Long before the Democratic Convention where Kerry was nominated, even before the obscure state senator from Illinois was chosen to give the Keynote address at the Convention. Where do these crazy bloggers find these people?
Barack Obama: Patron Saint of Daily Kos
by kos
Fri Jun 11, 2004 at 09:59:10 AM PDTOur Senate endorsement vote, warts and all, showed that the community was willing to be strategic in their choice of candidates. Nothing wrong with that, and it's a level of practicality that I often encourage.
But it was also clear, that given the chance to vote our hearts, most of us would've chosen Barack Obama.
There's no doubt that Obama is a special candidate -- a great orator, accomplished, great life story, and hails from a state where he can be as progressive as he wants to be. He has clearly captured the imaginations of Illinois voters, who gave him a resounding victory in a crowded Democratic primary field. He is African American, but his support cuts across ethnic lines.
We are a politically savvy bunch here at dKos. We looked at his poll numbers, where he enjoys a solid lead. Some of us looked at his fundraising numbers, and saw that Obama could raise money like the best of them.
So we collectively decided to lend our hand elsewhere.
But there is no doubt that our hearts lie with Obama. And if he finds himself in a tighter than expected race come the fall, I have no doubt we'll ride to his defense.
So a toast to Obama, the Patron Saint of Daily Kos.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2004/6/11/125910/676When searching for the date of the announcement that Obama would give the Keynote address, I ran across this article:
The Speech
When Barack Obama launched into his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, he was still an obscure state senator from Illinois. By the time he finished 17 minutes later, he had captured the nation's attention and opened the way for a run at the presidency. A behind-the-scenes look at the politicking, plotting, and preparation that went into Obama's breakthrough moment.By David Bernstein
A star is born: Obama soaks up the cheers moments after finishing his keynote address. "His public image changed because of that speech," says Illinois senator Dick Durbin.-snip-
Talking to reporters on the first morning of the convention, New Mexico's Gov. Bill Richardson, the convention's chairman, tried to promote the lineup of prime-time speakers. He ticked off the names of those scheduled for the first night-political heavyweights who included Al Gore, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton. "You'll see exciting speeches the second day," he continued. Then, drawing a blank, he hollered to a nearby aide, "Who are they?"
One was Obama, who was little known outside Illinois before the convention. As the Philadelphia Daily News headlined on the morning of his keynote address: "Who the Heck Is This Guy?" Obama admitted in interviews at the time that he was "totally surprised" by the speaking invitation. (Through his spokesman, he declined to be interviewed for this story.) As he put it in his book The Audacity of Hope: "The process by which I was selected as the keynote speaker remains something of a mystery to me."
-snip-
Kerry and his aides first began to zero in on Obama after Kerry's two-day campaign swing through Illinois in April. Stumping together at a vocational center on Chicago's West Side and at a downtown fundraiser at the Hyatt Regency Chicago, Kerry came away impressed with the charismatic political hot shot. Watching Obama address the donors who filled the hotel's ballroom, Kerry's national finance chairman, the Chicago investment banker Louis Susman, told Kerry: "This guy will be on the national ticket someday." To which Kerry replied, according to an account in the Chicago Tribune: "Well, I have a way in mind for him to be at the national convention this year. He should be one of the faces of our party now, not years from now."
Corrigan says he had already heard good things about Obama, including from a friend who had been a law-school classmate of Obama's and recalled the stirring speech that Obama made when he was elected editor of the Harvard Law Review. Meanwhile, several of Obama's top advisers were also making the case for him. Darrel Thompson, Obama's campaign chief of staff, says he met with Kerry's two deputy campaign managers to press for the keynote slot for Obama, or, short of that, for a prime-time spot, when the TV networks would be airing the speeches live. David Axelrod and David Plouffe, an Axelrod partner who now manages Obama's presidential campaign, also lobbied Kerry staffers. "We wanted to let them know that Barack would give a great speech," says Thompson.
Five days before he is to address the convention, Obama reviews a draft of the speech at his Senate campaign office in Chicago.-snip-
Soon after, Axelrod discussed the speech with Obama: "Almost immediately he said to me, ‘I know what I want to do-I want to talk about my story as part of the American story.' He had a very clear concept in his head," Axelrod recalls.
Obama composed the first draft in longhand on a yellow legal pad, mostly in Springfield, where the state senate was in overtime over a budget impasse. Wary of missing important votes, Obama stayed close to the Capitol, which wasn't exactly conducive to writing. "There were times that he would go into the men's room at the Capitol because he wanted some quiet," says Axelrod. Once, state senator Jeff Schoenberg walked into the men's lounge and found Obama sitting on a stool along the marble countertop near the sinks, reworking the speech. "It was a classic Life magazine moment," says Schoenberg, who snapped a picture of Obama with his cell-phone camera.
In practice sessions: Obama struggled to master using the teleprompter. Looking on are Michael Sheehan (standing), a Washington speech coach, and (seated from right) Obama's wife, Michelle; campaign manager David Axelrod; and chief press aide Robert Gibbs.The convention had been weighing heavily on Obama's mind, in part because of his bad experience at the Democratic convention four years earlier. In 2000, fresh from a failed bid for Congress, Obama was dispirited and nearly broke, and he was planning to skip the convention in Los Angeles. At the last minute, though, some friends persuaded him to catch a cheap flight. The rent-a-car facility at the Los Angeles airport, however, declined his American Express card-it was maxed out. When he finally got to the convention hall, he could not get a floor pass and had to watch on the TV screens around the Staples Center. He recalls the episode in The Audacity of Hope: "Given the distance between my previous role as a convention gate-crasher and my newfound role as convention keynoter, I had some cause to worry that my appearance in Boston might not go very well."
http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/June-2007/The-Speech/index.php?cp=1&si=0#artanc 
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