Savoring the echoes

A day later, things have begun to shake out. Euphoria lingers as but a slowly dulling echo.

The reality is settling in as the rationalists throw cold water upon jubilant celebrations. Yes, we know: President Barack Obama has a rough road ahead. Nothing reveals a man’s character like his actions in times of crisis. Obama will get his chance.

But step back a moment and reflect. Don’t move on to tomorrow so swiftly that you miss the hugely important moment that is today.

In the eyes of the world, the dream of America has been renewed.

"Given Obama's name, his background, the doubts about his religion, Americans still voted for him, and this proved that America is a democracy," Saudi journalist Samir Saadi told The Washington Post. "People here are starting to believe in the U.S. again."

"It's the beginning of a different era," Rio de Janeiro police officer Emmanuel Miranda told The Associated Press. "The United States is a country to dream about, and for us black Brazilians, it is even easier to do so now."

Many Americans view the last eight years as a period in which the Bush-Cheney administration desecrated the name of the U.S., evaporating good will and political capital with their actions.

But one cannot overlook the preceding half century that laid the groundwork for their overreaching power grabs. While few Americans noticed, the U.S. supported military dictatorships in Brazil and Chile, laid the groundwork for strict Islamic control in Iran by supporting its corrupt leaders, and empowered with pro-oil policies Saudi leaders who control their people and indirectly create terrorists through careful distribution of wealth and Wahhabism. We fought and failed in futile wars in Korea and Vietnam and watched Bush’s predecessor disgrace his office long before Cheney ever took to his bunker.

This was no mere eight-year detour.

Rather, it was a culmination of a New Gilded Age of American politics that spanned 45 years. It began the day Kennedy was shot, and it ended Tuesday with John McCain’s poignant concession.

Obama comes into office with a very different mandate from Teddy Roosevelt, who ended the last gilded age upon succeeding to the presidency after William McKinley’s death. Roosevelt broke up powerful monopolies, empowered workers to gain greater protections and essentially launched the conservation movement, but he ascended to the presidency after an assassination, not on a popular wave like Obama’s.

Obama faces similar problems. He faces a runaway corporate power structure that has enriched itself at the expense of its workers, increasing class divisions that have led to populist outcry and a government grown drunk on military power.

But Obama has a very different mandate, and it is no ordinary call for change.

This country made a statement Tuesday, and that statement is no less than a peaceful revolution in the way we look at the world and the world looks at us. We defined to our leaders and the world just who it is we are as a nation: We are a people who will accept no less than our ideals. Every action the U.S. now takes occurs in an environment in which we have affirmed our identity as a people that truly believes in freedom and equality and doesn’t merely use those terms to further our ambitions of power.

Yes, Obama still has to prove himself as president. But he will do it with a type of political capital we have not seen in a long time.

The people have demanded greatness and given their blessing not to the lesser of two evils, but to a man whose very existence symbolizes all that the Declaration of Independence envisioned our country to be.

Obama steps forth on the wings of a call for renewal so dramatic that it has echoed around the world. Celebrate that call, and savor the echo.