Who said yes we can

The Washington Post reports that Michelle Obama convinced the president use the phrase, even though he was worried it was too "corny. In an interview with the New York Times, Obama's political advisor David Axelrod recalled his hesitation to say the phrase in a political ad when he was running for U. Senate in Illinois. View Iframe URL. President Obama, and our country, does not only owe Michelle Obama praise for her selection in her husband's campaign slogan.

The slogans being used by the current crop of Democratic candidates fall into a few different categories. More monikers than slogans, these descriptive taglines simply convey to voters that a particular person is running for office. The basic tagline can be spiced up with poetic devices such as alliteration—for example, Amy for American or Win with Warren. More creative yet are the puns, such as Feel the Bern, that play upon words that sound alike but have different meanings.

For a successful political slogan, this means a certain aesthetic appeal that arises from leveraging the poetic function of language. Senator Obama first introduced this slogan in a speech to supporters on the evening of the New Hampshire primary in January We know the battle ahead will be long.

But always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change. Yes, We Can. It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation: Yes, we can. It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights: Yes, we can.