Obama: A Canadian'80s Perspective

Welcome back again. After a slow start to the year, the Blog Journalists are back on track and ready to return to our steady schedule of posts Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, at 5:00pm EST. We will be joined by new member Brent Densmore with a weekly post, as well as be unveiling some new features in the coming weeks. Thanks for reading, and remember to check back frequently. Now for Monday's post:

Five days after the eightieth anniversary of the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr., Barack Obama will be inaugurated as the forty-fourth President of the United States. The fact that my father was not only alive, but almost a teenager when King was assassinated in 1968 is I think somewhat lost on my generation. The event is chronicled in our history textbooks, somewhere after Sputnik, and just before Trudeau. We cannot grasp the enormity of systematic racism or the civil rights movement from our Canadian'80s vantage point. That perhaps is a testament to how far we have come. Hopefully Barack Obama's ascension to the Oval Office is a further testament to that.

Much has been made about Obama being the first African American President, and this is indeed a significant event. But more importantly in our post-race world is the fact that he will be the first president born after 1946. He is fifteen years younger that W and Bill Clinton, and he is twenty-five years younger than John McCain. He is also younger than Harper, Brown, Sarkozy, Merkel, Rudd, Putin, etc, and he will be the first president since 1989 not to be named Bush or Clinton. While Hillary Clinton certainly had her own qualities and merits, it is important for America to embark in a new direction of the next generation. Dare I say 'Change'.

America is at a cross-roads. Before his term is even over, the title of 'Worst President' is being bandied about for Bush (much to Warren Harding's delight). Grappling with debts and recessions, wars and oil, and an international image that is not merely tarnished but thoroughly corroded, there is a lot on the plate of the incoming president. He campaigned on the promise of Hope and Change, and he is being heralded a savior world-wide. Kenyans were dancing in the street. These are extremely high expectations for a man entering the post under two foreign wars and a global recession. Will he be able to live up to all that is expected of him and all that is necessary of him? I believe he has the tools and the temperament to be unlike any leader we have seen for a long time, and certainly has a better shot at righting things than everyman moose-hunting hockey-moms. Reading passages from The Audacity of Hope just made me tingle with idealism.

Are we really living in a post-race world? Of course not. Despite what Stephen Colbert says, subtle racism, as well as sexism, streak through our society (just ask Prince Harry). Will Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton change that? Probably not. But him at the helm represents a chance for a new direction; a hope for change. There are watershed moments in history; moments when we stop running uphill and start bouncing down the other side. Just as the end of the First World War realized a new kind of warfare, 20 January 2009 will realize a new kind of president. One which we can believe in.

Russel MacDonald