Obama donor received a state grant
After an unsuccessful campaign for Congress in 2000, Illinois state Sen. Barack Obama faced serious financial pressure: numerous debts, limited cash and a law practice he had neglected for a year. Help arrived in early 2001 from a significant new legal client -- a longtime political supporter. More...
Obama said oops on 6 state Senate votes
Barack Obama angered fellow Democrats in the Illinois Senate when he voted to strip millions of dollars from a child welfare office on Chicago's West Side. But Obama had a ready explanation: He goofed. More...
As a child, Obama crossed a cultural divide in Indonesia
As a boy in Indonesia, Barack Obama crisscrossed the religious divide. At the local primary school, he prayed in thanks to a Catholic saint. In the neighborhood mosque, he bowed to Allah. More...
Obama's peers didn't see his angst
As a second-stringer for the Punahou high school basketball squad, Barack Obama would fire up his teammates with renditions from the R&B group Earth, Wind & Fire. In yearbooks, he signed his name with a flourishing O, for Obama, which he topped with an Afro. In a world of 1970s rock 'n' roll, he was known for a love of jazz. More...
Early on, Obama showed talent for bridging divisions
Barack Obama's entry into politics came on a winter morning at the white-columned Harvard Law Review building when, about 2 a.m., a deeply divided editorial staff chose him as the first African American to lead the prestigious publication. More...
Fellow activists say Obama's memoir has too many I's
The drama began with a tiny ad in a local newspaper -- a notice that asbestos was about to be removed from the management office at Altgeld Gardens, the all-black public housing complex where young Barack Obama worked as a community organizer. More...
Fresh face or old-school player?
He managed to burnish a reformer's reputation while swimming in the muddy waters of special-interest- infested state politics. More...
McCain's mixed signals on foreign policy
Sen. John McCain is well-known for scorching denunciations of Democrats, who he says would raise the "white flag of surrender" by cutting off funds for U.S. troops in Iraq. More...
John McCain returned from Vietnam determined to lead
When John McCain limped home from a Hanoi prison camp in 1973 with a badly injured knee that he could not bend, Navy doctors gave him the bad news: His 15-year career as a jet pilot was over. He would never fly again. More...
When John McCain turned to politics, he went all-out
Navy liaison to the Senate:Second of two parts More...
McCain enters from the outside
Sen. John McCain presented a memento to fellow Republican Sen. Ted Stevens when they met in the Senate earlier this year: a key chain with a small battery-operated pig's head. More...
CAMPAIGN '08
McCain doesn't put his faith out front
Not long after he became the presumed Republican nominee, John McCain flew to New Orleans to face a skeptical audience -- conservative leaders of the Council for National Policy. More...
Starring John McCain
Some slightly disconcerting things you might have learned about Sen. John McCain had you paid attention to his biography tour this week: More...
McCain's temper back on campaign's front-burner
An angry, profane exchange between Sen. John McCain and another Republican senator last week prompted a new round of questions Monday about whether McCain's legendary temper is becoming a liability to his campaign for the presidency. More...
McCain faces question of fitness to serve, physically
As he exited the stairs of his "Straight Talk Express" campaign bus on a chilly March day in Iowa, Sen. John McCain carefully took one step at a time, his left hand gripping a rail and his right knee looking stiff. More...
Meghan McCain's straight blog express
On the night of the hard-fought Florida primary, John McCain spoke about weighty issues -- whether the Republican Party had lost its way and how he would fight America's enemies. More...
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