Yes he did
| By editorial Wednesday, 5 November 2008 - 2:31pm. |
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream—and last night it finally came true.
Forty years after Dr. King’s assassination, 40 years after the race riots that threatened to tear the nation apart, a black man stood before a throng of 250,000 cheering and crying people in Chicago to deliver his victory speech after being elected the 44th president of the United States.
The notion of a black president would have been preposterous in 1968—and no doubt many even today never thought they’d live to see it. But Barack Obama, an obscure senator from Illinois just a few short years ago, rode his “Yes We Can” mantra first to the Democratic Party’s nomination over Hillary Rodham Clinton and then to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. in Washington against Republican challenger John McCain.
And with it, the final race barrier came crashing down—a fitting tribute to the brave men and women, both black and white, who fought and sometimes died for the right for people to eat in the same restaurants, drink from the same fountains, swim in the same pools, ride the same buses, attend the same schools, and play the same professional sports regardless of their skin colour.
Prejudice and racism will never be completely eradicated in the U.S. (or any other country for that matter, including Canada). And while Mr. Obama picked up the torch carried by so many before him and took it over the last hurdle to fulfilling Dr. King’s dream, he now faces the daunting task of living up to the lofty, almost messianic, expectations held by so many Americans.
History ultimately will judge whether Mr. Obama was a great president or not; whether he saved the country from the current financial crisis or transformed its stature in the eyes of the world. One accomplishment that can never be taken away, however, is that presidents after him will be chosen based on their actions, skills, and ideas, not their ethnic background nor (hopefully some day) their gender.
Yes he did.
