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Barack Obama's rise to the presidency has electrified not only Americans of all races, ages and backgrounds, but much of the world.

Senator Obama has appeared an embarrassing number of times on the cover of U.S. publications, from national interest titles to fitness magazines.

That in itself is an indication of his broad appeal. Senator Obama sells magazines - which is progress in and off itself. Prevailing wisdom in U.S. media suggested that putting a black person on a magazine cover (with the exception of Oprah Winfrey and a Beyonce airbrushed blonde) would lead to a sizeable drop in sales.

All of this is happening 45 years after Dr. Martin Luther King delivered his  "I Have A Dream" speech in Washington D.C. With yesterday's victory, Senator Obama has made it to the mountain-top of U.S. politics.

One month after the March on Washington, in September 1963, four black girls were killed in a church bombing in Alabama-the work of white racists and one of the more horrendous murders of the modern civil rights movement.   

Yet today, two black girls, Malia and Sasha Obama, are now America's first daughters in-waiting. (It all becomes official after the inauguration in January).

Is it any wonder that the U.S. and the rest of the world have been gripped by the symbolism of a black family occupying the White House for the next four years?

Perhaps the New Yorker magazine put it best in its editorial that endorsed Mr. Obama. "His ascendancy to the Presidency would be a symbolic culmination of the

civil-and voting-rights acts of the nineteen-sixties and the century-long struggle for equality that preceded them," its editors wrote.

Barack Obama's accomplishments and his worldview owe much to his unusual mother and his grandparents who raised him, and his untraditional upbringing.

But his biracial ancestry in no way diminishes the resonance of his story with blacks, who despite major gains in their social and economic status in the last 30 years, still have to face perceptions of inferiority.

New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristoff wrote of his conversation with a friend in Beijing, China. "But surely a black couldn't become president of the United States?" the friend said. "That's such an important job! In

America, I thought blacks were janitors and labourers."

One characteristic often applied to Mr. Obama is his intellect. The New Yorker cited his "formidable intelligence." Colin Powell spoke of his "intellectual curiosity" and his "depth of knowledge."



Assets like that, along with others such as character, judgment and commitment to family, speak volumes to a group of people who are used to being viewed negatively. He is also credited with running a brilliant campaign in contrast to John M Cain's, which was widely criticized as being disorganized and inconsistent.

Writing in Time magazine, columnist Ta-Nehisi Coates said of the Obama phenomenon: "Consider this fact: the most famous black man in America isn't

dribbling a ball or clutching a microphone. He has no prison record. He has not built a career on four-letter words. ..

"But for more than a year now, we have been treated to a p.r. campaign for our side of the tracks. There is what the world sees in Obama, and then there is what we see. Words like hope, change and progress might seem like naive campaign sloganeering in a dark age.

"But think of the way those words ring for a people whose forebears marched into billy clubs and dogs, whose ancestors fled north by starlight, feeling the moss on the backs of trees. The sight of the Obama family onstage that first night in Denver was similarly mind-blowing, an image of black families that television so rarely provides. With its quiet class and agility - the beaming beautiful wife, the waving kids - this campaign has confirmed us, assured us that we are more than just a problem."

Mr. Obama and his wife Michelle, both graduates of top U.S. law schools, represent the highest levels of black achievement. Their accomplishments demonstrate that while racial barriers remain, in the 21st century, preparation, discipline and a rigorous education will almost certainly pay off. (That goes for Bermuda as well, where the correlation between income and race, is well-documented and often spoken off in public discourse. The equally well-documented link between income and education gets less attention.)

Yet Mr. Obama's appeal transcends race. It'll take a few days to digest all the data from last night's vote but recent polls have show him attracting more support from white voters than any Democratic presidential nominee

since Jimmy Carter in 1976, Mr. Obama appears to have pulled back into the Democratic fold the legions of whites, mainly Southern men, who deserted the party following the gains of the civil rights movement.

With leading republicans such as Colin Powell, Christopher Buckley and George Will throwing their support behind Obama, and endorsements from publications like the Chicago Tribune, which has never endorsed a Democratic for president in its history, it seems likely the Republican Party will be left in tatters.

Obamania has hit Bermuda as well. Some Bermudians booked tickets to attend the inauguration in January well before election day.

As the Bermuda Sun reported on Friday, Spencer Critchley, a white Bermudian who runs a communications company in California and is now a U.S. citizen,

has been so inspired by Mr. Obama, he has been working with the Obama campaign as a volunteer all year.  Amani Flood, a black American who has lived in Bermuda for more than 27 years, was so fired up she started a

Bermuda for Barack campaign.

White Americans living in Bermuda have also lent support with cash and by pulling up their sleeves to work as volunteers in traditionally Republican states like Colorada, which the campaign needs them.

Despite his stated disposition to pull the plug on U.S. companies operating in offshore centres such as Bermuda, Mr. Obama's message of change and his emphasis on unity and consensus seem to have overshadowed any concerns about threats to our economic livelihood, a least among the general population.

Black Bermudians in their 60s and older who came of age in a segregated Bermuda and remember Bermuda's own battles for racial equality in the 50s, 60s and 70s cannot contain their wonder. The words on the April cover of Ebony magazine signalling a mixture of incredulity and hope would have had special meaning for them. It said: 'In our Lifetime-Are We Really Witnessing the Election of the Nation's First Black President?'  

The excitement over Mr. Obama's triumph recalls the excitement in Bermuda in 1998 over the  PLP's election victory and in South Africa, four years earlier, when the ANC was elected to power.

People everywhere are today savouring Mr. Obama's victory. But given the level of disillusionment being experienced by party supporters in both countries, and political realities being what they are, will the enrapture over Obama will be replaced in time with cynicism?

Will the assessment of his opponents that his talk is empty rhetoric turn out to be true?

It's likely that disappointment in his policies will surely follow. Mr.

Obama cannot possibly be all things to all supporters.

Yet, Bermudians and Americans can also take heart from the chorus of commentary that points to Mr. Obama being a "transformative figure",  to quote Colin Powell, a man of exemplary character, who could raise the bar for a new breed of politician, black and white, in the 21st century.

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