Paradigm Shifting

A map of newspaper endorsements ===>

In the category of "wow" endorsements of the day, the Economist has come out in support of Obama: "In terms of painting a brighter future for America and the world, Mr Obama has produced the more compelling and detailed portrait. He has campaigned with more style, intelligence and discipline than his opponent. Whether he can fulfil his immense potential remains to be seen. But Mr Obama deserves the presidency."

Politico looks at the effects Obama's voter turnout is having down the ballot: "Barack Obama is shaking up the South by greatly expanding the black vote and forcing Republicans to confront splits in the same white conservative base that has long fortified the GOP in Congress. Georgia's U.S. Senate race is Exhibit 1, as a record turnout by African-Americans in early voting has lifted the candidacy of Democrat Jim Martin against Saxby Chambliss, the Republican incumbent. At the same time, Wall Street's meltdown — punctuated by the state's own fiscal woes — has soured the mood for Republicans, and Chambliss must win back conservatives, angered by his vote for Treasury's $700 billion financial rescue plan."

You know what I also love about this election? I love the reminders of what we have in common across the nation. I love that there's a guy in Salem, Virginia who apparently lives in the woods, who feels the same way a ballet-crazy liberal in Japantown, San Francisco does. He's obsessed with the election, and so am I. He blogs from his laptop constantly. And so do I. America, we're not so different as you might imagine.

Here's how far we've come. The Austin-American Statesman offers this story of 109-year old Texan Amanda Jones, whose father was born into slavery. "Amanda Jones says she cast her first presidential vote for Franklin Roosevelt, but she doesn't recall which of his four terms that was. When she did vote, she paid a poll tax, her daughters said. That she is able, for the first time, to vote for a black presidential nominee for free fills her with joy, Jones said."

In a Wall St. Journal op-ed, Daniel Henninger defines the shift embedded in this election's outcome. "The political planets are aligned to make this achievable. In the aftermath of the financial crisis, prominent Democrats, European leaders in France and Germany and more U.S. newspaper articles than one can count have said that the crisis proves the need to permanently tame the American "free-market" model. P.O.W. Alan Greenspan is broadcasting confessions. The question is: Are the American people of a mind to throw in the towel on the system that got them here? This would be a historic shift, one post-Vietnam Democrats have been trying to achieve since their failed fight with Ronald Reagan's "Cowboy Capitalism."

Here's a little tidbit for those West Wing fans out there: "Four years later, the writers of The West Wing are watching in amazement as the election plays out. The parallels between the final two seasons of the series (it ended its run on NBC in May 2006) and the current political season are unmistakable. Fiction has, once again, foreshadowed reality... Online, some West Wing fans are wondering whether the show will wind up forecasting the real-life result as well. In Britain, where the series remains popular in syndication, a recent headline on a blog carried by the newspaper The Telegraph declared: "Barack Obama will win: It's all in The West Wing."