Dog & Duck Dispatch No. 1

I'm down at the Dog & Duck, where the Drinking Liberally folks are holding their election watch party and the line for the bar has been the same length--really long--since I got here about 40 minutes ago.

Despite the crowd, ACC student Amanda Torres has managed to stake out her own table as she waits for her friends. I noticed her because while I was in line scanning the crowd, she was in the crowd scanning the line--and taking notes in a spiral notebook and wearing an "Ask me why I'm voting for Obama" button.

It turns out Torres is an international business undergrad minoring in psych, and she's taking notes on crowd behavior for one of her classes. And the button? She says that in one of her classes earlier in the semester, a student said he was voting for Obama because he is black. Torres, who is also black, said she hopes people won't assume that's her reason for her vote, and that it's an insult to her intelligence to assume she'd vote for someone just because of his or her race.

So why does she like Obama? "Many people say he's an eloquent speaker, and that's nice, but also he's an amazing thinker," she said. Torres admires his ability to throw out the "old politics" and take on the new. She especially appreciates his views on Palestine and Israel, she said--instead of just agreeing with one or the other, he wants both sides to "sit down and talking about it."

It's also important that "he can appeal and empathize with not just the majority race in America but the minority races in America," said Torres. "I don't believe he's the messiah or the chosen one or anything crazy like that," she continued. "He's a man who's an actual statesman. He not only believes in his country but in doing everything in his power to make it thrive."