With the recent assault on Barack Obama perpetrated by both the internet media and the Hillary Clinton campaign, I think now is as good of a chance as any to address what I think Barack Obama means by "change."

I will admit that I have never been a particularly big fan of the Clintons. While I always appreciated Bill Clinton's efforts to embark on diplomatic missions and his willingness to listen to his advisers, I always thought the main problem with that administration was simply the lack of transparency. Simply, the Clintons didn't want people in their business, and quite frankly, at the end of the presidency, I think we all saw the reason why.

The Clintons, however, paled in comparison to the current Bush regime - which frankly showed a disgusting lack of transparency in almost everything they did. Yes, the last eight years of the Bush Administration has been a mixture of ill-thought out foreign policy, secretive domestic policy and little social progress despite the fact that the administration has enjoyed one of the biggest rallying cries the country has ever experienced. Rather than use this to our advantage and promote bipartisanship and American leadership, the Administration managed to further divide our country and squander all that good will with alarming ease and alacrity.

So yes, I believe that regardless of who is elected in 2008 (be it Clinton, Obama, or McCain) will do a better job of running this country than the current president. It'd be difficult not to. The "change" preached by Barack Obama, however, is why I believe he is the best man for the job.

First, I think we should, for once, define what change entails. It seems from the many ill-informed columns written by many ill-informed columnists that change means different things to different people. Does the change that Obama preaches entail an immediate and effective shift of Partisan politics? No, and frankly we'd be foolish to expect it. Does the change he preaches involve a fundamental shift in the methodology of political campaigns? Maybe eventually, but to expect so right now is to place an unfair burden on one individual. What change means, I think, is a change in the sources of information and who has access to it.

On the right side of this blog, you'll find a link to USSpending.gov, a new site that was recently established as a part of the Office of Management and Budget. It is a site that shows Americans how their money is spent. This site is the brain-child of Brack Obama, and this is what he means by change. Change means people having access to the information that they deserve. Change means allowing voters and taxpayers to see how their government spends their money and change means allowing the people to hold the government accountable for the first time in many, many years.

Of course, Change also implies action on the part of every individual who live in this country. Change means using our natural intelligence to analyze the information we're given and questioning the veracity of information. Change means looking at the National Journal's ranking of "most liberal senators" and questioning their methods and their political motivations. Change means analyzing data critically, rather than accepting every article and rumor that comes from the internet or a magazine as fact. This is what change means. It implies action on the parts of everyone, not for one man to overhaul the system while everyone else piles condemnations and doubts upon him.

Change is already being exercised by Barack Obama, and that change comes from the different types of people with which he surrounds himself. His advisers are a mix of old school professionals and new-wave academics. To him, every idea has to be heard so that the best ideas can be enacted. The realm of policy should not be dominated by people who are indoctrinated in the system. Sometimes, external sources of new, fresh ideas are necessary. This is, I believe, Obama's approach to change, and it is an approach similar to that of another young, inexperienced presidential hopeful who was told his words will never translate into action. And all of this new doubt cast upon the message of change and its preacher seems also seem similar to the doubt cast upon another man.

As Steve Kornacki of the New York Observer points out:

"In this sense, he can be likened to Ronald Reagan, who flunked all of the traditional tests of electability in 1980—he was one of the most ideologically extreme candidates ever nominated, he was ignorant of some basic policy details, and he was nearly 70 years old—but whose style, presence and wit connected with the masses and overrode all of those concerns. The term "Reagan Democrat" was born and he won in such an intimidating landslide that his political foes essentially let him enact whatever reforms he wanted for his first few months in office.

Hillary Clinton, by contrast, calls to mind Walter Mondale, who in 1984 combated Reagan's sunny vision with what Newsweek described as "a gigantic To-Do List, a leaden compendium of programs heaped one on another … as if he intended to crush his audiences in specifics."

So I suppose the question we have to ask ourselves is that can we keep going the traditional way? Can we afford to travel on the same road we've been on for the past 16 years? Although electing Hillary Clinton or John McCain might lead to a smoother ride, we're still traveling the same worn out, ideologically down-trodden road. With Barack Obama, I think the road changes altogether, and I think that change of direction, change of methods and change of course is exactly what this country needs right now.