out of college, the sort of service every college-educated American should perform, in some form or other--as anything other than noble is cheap and tawdry and cynical in the extreme.

Answer 7

What about as an ATTORNEY?

What about as a LAW PROFESSOR?

What about as an Illionois state representative?

What about as a US SENATOR?

Look up famous community organizers, some might be familiar to you, one was shot in Memphis trying to secure civil rights.

Answer 8

I'd rather hear about his plans for the future at this point rather the obsessing over the past.  Given McCain's history, conservatives would be wise to do the same.

Answer 9

What successes?

What does an organizer do?  He recruits people for some kind of organization.  It must be kind of like recruiting people to vote for him.

It is great training for campaigning, but not for executive duties.

Answer 10

This is a lie about being a community organizer. He was actually a Communist Organizer.

Answer 11

He worked as a youth at Burger King and developed a speedier way to have a lunch break.

Answer 12

When I was a community organizer in the Peace Corps my accomplishments were small, but even then these small victories were a difficult road.

Unless you're MLK, it's incredibly difficult to put words to what you do as a community activist.  Thus the majority of us talk about it in broad terms.

Answer 13

Community organizer = not a real job.  He has never had a real job like the rest of us.  He was a community organizer after getting a law degree from Harvard, then became a State Senator for 8 years, where he did little, then he served part of ONE US Senate term (he was on the floor a total of 143 days) and then went into campaigning for President.  Obama's bio tape they played at his convention pretty much did not speak about anything regarding his career in politics as he HAS NONE.  He has done zilch. Nada. Nothing and expects to be given the most powerful position in the world, thinking he is a leader because he is throwing out ideas for change with no rationality or backing that he can pull half the stuff off he wants to except by ultimately taxing higher to pay for his socialist ideals.  His idea to close tax loopholes to get money for the government before has been tried before and failed.  For a guy that wants change, he is not approaching us with anything new.  He is just a radical!

Answer 14

I find in this world that if you want the answer look for it.  Research.  We cannot wait as voters to get more information and let it be fed to us.  I personally do not know if its out there but these days I can almost be certain it is and you will not find anything else but biased opinions not facts on yahoo answers.  Seek the real answers to your questions.  And do so greatly please.