so i know the election was last tuesday but to be honest i wanted to let it settle in a little before posting and ensure that i didn’t get swept away by the ongoing ‘obamania.’ i actually ended up watching the coverage on cnn from 4:30 until almost midnight. i just couldn’t look away. actually, the coverage on every other channel was absolute shit, i usually quite like nbc news but even they were crap. also, cnn wasn’t just better than the rest, it was amazing in and of itself. first of all they had sexy ‘mo anderson cooper and the always enjoyable wolf blitzer and furthermore they had a plethora of enjoyable panelists and some killer graphics that included holograms (as mentioned by bobby). i also liked that cnn was quite conservative in calling victories. the media has gotten so jumpy when calling victories in recent years and this new conservatism in that respect was a nice change. obama’s win was a bit of a forgone conclusion from midway through the night but i was glad that he wasn’t called as the winner until the votes from the west coast came in.

so after the win john mccain gave a very good concession speech that was extremely gracious and that was nice except that his bastard supporters kept booing whenever he said obama’s name. in fairness, mccain was having none of it and kept pushing them to shut the fuck up, but it was still quite annoying. sarah palin said nothing which was obviously for the best. obama’s speech was KILLER! first of all, he gave a shout out to the gays, and everyone knows we’re fickle bitches who like to be mentioned. it was nice that the future president clearly values the ‘mos more than worrying what idiotic homophobes think. but yeah, the speech was EPIC. he was excited about victory but made it clear that america has a long way to go and the challenge is far from over – it was nice to hear a politician honestly telling the people that hard times are ahead without sugarcoating it with lies about instant change. it was near perfect but for one minor detail. he didn’t mention hillary. at one point he started talking about ‘a lady’ but then he ended going on about some super-old woman who had voted since the beginning of time and completely ignored the brilliance of the hill. i think it would have been gracious to mention hillary who stumped for him hardcore after losing the democratic nomination but there you go. his team was probably not wanting to associate obama with her on election night which is unfortunate.

all in all it was an exciting and historic evening although i did keep worrying that obama was going to be shot while he was speaking because even though there was glass around him it was still a very open area. i think there’s a worrying possibility of assassination attempts from crazy rednecks who don’t like the idea of a black president – thank god they’re usually not as organized or committed as al qaeda or he’d be fucked. the harvey milk biopic that’s coming out seems strangely appropriate and i hope obama has some serious security to deal with all the crazies (on a sidenote, MILK looks amazing).

i am quite excited about barrack obama as president for many reasons including the obvious that a person from an ethnic minority is running america for the first time. i am more excited that obama won by promising to re-evaluate the right wing neo-liberal policies that america has been run on for over 30 years. it’s exciting that the first president in memory is talking about more left-leaning social policies and progress for the middle class. perhaps america is finally letting go of cold war paranoia and evaluating social policies on their individual merits rather than whether or not they seem possibly ‘communist’ in nature. this truly would be a giant leap forward for a country that seems forever locked in an ideological battle with a foe that no longer exists. a flush of young and foreign-born voters voted for a change to failed policies of the right and hopefully change is what they’ll get

also, michelle obama rocked it. love her, obviously.