Barack Obama was elected the US’ first African-American president, defeating John McCain decisively on Tuesday as citizens surged to the polls in a presidential race that climaxed amid the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
“Change has come,” senator Obama told a huge throng of cheering supporters in Chicago at a midnight rally.
In his first speech as victor, Obama catalogued the challenges ahead. “The greatest of a lifetime,” he said, “two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century.”
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He added, “There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as president, and we know that government can’t solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face.”
The culmination of the epic two-year campaign marks a historic moment in a nation that since its founding has struggled with racial divisions. It also ushers in a period of dominance for Democrats in Washington for the first time since the early years of president Bill Clinton’s first term. With Tuesday’s elections, Obama’s party will control both houses of Congress as well as the White House, setting the scene for Democrats to push an ambitious agenda from health care to financial regulation to ending the war in Iraq.
In becoming the US’ 44th president, Illinois senator Obama, 47 years old, defeated Arizona senator McCain, 72, a veteran lawmaker and Vietnam War hero. Despite a reputation for bucking his own party, McCain could not overcome a Democratic tide, which spurred voters to take a risk on a candidate with less than four years of national political experience. Obama is the first northern Democrat elected president since John F. Kennedy in 1960.
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McCain conceded the election to Obama, congratulating him and pledging to help bring unity to the country.
McCain was defeated in Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Mexico and New Hampshire, swing states he was hoping to secure for the Republican column.
According to a preliminary tally, Obama led the race with 349 electoral votes versus 173 for McCain; 270 were needed to win.
Also elected, as vice-president: Joe Biden, the veteran senator from Delaware who has promised to help Obama steer his agenda through Congress.
Obama’s victory was built on record fund-raising and a vast national campaign network. It remade the electoral map that had held fast for eight years. He overwhelmed reliable Democratic strongholds in the Northeast and West Coast. He won big in the industrial Midwest and contested fiercely in areas of traditional Republican strength. He won Virginia, the first time a Democratic candidate had taken the state since Lyndon Johnson in 1964. And he finally wrested Florida and Ohio from the GOP, two states that had bedevilled his party in the last two elections.
Source: Livemint.com
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