BY: CHARLIE SZOLD

Claus Kleber has been on his feet all night. If anything, the esteemed German news anchor at least has endurance. We, the American bloggers, have been more or les shuttled off into a corner. Sam Hagerdon, my co-blogger, is wracking his brain to figure whether or not Obama could pick up Indiana too. I’m just sitting here — a bit shell-shocked. I have some serious egg on my face. I really thought that the American people would tack right once they entered the voting booth.

They didn’t. And now, Barack Obama is the president-elect of the United States of America.

I call myself a conservative, but this moment is a beautiful moment. This moment means so much to so many people that it is impossible to be sad. The Germans are on their feet chanting and yelling. They are as excited as the AU students. I can’t stop smiling, people can’t stop yelling… is it weird that I want to cry a little? How could you not?

This is America; this is what we do. For eight years the American people slowly became more and more alienated from their government and tonight, the healing can begin. We can, at a moment like this, be hopeful. Let the politics come later — this isn’t the time to talk about them. This is a time to be excited that so many other people are excited. Congratulations to the United States.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 12:03 am and is filed under analysis, from the tavern. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.