Barack Obama - US new elected chief executive

[Italkcash Newsfeed]

Promising change in a climate of unprecedented voter discontent, Sen. Barack Obama rode massive voter turnout to a sweeping victory in Tuesday's presidential contest over Sen. John McCain and became the first African-American elected as the nation's chief executive.

Obama was projected to easily win California, which put him over the 270 electoral-vote threshold needed to secure the presidency, and was on his way to handily defeating McCain by more than a 2-to-1 margin. At last check, Obama led by 338 to 157 electoral votes.
The popular vote was within a few percentage points.
If the electoral-vote margin holds as expected, Obama will be inaugurated on Jan. 20 as the nation's 44th president and its first of African descent.
"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer" Obama told a crowd of roughly 1 million in his victory speech at Chicago's Grant Park.
McCain noted Obama's achievement in being elected the nation's first black president in a concession speech in Phoenix, Ariz.
"His achievement alone commands my respect of his ability and perseverance," McCain said of Obama. "Let there be no reason now for any American to fail to cherish their citizenship in this, the greatest nation on Earth."
Obama's victory seemed assured earlier in the night when he secured the battleground states of Ohio and Pennsylvania, then later Florida, virtually assuring before polls closed on the West Coast that there was no way McCain, a Republican from Arizona, could capture enough electoral votes to beat Obama.
The states that went into the Obama column included a number of traditionally Democratic territories, but by capturing Virginia, he won the state that last went to a Democrat in 1964, when Lyndon Johnson secured a landslide victory over Barry Goldwater, another Arizona senator.




Source: Marketwatch