It is indeed significant to have elected our first black president. This will help in exorcising our racial demons. (I read a black journalist who said that if Obama won, which he could scarcely believe would happen, that it would show that everything he believed about white people would be proven wrong).
I think we will see in President Obama a repeat of the John Kennedy phenomenon: an upsurge of idealism that may sweep away much of our cultural cynicism, especially among the young and among our cultural elite. This would be healthy.
Also, American prestige will shoot up in the world. Developing nations will love us. Europe and Australia will admit our moral superiority. Russia and China will test us, but we will trump them with the world’s support.
I have misgivings and fears, but I’m looking for the positives, and I do think there will be some.
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