Lynn's victory.

Looks like Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com was right. Never would have thought it. Barack Obama winning North Carolina? Virginia? Florida? Astounding. Pretty solid victory for a Democrat, I must say. (It bears remembering that Bill Clinton never broke 50% of the popular vote.) I will admit to a certain divided sentiment going into this election. On the one hand, it felt inevitable that Obama would win - not so much because of the polling, but because he just seemed like the person for this moment. On the other, I just found it hard to believe that this country would elect an African American guy named Barack Hussein Obama President of the United States. Up until the last couple of years, I'd always assumed that the first black president - if ever there was to be one at all - would be a Republican/conservative hawkish type, like Colin Powell.... you know, offset the "otherness" with a healthy dose of jingoistic cultural hegemony. But hey, w.t.f., so much for that. I guess it's true until it's not, like sitting Vice Presidents never win. Now ... there's going to be a black liberal Democrat in the White House this January.

Readers of this blog (all five of you) know that I have significant political differences with Obama and, more generally, with the Democratic party. But Tuesday was a source of both joy and relief to me. Joy after eight years of Bush and an even longer stretch of just plain bad government, descending into catastrophe over the last two terms. Relief that a hot head like McCain is not going to be driving the ship of state over the falls, or crashing it like one of his planes. I felt a little bit of this when Clinton won the first time, though I was never as comfortable with big Bill as I am with Obama. I suppose I experienced a kind of visceral charge out of, for once, pulling a lever with someone's name on it and having that someone end up president. That didn't count for much. And I can't say that I was in a gloating mood around the McCain voters the next day... though I did leave the Obama lawn sign up for the rest of the day. (If I could endure the fool for eight years, they can stand that sign for a few hours.)

As it happens, there's a personal dimension to the success of the Obama campaign. One of the first people to talk to me about the Illinois Senator was a neighbor, a retired school teacher named Lynn Beaton. He lent me Obama's most recent book, actually, which I have yet to read (and yet to return). Sadly Lynn died of a heart attack last year, but since then it has almost seemed as though he were observing the race from afar, coaxing it along. Every time I thought Obama really didn't stand a chance, he would pull it out somehow, and I'd think about Lynn. When my wife Karen and I went into the voting booth this past Tuesday, we both thought of him as we pulled that lever. How he must be smiling right now... and I don't mean at all that stuff about Palin's wardrobe (though he'd probably get a kick out of that, too). For all it means to so many people, I'll always think of this election as Lynn's. He was out ahead of most of them.

Anyway, congratulations to all those who wanted this to happen. Now the work begins.

luv u,

jp