"Given the responses that I've been getting over the last several months, I have thought about the possibility.  But I have not thought it—about it with the seriousness and depth that I think is required.  My main focus right now is in the '06 and making sure that we retake the Congress.  After oh—after November 7, I'll sit down and, and consider, and if at some point, I change my mind, I will make a public announcement and everybody will be able to go at me."

Obama has been much in the news in the past couple of months.  He made a high profile two-week trip to Africa, and closer to home was the special guest at Sen. Tom Harkin's 29th Annual Steak Fry in Indianola, Iowa.  He has appeared on the covers of Men's Vogue ("The Path to Power") and Time ("Why Barack Obama Could Be The Next President").  Oprah Winfrey lauded him as her "favorite guy" on the September 28 "Larry King Live."  On October 17 he started promoting his new book The Audacity of Hope with three events in Chicago; his tour is scheduled to take him to thirteen cities in two weeks.