SALON

Monday, Sep 10, 2012 2:36 AM UTC

Lifting Obama higher

If the president gets re-elected, something about this hilarious and joyous viral photo will tell us why VIDEO

By

Topics: Barack Obama,

Lifting Obama higherPresident Barack Obama, right, is picked-up and lifted off the ground by Scott Van Duzer, left, owner of Big Apple Pizza and Pasta Italian Restaurant during an unannounced stop, Sunday, Sept. 9, 2012, in Ft. Pierce, Fla. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) (Credit: Associated Press)

I saw it everywhere last night. I made it my Facebook cover photo. I couldn’t stop smiling every time I saw it. I wanted to know the back story.

According to Helene Cooper, it’s simple: Pizza parlor owner Scott Van Duzer regularly donates blood. He started the Van Duzer Foundation, to encourage others to do so as well. The Obama team decided to visit his restaurant, Big Apple Pizza and Pasta Italian Restaurant, in Fort Pierce, Fla. on Sunday, at least partly to hail Van Duzer’s charity. A little while after the president walked into the restaurant, the powerful Van Duzer, who can bench press 350 pounds, lifted the skinny president high into the air.

“Man, are you a power lifter or what?” the president asked.

The iconic photo only shows the back of the president’s head and his arms raised in supplication, so you’re not entirely sure how he feels about it. The video shows that Obama was shocked but seemed to enjoy the ride Van Duzer gave him. The restaurant owner says he told a Secret Service agent his plans, and the agent said “I was alright as long as I didn’t take him away.”

And so he didn’t. The photo was everywhere on Twitter and Facebook Sunday night, and I struggled to figure out why – and why I had such a strong reaction to it. I literally felt for the very first time that the president would win re-election — and of course that’s irrational. But the sight of this swing-state Republican small business owner (who admittedly supports Obama) pulling the president into a gravity-defying bear hug seems to thwart the conventional wisdom that guys like Van Duzer don’t like our first black president. It makes me feel optimistic about what I’m saying in my book: that a lot of people we’ve written off as hopelessly Republican don’t like Mitt Romney and maybe against all odds find themselves fond of the president.

We’ll probably find out on Monday that the Obama team did awesome advance work to identify Van Duzer, and I’m perfectly prepared for my reaction to be proven naïve. But I’m going to enjoy it anyway. Coming out of his convention with a bounce, watching Romney and Paul Ryan stonewall their way through the Sunday shows without a single human moment of connection, the president has to feel good about his chances as we move into the middle of September. It’ll be a long six weeks, but this photo tells us something about why people say, despite the sluggish economy, they believe the president can relate to them better than Romney can. It will be a powerful advantage in the weeks to come.

 


CNN via Buzzfeed

Joan Walsh

Joan Walsh is Salon's editor at large and the author of "What's the Matter With White People: Finding Our Way in the Next America." More Joan Walsh.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 18 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Loaded terminology like "entitlements" and "welfare" skews the debate and alters America. How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government.
337 points338 points | 101 comments
vote
How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government -- "...much of the U.S. economic security support system consists of subsidies for the affluent in the form of tax breaks, like those for private retirement savings plans such as 401(k)s and private employer-provided health insurance."
64 points65 points | 3 comments
vote
Temple Grandin on DSM-5: “Sounds like diagnosis by committee.” When it comes to autism, Grandin argues we're paying too much attention to labels -- and not enough to individuals
34 points35 points | 3 comments
vote
Temple Grandin on DSM-5: “Sounds like diagnosis by committee.” When it comes to autism, Grandin argues we're paying too much attention to labels -- and not enough to individuals
30 points31 points | 2 comments
vote
With the help of Photoshop, artist Yao Lu has made shanshui — traditional ink paintings — of China's landfills
30 points31 points | 1 comment

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations