Tim Bates' March 19 letter says that Barack Obama is a "one-term Congressman with almost no track record," and that he is a liar for taking contributions from some major corporations and law firms that are registered lobbyists while stating that he does not take money from lobbyists.

I'd like to present some facts.

Mr. Obama has held state and national elected office for roughly 10 years, and his record includes the following (a fuller statement of his actions and accomplishments is available at barackobama.com):

During his eight years of elected service in Illinois, he sponsored more than 820 bills. He introduced 60 human rights and anti-discrimination bills (including helping to reform the death penalty system in Illinois to protect innocent people on death row); 21 ethics reform bills (and he joined forces with the late Senator Paul Simon to pass the toughest campaign finance law in Illinois history); 233 bills regarding health-care reform; 125 on poverty and public assistance; 112 crime-fighting bills; 97 economic bills; 15 on gun control; and 6 on veterans affairs.

His work since entering the US Senate includes writing more than 890 bills and co-sponsoring more than 1,090. Among them are the 2007 Government Ethics Bill (which the Washington Post called "the strongest ethics legislation to emerge from Congress yet"), the Coburn-Obama Government Transparency Act of 2006, the Lugar-Obama Nuclear Non-proliferation and Conventional Weapons Threat Reduction Act, and legislation to slash red tape to help wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital.

Opensecrets.org shows that no one is 100 percent "clean" when it comes to sources of their dollars, but Obama is probably as good as it gets until we can change the financing system to one of public funding or something else that will eliminate the loopholes as well as the obvious problems. (I believe Obama's commitment is to not take dollars from federal lobbyists.)

I agree with Mr. Bates that we will be best served when no politician owes favors to others due to money received. In the meantime, all candidates must maneuver through some Catch 22s regarding securing enough money under our current system to make them viable candidates. I think Mr. Obama is doing a decent job with this challenge, and I am volunteering my time to help get him elected.

JANE ELLEN BLEEG, BRIGHTON