Obama Plays to the Crowds in L.A.

Barack Obama covered all the political bases and sartorial styles Tuesday during his first trip to Los Angeles since joining the presidential race. In the afternoon he addressed a multicultural crowd of about 3,000 people in his shirtsleeves during an outdoor rally in the predominantly black, middle-class enclave of Baldwin Hills. Later that evening, he put on his jacket to hobnob with a ballroom full of Hollywood suits and movie stars who paid $2,300 per person to attend a reception at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. The night ended with a dinner for the candidate and the event's biggest fund raisers—Obama collected $1.3 million from the group—at the home of entertainment mogul David Geffen.

Obama's Baldwin Hills stump speech was as sunny as the skies above him and the image of the horizon adorning his campaign posters. Cynicism is easy, the Senator told an enthusiastic but hardly raucous audience. What's difficult is "recognizing that the world has problems, and being hopeful and optimistic that we can change things if we come together as a community and a nation." That's the can-do attitude that makes up "the essence of the American experience", as he called it—a current that runs through the American revolution, the abolitionist campaign and the movements for women's sufferage, workers' rights and civil rights. "There's a mood in the air," Obama said. "We're in a moment where we can transform the country right here and right now. There have always been people who were willing to settle, but there also has always been a group who said 'yes we can.'"

It seemed to strike a chord. To gathering cheers, he repeated the phrase "yes we can" as he ticked off a list of pressing issues he intends to tackle as commander in chief—from ending the Iraq War and providing universal health care, to fostering energy independence and rebuilding New Orleans. Echoing his cheery view, the disco hit "Good Times" blasted from the speakers as he left the stage and waded into the sea of outstretched arms and dancing OBAMA '08 signs.

Obama's critics have scoffed at the lack of specifics in the Illinois Senator's speeches, but in an interview with TIME.com, David Axelrod, Obama's media strategist, says such details are best left for other times and other forums. Campaign rallies, he explains, are catalysts that stoke the passions of the politically disaffected. "The people who've come out here today have hope that this is an opportunity to change the country," Axelrod says. "This isn't a policy address. This is the impetus for change that we need in order to make the good ideas become reality. Without this, all you have is an academic discussion. Senator Obama has been working on issues like health care, arms control and energy independence for 10 years. But ultimately, good ideas don't mean anything unless you have a political force to see them through."

Axelrod was also dismissive of the skepticism voiced by some black political leaders about whether an Ivy League graduate and the son of an African father and a Caucasian mother is the best champion of their community's interests—and of South Carolina State Senator Robert Ford's recent comment that if Obama becomes the Democratic party's nominee, "every Democrat running on that ticket will lose because he's black." (Ford, who is also black, eventually apologized.) "Seems like those two views are in conflict," Axelrod said of the criticisms. "We get crowds like this everywhere we go—of blacks, whites, Hispanics and Asians all unified around the prospect of positive change. I think the American people are ready for this. Senator Ford sold the American people short and we are going to prove it."

Casting the Obama candidacy as an underfunded, grassroots insurgency, compared to what he calls the "formidable political machine" Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has assembled, Axelrod said, "We're never going to be the most proficient army in terms of tactics and political accoutrements. But we may be the most spirited, and that may make the difference." At some point, though, Obama may have to add more substance to his sanguinity to keep that spirit burning.