Barack Hussein Obama has been elected to the office of President of the United States of America.

The junior Senator from Illinois swept the 2008 election with a majority of both the popular and electorial votes.  He won a solid victory against Arizona Senator and Viet Nam-era war hero John McCain, winning in both traditional Democratic states as well as states known as Republican strongholds.

A virtual unknown until his stirring keynote address at the 2004 Democratic Convention, the President-elect’s meteoric rise to the White House was fueled by a riveting personal style, a gift for stirring oratory and a commanding ability to deploy new technology to raise funds and organize supporters.

The election of the left-leaning Democrat marks significant demographic and cultural shifts among the American electorate.  He will become the first post-Baby Boom President, as well as the first bi-racial President.  Politically, his ascendancy will mark the end of the prolonged era of small-government and unregulated capitalism that’s been in power since the Reagan Revolution of 1980.