Some dear friends and relatives of mine were swept away with Senator Obama a few months ago. The reasons given were generally as follows:

1. "He seems to have a kind and decent way about him, while still being tough. Like when he said to HIllary during the debate, 'I'm looking forward to you being one of my advisors, Hillary,' ... that was funny, tough, but not mean and rude. He was nimble on his feet and said exactly the right thing. It makes me think he has the intellect and temperment for the job."

2. "I know I shouldn't really care if he's a black man, and I don't, but in more ways than just his personality, he could be such a refreshing option from the vile politics we've seen so much of, and, yes, he's black, he could be a great symbol for all Americans and the world."

3. "I like McCain enough, but he just doesn't have that extra something Obama has. I can't stand any of the other candidates, including HIllary. God please don't let it be Hillary."

I held my tongue. These are people I care about, and who was I to say that Obama was full of purely empty rhetoric, was the most liberal Senator alive, and wasn't fooling me for a second. I'm cynical, most of the time, and I hadn't paid much attention to Rezko, nor had I even heard about Reverend Wright or The Weathermen in connection with Senator Obama. But I still thought he was a complete socialist phony politician full of utterly empty speeches. I did say, compared to the Clintons, he was something new, and I couldn't resist offering my opinion that McCain was a scumbag.

This was at a time when Mitt Romney still had a chance and Hillary appeared to be the presumptive nominee.

But it was also at a time when reports started surfacing of people swooning in the audience and actually fainting during some of Senator Obama's speeches. I remember seeing some of his speeches and noting that he'd better not overdo the Malcolm X hooked index finger point-making technique, because it had been done, and anyone who tries to take someone else's trademark looks like an idiot.

But to my point. I don't have a horse in this race, sadly. I don't know how in the hell I can possibly cast a vote for McCain, but as an American patriot, I don't know how I can possibly sit aside and not let my vote count against a pure socialist like Senator Clinton or Senator Obama. I may be well and truly triangulated, but it makes me sick to my stomach and I may have to write "REAGAN" all over my ballot just so that I can look myself in the mirror.

So, with that understood, I do have to ask: could any politician make you faint? I loved President Reagan. He gave the greatest speeches of my lifetime. I love this President Bush in spite of his ongoing wreslting match with the English language. You try being born without a propensity for public speaking, and then go give about a million speeches in a decade.

What kind of person is it that allows an empty speech about "hope," without a single iota of substance or real ideas behind it, cause him or her to faint away?

One can believe in real mankind generating human beings worthy of great admiration. I consider Ronald Reagan and President Bush to be heros; that doesn't mean I think they're one jot more than humans. We all have our flaws, even our heros. But I never got dizzy because of a Reagan speech. When President Bush spoke of 9/11 at the cathedral in Washington I was moved, but I didn't need an icepack.

Who are these people that faint at the empty rhetoric of Senator Barrack Obama? If you are one could you please help me understand?

Politicians who make people faint are scary.

It never turns out good.

The politicians who made people faint were Hitler, Stalin, Kim Jong Il, and Saddam.

Nobody ever fainted at one of Lincoln, Reagand, Kennedy or FDR's speeches unless it was 105 degree outside.

at a Dead show, once. But, um, I think it had less to do with the power of the lyrics and more to do with my lunch of mushrooms and nitrous oxide that afternoon.

Are they passin' balloons around at those Obama rallys?

. . . is that I rarely to never see a speech/performance that I don't feel I could do better. So frankly, I'm disinclined to swoon.

You so need to get out more

I'm unavoidably heading toward the same conclusion. I don't know how many people actually fainted in a swoon of euphoria over the speeches of those you mentioned, but you're right that there's a certain rhetorical method employed by some that seems to effect some in the audience way more than is rational or even healthy.

That said, Martin Luther King, Gandhi, and a few others were powerfully moving in a positive way.

But with Obama the rhetoric seems starkly more empty to me than I would hope would be enough to move people to fainting. It makes me think that something a little different is going on. I think these people are either faking it, or perhaps fainting "on purpose"; i.e. they've gotten themselves so worked up in their own scatterbrained way that Obama could literally say, "blah blah blah HOPE blah blah" and they'd drop like canaries in coal mines.

Okay, so maybe someone could make me faint at a speech. LOL

Not necessarily that overpainted bimbo, but somebody.

Jerry Garcia, Blues Traveler, and the Allman Bros.

Sophomore co-ed we're with tries mushrooms for the first time and passes out, very green around the gills. We had to carry her butt back to the house where we were staying a few miles away. She was a tiny little thing, but hallucinating while taking turns carrying anyone is just a downer.

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Is she a Republican?

YOu love this President? You think Ronnie gave great speeches? I sometimes wonder if I am on the same planet as some folks in the country....Empty rhetoric? You mean like Ronnie talking about welfare queens or GW talking about free bubble up and eating that rainbow stew?

Hilarious. My buddy fainted at a dead concert in 75 from acid. He went down like a prize fighter, I caught him but man was he out of it.

my top 10 reasons people faint at a barak obama campaign rally . . .

10 - disoriented; mistaken belief that they are at an evangelical tent revivial, and the devil has been cast out of them

9 - like delaware senator joe biden, they have so little experience around people of color that a "clean, articulate black man" comes someone as a shock

8 - the notion that if it comes down to a choice between, hillary, obama, or mccain, we may have 4 more years of republicanism in the white house

7 - CBS gave them a $20 bill for fainting footage, to pump up the 7pm katie couric broadcast. (hey . .. ow . .. stop hitting me. they paid for the fake national guard papers, didn't they?)

6 - people aren't fainting - they're falling asleep while waiting to find out if obama will ever reveal what "change" really means

5 - fainting is another hillary dirty trick.

4 - or perhaps part of the republican vast right wing conspiracy

3 - hoping to be included in the final footage of "obama backers gone wild", to be hawked next year on late night TV for $9.95 per DVD

2 - they gave blood earlier in the day, too. socially responsible people.

1 - something in the kool ade

I wasn't the one who coined the phrase "The Great Communicator."

Reagan ran on strenthening the military in order to win the Cold War and on tax cuts to cure the economy. He also spoke of his pride in America during the time of Jimmy Carter's "malaise."

President Bush ran originally on a plank of "compassionate" conservatism. I personally believe that's a redundant phrase, just as "supply side" economics is redundant, but one must campaign with slogans at times. The phrase as President Bush used it was meant to explain why a policy of tax cutting could still be combined with a government safety net (something I generally disagree with), as well as individual giving and religious charity, including school vouchers.

Neither of them made me faint. Reagan was truly inspirational even before elected, and more so once in office. President Bush made me a fan during his campaign, but, for me, became a truly inspirational figure while in office.

Obama won't explain why he wants to raise everyone's taxes, can't explain what he means with, nor can he even define, capital gains taxes. He has proposed the obligatory government controlled health care system all Democrats have to trumpet, but he spends practically no time on it. Unlike Reagan who hammered his core policy messages every chance he got, including national pride, Obama ran for months exclusively on the words "change" and "hope" without ever defining what they actually mean in the context of things he wants to do in office.

You may have been the opposite of inspired by Reagan and Bush, but relative to Obama they weren't trying to hide their philosophy and mask it with a nudge and a wink to those in the know.

He is not raising everyones taxes. He is not a socialist and he is not ducking anything, read his site if you want the details. BTW, ronnie was not a policy wonk at all, he talked about John Wayne type shit, couldn't remember his hat size, he would say its between 6 and 7, I think....