Could the Barack Obama Story Happen Only In America?


Lately I have grown a bit tired of the "Only in America" sentiment that has been going around in the aftermath of Barack Obama's historic win in the 2008 US presidential elections.

I am proud to have been a very early supporter of Obama's candidacy. I joined his Facebook fan club when he was a long shot for the Democratic Party's nomination and had 300K odd fans. He now has 2.5M fans on Facebook.

However, we ought to remember that there are many other nations that have been electing women and other minorities as heads of state, in some cases since decades ago.

Women have been elected heads of state in the UK (Margaret Thatcher), Canada (Kim Campbell), India (Indira Gandhi) and elsewhere.

Similarly, ethnic minorities have been elected/appointed to the top in France (Sarkozy), Peru (Fujimori), Argentina (Menem), India (Manmohan Singh), Bolivia (Morales), Venezuela (Chavez) and elsewhere.

Barack Obama's election is a huge milestone for America, but let's maintain a reasonable perspective. The winner in the US baseball leagues isn't the world champion and Obama's victory, while commendable, rests on the shoulders of many other nations that have elected minorities to the top.

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