Barack Obama told supporters that "change has come to America" as he claimed victory in a historic presidential election.
"The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America -- I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you -- we as a people will get there," Obama said in Chicago, Illinois, before an estimated crowd of up to 240,000 people.
With Obama's projected win, he will become the first African-American to win the White House.Obama had an overwhelming victory over Sen. John McCain, who pledged Tuesday night to help Obama lead. McCain called Obama to congratulate him, and Obama told the Arizona senator he was eager to sit down and talk about how the two of them can work together. President Bush also called Obama to offer his congratulations. Bush told Obama he was about to begin one of the great journeys of his life, and invited him to visit the White House as soon as it could be arranged, according to White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. Obama will be working with a heavily Democratic Congress. Democrats picked up Senate seats in New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina and Virginia, among others.
Flanked by American flags, Obama told the roaring crowd, "This is your victory."
"To those Americans whose support I have yet to earn -- I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your president too," he said.
More than 1,000 people gathered outside of the White House, chanting "Obama, Obama!"Sen. Hillary Clinton, Obama's former rival for the Democratic nomination, said in a statement that "we are celebrating an historic victory for the American people." As results came in Tuesday night, Obama picked up early wins in Pennsylvania and Ohio -- states considered must-wins for McCain. Obama also won Virginia, a state that has not voted for a Democratic president since 1964. Going into the election, national polls showed Obama with an 8-point lead. Voters expressed excitement and pride in their country after casting their ballots in the historic election. Poll workers reported high turnout across many parts of the country, and some voters waited hours to cast their ballots.
Tuesday marks the end of the longest presidential campaign season in U.S. history -- 21 months.Obama, 47, will now begin his transition to the White House. He will be sworn in at the 44th president on January 20, 2009. [End of report]
He finally did it! Barack Obama is now the president-elect of the United States of America and as one of his supporter, I share his joy as well. It has been a long journey with a lot of challenges, but I think it was all worth it. Let's now look at some of the reasons why he managed to win the elections. First of all, Im going to be honest here and say that I dont know who Barack Obama was before the start of the campaign, nor have I ever heard his name before and I dont think many Americans did too. But after he won the Iowa caucuses, we started to hear his name more often and he went on to win a few more caucuses as well as primaries which was a bit of a surprise to some people as they thought that Hillary Clinton, who was the most popular candidate in the Democratic party would win it all. That didnt happened of course as Obama started to get some momentum in his campaign going. People were starting to know Obama better as the campaign moved on. One by one, the Democratic presidential candidates starts to drop out from the race. My choice for the presidential nomination was John Edwards at first but he too had to drop out from the race. But before he did, I managed to see the signs that he would do just that, and I started to support Obama as well as my second choice, just in case Edwards drop out which he did later. The race was down to two, Obama and Hillary and this is another reason why I think he managed to do so well in the elections.
As we all know, both Obama and Hillary had a long and bitter primary battle and I think this actually helped Obama more than it hurts him. I think during the long battle, it gave Obama the time he needed to let the people know more about him. This wasnt a problem for Hillary as I think almost everyone know who she is, but I thought Obama needed more time and as the primary battle went on, people get to know more about Obama which could be a crucial factor if he was going to be the party's nominee as he will be going on against a more experienced and well known John McCain from the Republican party. The bad side of it is that it turned many Clinton supporters off Obama in particular the women voters. If you could remember back then after Hillary conceded defeat, the polls were showing a large percentage of Clinton's supporters who did not plan to vote for Obama in November. But that was then. Soon, Hillary started to give her support to Obama, doing some fundraising events for him and appearing in the Democrat National Convention calling for her supporters to support Obama. Another reason I think is his youth factor. Obama as we all know is the much younger candidate of the two, and I think it is precisely because of this that many young and new voters decided to vote for him.
I believe that because of the vast age difference between him and McCain, it managed to help him to appeal to the young voters and they probably felt that they can relate better with an Obama presidency than McCain and the statistics doesnt lie. I went to do some research and found out that there was a strong support from young voters for Barack Obama. Voters in the 18 to 24 age group broke 68 percent for Obama to 30 percent for John McCain, according to the exit polling. Those in the 25 to 29 age bracket went 69 percent to 29 percent in Obama's favor. If you look at the numbers, its staggering. And among those factoring age into their vote, 78 percent went for Obama to 21 percent for McCain, exit polls showed. So all these factors among others contribute to his victory I think. The first thing I did when I woke up this morning was to tune in to CNN and when I saw the key states of Pennsylvania and Ohio, I knew there is no way that McCain was going to make a comeback. It was only a matter of time before Obama was declared as the winner and at the stroke of exactly 12pm, Singapore time, the news was in. Obama will be the new president of America. Im not an American, but I would like to call myself an American at heart, so when I saw that news, a lot of emotions ran through my mind. I was completely overjoyed and sad at the same time, overjoyed because my man has won it, and sad because the campaign trail is finally over.
I really enjoyed the entire campaign trail right from the start. I wished that it never had to end but then again, if that happen, then Obama wouldnt be the president-elect. I might not be supporting John McCain but I think we can all agree that he had run a great campaign as well despite all the differences he had with Obama and all the bad things he said about him. He made a great comeback during the primary season and he needed a greater comeback to win the elections, but it was never to be. I watched his speech in which he conceded defeat and I think it was really great to hear. He spoke from his heart and even though I didn't support him, I shed some tears hearing his speech I dont really know why, its probably because I dont get to see Sarah Palin as often anymore. I dont think John McCain will contest for the next election but the same cannot be said on Palin's part. So do watch out for her. After that I watch the speech from Obama and it was inspirational to hear as always. Now that the first part of the job is done and over with, he will have a far more greater challenges ahead. He will have to think on ways to restore the economy, stop the terrorist threats, mulling over the possibility of a nuclear Iran, the challenges and problems he will face is endless but I believe he will be able to overcome all of it just like what he had promised he would do as the president.
He wont be taking charge of the White House just as yet though. Obama and running mate Joe Biden will take their oath of office on Jan. 20 next year. Although it will happen next year, the work for Obama starts from this day onwards. Obama has always talked about bringing change that the people can believe in, now the people have a president that they can believe in. For now though, lets keep the party going!
*For those of you who missed the speeches from Obama and McCain, you can read their full transcript here respectively at http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/04/obama.transcript/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
or
Or if youre too lazy to read it, you can watch the entire video of it here http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/04/obama.transcript/index.html?iref=mpstoryview#cnnSTCVideo
or
http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2008/11/04/sot.mccain.concession.cnn?iref=mpvideosview
*The report was taken from CNN
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