Homestretch for Barack

ALTHOUGH I LIVE IN THE PHILIPPINES, I've avidly followed American presidential politics for many years. As a child back in the mid-'70s, I devoured every issue of my dad's TIME Magazine left lying around the house, especially during the months leading up to elections. I clearly remember reading about Nixon's impeachment (though I only half-understood the details), Jerry Ford's forehead's frequent encounters with the doorways of aircraft, Mike Dukakis' tank-driving skills (or lack thereof), and other vignettes both great and trivial. When CNN burst on the scene, I could hardly get enough coverage. In short, I was a total nerd for U.S. politics.

Today, I no longer belong to the fringe. The world is now more interconnected by cross-border trade and investment, the imploding capital markets, the Internet and broadband and mobile conveniences, geopolitics, fundamentalist terrorism, the threat of pandemics, military overstretch by the global hegemon, and unfolding climate change. Thus, more than ever, more eyes are trained on the political leadership of the United States, and what it could mean for everyman in Harare, Reykjavik, and General Santos City.

What will the new U.S. administration bring? The world is keeping its expectations low, but you can feel the demand for fresh ideas and direction bristling with urgency just beneath the surface. Please, let it be a new day. Deliver us from Depression. It's interesting that the world outside the U.S. overwhelmingly favors Obama. Even the ongoing Internet poll being conducted by the conservative publication The Economist shows that the world is turned overwhelmingly against McCain. (See http://www.economist.com/vote2008/)

Now that we've just seen the third McCain-Obama debate, and also had a healthy dose of the CNN pundits' post-debate debate, it seems momentum remains with Obama (at least if you believe the polls). If the U.S. economy and capital markets continue looking sour through the next 2+ weeks, Barack Obama will almost certainly be elected the 44th president. Given what he faces, I don't know whether the next president deserves congratulations or condolences. Still, I for one, will probably breathe a sigh of relief, because the locus of uncertainty should have narrowed considerably after Election Day. One less wild card for the world to deal with in a year full of unpleasant surprises. Of course, we'll always find new problems to occupy ourselves with, but at least for the short term, I suspect a new mandate in the White House should help to counteract somewhat the intense instability and nervousness the world has been afflicted with of late.

Good luck to all of us!