[The Independent, U.K.]

 

 

Estrella, Spain

A Historic November Begins for 'All of Us'

 

"If, as it looks now, Obama enters the Oval Office in January, 2009, a Black man, an African American - in other words a member of an ethnic minority that was once a collective of slaves - will arrive for the first time in more than two hundred years in the highest office of the most powerful country on the planet."

 

By José Antonio Zarzalejos

                                                

 

Translated By Barbara Howe

 

October 31, 2008

 

Spain - Estrella - Original Article (Spanish)

Tomorrow, a month of November begins that will be loaded with historic milestones. The presidential election in the United States will merit an entire chapter of its own if, as it looks now, Obama enters the Oval Office in January, 2009. With him - a Black man, an African American - in other words a member of an ethnic minority that was once a collective of slaves, will arrive for the first time in more than two hundred years in the highest office of the most powerful country on the planet.

 

The stars of history align only rarely as they will immediately after the American elections, when the States of the G-20 are scheduled to meet in Washington to “rewrite capitalism” - in the eye of this financial and economic hurricane - the most profound and devastating in memory.

 

Who emerges as President of the United States will not be irrelevant, when on November 15th, world leaders meet to alter this dismal course of events. Obama's symbolic momentum is such that his possible triumph is tied in the collective imagination to positive values like reform, regeneration, a new economic order, renewed effort to balance freedom and security, a different kind of foreign policy toward Europe and Asia, the possibility of peace in certain parts of the world … a dazzling array hopes and attributes that prompted that cult magazine - The Economist - to endorse the Democratic candidate because he so embodies the hope for change .  

Posted by WORLDMEETS.US

 

The psychological effect of a possible election of Obama will have repercussions on the global spirit, but will also affect an old conception of politics and economics in developed countries. The Democratic candidate has elaborated a whole new political language, has utilized the mass media with extraordinary facility, has shown that the Internet is no longer an option but a necessity for electoral communications and has introduced a new protocol for relations between voters and their political leaders.

 

This November is historic for all of us. Spain, too, is politically and economically perplexed. We don't yet know whether President Rodriguez Zapatero will be present in Washington for the summit meeting on November 15 - attending with the support of Latin American countries garnered at the Ibero American Summit that just ended in El Salvador. But the march of events in our own country, tangible and merely psychological, depend on what happens at the U.S. ballot box on the 4th and then “reestablishment” of capitalism on the 15th. The impact of these events will be convulsive, almost revolutionary and necessarily surgical. Let's live this month to the fullest - the most intense November in decades. It will leave its mark in the pages of history.

 

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[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US November 2, 10:15pm]