Obama’s victory, hope for America and inspiration for Indonesia
There is much that evokes emotions about Barack Obama, a quality that we last saw in John F. Kennedy. Kennedy was a junior Senator from Massachusetts when he was elected in 1960 just as Obama is one from Illinois. Both did not have much experience but both exuded leadership. Both were admired by a world extending far beyond the borders of the United States. American politics comes with a generous dose of romance. Indonesians respond to Obama as no one did for McCain. Text messages jangled mobile phones in Indonesia and congratulatory messages filled email in all languages. The live coverage of the vote count on November 5,2008 was watched by many in Jakarta and many rejoiced when Barack Obama passed the 270 electoral vote mark, which sealed his place at the center of the world. Not everybody knew what his programs are but mist sensed a positive area around him.
To start with, like no other US President since Franklin D, Roosevelt, Obama is a president for all America. He has stepped away from partisanship and appealed to all parts of the country regardless of race, region, and religion. His message of inclusion is the thread of his campaign, both in the Democratic Party and across the political divide. By his discipline he avoided the looming threat of the culture war which has haunted America since Richard M. Nixon used it to energize the Republican Party.
As a person Obama comes with an incredible background. We all know how he spent four years of his childhood in Indonesia, His friends at school in Jakarta and his neighborhood will give testimony to the fun he had playing and learning life at his mother’s side. When he went back to the United States he benefited from the care of his grandmother who sadly left him the day before the elections. His half-sister Maya Ng share their Indonesian background as the only survivors of this family of ordinary people.
But we will not make the mistake of claiming him for Indonesia. We are happy to have had some relevance in the development of Barack Obama. It will be our collective pride to see him become an outstanding president of America and make it a better country, because what is good for America is good for the rest of the world.
The difference between Obama and most presidents of the United States is that he does not build on fear but on hope. He is the antidote to George W. Bush of the “you are either for us or against us” mindset, promising instead dialogue and a chance at understanding even the nation’s worst enemies, keeping force as the weapon of last resort. Sensing this the world breathes a sign of relief. We will not be forced into accepting unilateral initiatives when Obama promises multilateral action whenever possible.
The sense of oppression does not exist only in the mind of America’s adversaries in the world but also in parts of the American population who have seen the space of their civil liberties consistently compressed in the name of capitalism and national security.
Maybe that is why there was so much joy in the celebration at Grant Park in Chicago, the scene of a polarized country in 1968 over the unpleasantness of the Vietnam War. The Iraq war had the same polarizing effect. And ordinary people started to feel they were held hostage of an alien kind of authority.
The scenes of celebration in the the park are reminiscent of the end of a sci-fi movie where people of the earth rejoice over defeating the aliens
The true genius of America is that it can change by democratic consensus. When it becomes clear that the people want change, they select the candidate of change by a landslide. With the magic wand of democracy, wars are minimized in glamour and the nation now concentrates on two tasks: economic recovery and improving the standing of the USA based on peace and prosperity.
These two goals are good for any country. When Indonesia can make its own democratic choice in that direction next year, we will have a sympathetic supporter in a new USA, led by a President who understands our hopes by having breathed them directly.
