I discovered in high school that elections aren’t really my thing. Bitter after losing a bid for the NHS vice presidency, I swore off politics and any personal ambitions that depended on the general consensus of high school popularity. True power, I reasoned, comes from quiet intelligence and behind-the-scenes hard work.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, for example, was never elected. And these days, he’s pretty much calling all the shots. I figure, if I can speak enough about the economy in a convoluted and roundabout manner, one day, I can have limitless power, too.

It took a two hour Frontline documentary on the lives and rise to power of Senators Barack Obama and John McCain to reignite my excitement for politics. PBS has always held the key to my heart, and true to form, the deep droning bass of a documentary narrator has spurred me to vote on Nov. 4.

I have in fact been following the election. I’ve followed the two-year marathon, watching the faces of Mitt Romney, the Clintons and other had-runs fly across the covers of news magazines. But in the end, when the round-the-clock coverage of the election boils down to Fox News apolitically wondering if a slight chin scratch by Barack Obama is in fact a subtle dig at Hillary Clinton, it’s hard to take the issues seriously.

And ironically, it’s what we’re not meant to take seriously that I think really defines this election. When Stephen Colbert challenges his viewers to spruce up McCain’s green screen backdrop and when Tina Fey lampoons Sarah Palin’s incoherent babbling, late night comedy zeros in on the sometimes insignificant and the other times very significant talking points of this election.

The talking heads and egomaniacal anchors of cable news shout for our attention, decrying the six degrees of separation between our candidates and their obscurely tied, nefarious associates. In this calamitous war for the most sensational headline, “news” has failed us by trying to make everything, no matter how minute, a serious issue. Comedy, though, gets it right. Pointed satire wins in the battle-that-should-have-never-been between “real” news and fake news.

I appreciate Frontline and PBS for putting something both real and serious on television for the American audience in these last days before the election. The documentary on Obama and McCain centers not so much on where the two senators stand on the issues but on how they got to where they are today. Casting aside the media frenzy around personality politics, “The Choice” tells the remarkable stories of two great men’s lives.

I passed up the chance to vote in the primaries earlier this year. It wasn’t that I was uninformed or uninterested, I think I was simply willing to let someone else make the decision for me. I believed that I, and a majority of college students, understood that Super Tuesday was likely to be the more important day in this election cycle’s history. The choice between Obama and Clinton was the choice that my generation had to make. And while the results of the primaries are old news by now, I bring it up because I realize now what the stakes of Nov. 4 are.

I don’t believe anyone has the right answers. Not John McCain. Not Barack Obama.

If either of our candidates were honorable statesmen and truly knew how to solve our wars, our struggling financial sector, our doomed health care infrastructure or our ineffectual public education system, these issues would be resolved regardless of who takes office next January. Our next president does not have the right answers. It’s clear from the way both maneuver around questions and speak in broad vagaries that neither has a cheat sheet in their shirt sleeves.

But the stakes are still incredibly high. This election is about the American brand.

In recent years, our brand power has slipped, and in recent months, it has been bleeding. The next American president has the duty of repairing our brand. Each of our candidates represents powerful American ideals. John McCain is honor and courage. Barack Obama is change and inspiration.

In a few days, I will be voting in my first election. Last February, I made the mistake of letting others decide for me. But I think I realize now that this election has the potential to redefine the postmillennial United States. We often discount the powers of rhetoric, believing words lack substance. But in Obama, I believe a new, substantive brand exists. Representing me and my generation, Obama embodies a post-racial, charismatic, ambitious and thoughtful America.

On Nov. 4, I believe Americans will be looking for a changed and newly inspired American brand. I’ll be voting for Barack Obama, and I hope you will too.

Henry is a sophomore in Business. He wonders if you have seen the Barack Obama remix of Kanye West’s Stronger on YouTube. Harder Faster Barack Obamer!