It's about YOU

The campaign that's "about you" has already begun to prove its motto.

A video made by a supporter has been filtering around the internet and the Associated Press picked up on the story today:

In the long history of political campaign theme songs, there has never been one quite like "Yes We Can," starring Barack Obama and a host of A-list celebrities. For one thing, it's more than a song — it's a viral video hit with almost 1.9 million views on YouTube since being posted last Friday.

There's also the fact that the Obama campaign did not commission the song — the rapper, songwriter and producer will.i.am, frontman for the Black Eyed Peas, says he was inspired to create it while watching Obama's speech after his second-place finish to Sen. Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire primary.

"It was as if he was talking to me," will.i.am told The Associated Press on Tuesday night as Obama and Clinton contended for the Democratic presidential nomination. "It was as if he was talking to and defending everything that made me who I am. I took that speech, and I wanted everyone else to be inspired by that speech as I was.

The song feature Obama's voice set to will.i.am's music and melody, plus vocalizations of the speech from the likes of Scarlet Johansson, John Legend, Kate Walsh, Common, Nicole Scherzinger, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Herbie Hancock and other celebrity supporters. The chorus is one of Obama's campaign slogans: "Yes We Can."

Obama is a fan of the video and recommended it to reporters on his campaign plane after he saw it Saturday. The campaign posted it on its Web site with a form so people can share it, and aides played it to warm up the crowd at an event headlined by Oprah Winfrey in Los Angeles on Sunday.

"After nearly a year on the campaign trail, I've seen a lot of things that have touched me deeply, but I had to share this with you," the candidate's wife, Michelle Obama, said in an e-mail to supporters Monday. "Sharing this video, which was created by supporters, is one more way to help start a conversation with your friends, family, co-workers, and anyone else who will be voting soon about the issues important to them in this election."

While will.i.am is hoping for an Obama presidency, he says the point of the song was not just to stir up votes for the Illinois senator, but to "remind people how powerful they are. The idea of 'Yes We Can' doesn't stop because he doesn't win."

-- Associated Press 2:34 p.m. PT, Wed., Feb. 6, 2008

Check out the video: