President Obama!

To the immense relief and open joy of most people around the world, Barack Obama did get elected President of the United States last Tuesday. The hope and optimism is as tangible as it must also be an enormous responsibility, perhaps even burden, to the new president elect. All over the world hopes have been expressed for a reconciliation of America with the world, of peace, of an end to unilateralism and warmongering. The wave of goodwill that welcomes Obama into his new office is amazing. So this is what it looks like if the world, or even one country, has a leader who really listens to the people! As I said in my last post, the real responsibility of a political leader is "to build and preserve the conditions a people need to thrive spiritually and materially". If indeed there is one who genuinely does so (rare as that may be), the people react with an out pour of love and goodwill. The best leader is the one who brings out the best in people. So far, Obama has truly inspired the majority of the American people as well as people all over the world. He carries a torch of hope and healing - but needless to say, the road ahead is daunting. As he said in his acceptance speech, the situation could hardly be more dismal: two wars, a planet in peril, and the worst economic crisis of a century. I personally neither doubt Obama's sincerity nor his ability to get things done. What I wonder about is how many obstacles will be in his way. How many are there with ulterior motives who will just try to manipulate, deceive, or worse, threaten him? How much will he be able to look through, and avoid, bad advise and corruption? How many compromises will he have to make, and how often will there only be a choice between two bad choices?

There are those who say that the world is really controlled by a handful of men known to conspiracy theorists as "the Elite". World leaders may often only play a surface role in events that were purposefully created by shadowy figures behind the scenes. Even though I don't necessarily want to buy into such a worldview, I think that the events of the last 8 years leave little doubt that there must be at least some truth to this view point. The question is if one wise and sincere man could rise above this mess of self interest and corruption and indeed reinstate the idea of the American Dream. Is it possible to believe that something good could actually come out of politics?

I, for my part, choose to believe so.