In many respects, Barack Obama was the ultimate candidate for the television age. He looked fantastic and sounded wonderful. He soared above politics and made people feel better about themselves.
Ability to get things done? Track record? Such petty considerations seemed beside the point in 2008 for Obama was the very culmination of history. It was almost as if the then Senator for Illinois symbolised the end of politics, the point at which the perfect candidate drew a line under grubby partisanship.
Now, Americans have woken up from that dream and are living with the hangover. Neither history nor politics ended when Obama's ascended to the Oval Office. The recession is biting, unemployment is still hovering just below 10 per cent, the deficit is soaring and there is still gridlock in Washington.
Having elected two Senators as President and Vice-President for the first time since 1960, Americans are likely to look once again towards the more traditional stable for commanders-in-chief - the governor's mansions.
Emphasis added. Note the hints of Romanticism, Hegel and Marx here. This is really how people viewed the biracial Obama, i.e., the eschatological embodiment of the perfection of the World Spirit; that we had finally reached an endgame in our messy politics and partisanship with the arrival an unblemished man who was unlike anything we had ever seen before.
Truth is, Obama is not exceptional, he is not post-partisan, he represents nothing new under the sun. He's just your typical liberal politician, only with less experience.
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