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It’s the hope of slaves sitting around a fire singing freedom songs. The hope of immigrants setting out for distant shores.…

The hope of a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too.

Hope in the face of difficulty. Hope in the face of uncertainty. The audacity of hope!

As soon as Obama finished his speech, one of our guests said, “That will change the calculation for 2008.” At last someone had invoked the language of idealism that I was longing for. Because Kerry had personally asked Obama to open the convention, I thought it reflected well on the tone he was trying to set for the party and on the general election campaign.

But his campaign seemed more focused on how to win than on why he should. Kerry was given a perfect opportunity to distinguish himself from Bush in the summer of 2004 when a bipartisan commission issued a damning report on the run-up to the American invasion of Iraq. The weapons of mass destruction, used by Bush to justify his decision to go to war, did not exist. Both candidates were asked: Had you known then what you know now—that there were no weapons of mass destruction—would you have still invaded Iraq?

Bush immediately said yes. Kerry dawdled for three days, and many assumed he was conducting a poll to determine the best answer or the best way to frame it. I furiously shot off e-mails to Kerry’s brother, a prominent Boston lawyer who was central to the campaign. I thought Kerry had a chance to present a different vision for using American military force while confronting the Bush administration for its carelessness in starting the war. Instead, he answered the question by agreeing with Bush. I was certain it was not what he believed.

At that moment, the air went out of the campaign for me and many others. I put on a brave face, of course, and helped where I could. But it seemed to me that the Democrats had lost the will to champion values and to be a voice of optimism. At a minimum, that meant rejecting the radical idea of preemptive war when there was no imminent threat to the nation.

I was still working at Coca-Cola at the time, but that’s when the seed was planted that I wanted to run for governor. The outcome of the Bush-Kerry contest was close. I was in the campaign suite in the Copley Place Hotel in Boston in the early hours of November 3 when the call was finally made that the race was over. I was thoroughly disappointed, though none could be more than the people around me who had dedicated so much to the campaign, and I left the suite quickly to avoid the inevitable recriminations. But I did wonder if the American people had been allowed to glimpse the real John Kerry or been given a reason for why his victory mattered to the nation. Here was an uncommonly decent man, who had sacrificed for his country and would lead with fortitude and worldliness. Would our knowing his values and ideals have mattered? Would knowing mine?

Obama won the Senate seat, of course. Not long after he was sworn in, I went to Washington to meet with him in his cramped basement office in the Russell building. The standard government furniture was still being moved in. He was himself: long, perilously lanky, relaxed, confident, and a little preoccupied. His eyes are deep and considering; his ears, famously wide. His hands are surprisingly delicate. We discussed staffing—he had hired an assistant who had worked for me at Justice—and the oddity of being a celebrity in an institution that values seniority above all else. He was looking forward to finding out about his committee assignments.

Then I told him that I was thinking of running for governor.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“You got any money?”

“No.”

“You got any name recognition?”

“No.”

“You got any staff or consultants yet?”

“No.”

I said what I did have was a passion for helping people, a willingness to make the tough calls if they are the right ones, and a hunger to reach out to people who were not feeling connected to their government. Above all was