Race to Washington

It's Over...

We have just come off air after our three and half hour Prime Time election marathon. In that perch, looking over a strangely quiet and serene White House, digesting the electoral drama across the United States, it was hard to process the history of what was happening.

But walking out of the studio, I heard the first car horns blaring in celebration, and passed the crowds of mainly young people cheering raucously on the streets of America’s capital. As a colleague said to me on the phone as I walked, ‘It has a touch of Italia 90’,

But the most poignant moment of the night was the sight of the bell boys and waiters gathered around the television in the lobby of our hotel. I stood with them for a moment and looked around at their smiles. They were all immigrants from Africa. I was reminded of what Obama once said: ‘Only in America is my story even possible.’

Forget margins of victory and ideology and the electoral college and all the machinery of this night. Just keep those immigrant Americans in your mind when you digest this result.

Posted at 05:13AM Nov 05, 2008