He offered economic change

CHICAGO
FOR ALL the multiracial throng cheering wildly at the moment Barack Obama won the White House, it was a stream of mostly white voters at a north side polling spot here who were symbolic of why we now have our first African American president-elect.

Color paled next to common pain.

Consider Ethel Kissin. She ambled slowly but glowingly down the street after voting for Obama. She put all her 99 years into that vote. A half century ago, she and her husband established a successful toy business, making kaleidoscopes. Her brothers fought in World War II. She understood discrimination as a Jew.

In her twilight, she has been hit hard by the economy. "I'm really down to my rent, my heat, and my food," Kissin said. "I just wear my old clothes. I was lucky I was able to buy good ones when I had the chance."

The first thing Kissin wants Obama to do as president is to fix the economy. "I don't know how much of what he does I'll get to see," she said. "But I feel he is a very special person. It will take a very special person to run this country the way it is now."

She was echoed by Bill Graburn, a 70-year-old retired Wall Street investment manager, who said, "I want him to restore the middle class."

Gina Konrath, 52, a freelancer in advertising, pays for her own health insurance, which costs more because of preexisting conditions. "And my job to just find a job is now so hard, Konrath said.

Genevieve Chencinski, 77, a retired office worker, said, "I just want him to be honest. We haven't had an honest president for a long time."

For a night of historic racial change, they said the Change We Need from President Obama is the change in their pocket.

Jackson's e-mail is jackson@globe.com.