Barack Hussein Obama II, the democratic candidate for the 2008 United States Presidential elections, has won by a landslide victory against John McCain, the Republican candidate, to become the 44th President of the United States, and the first African American to take up a Presidential position in the history of the United States.
A very culturally diverse man, Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, to a native Kenyan father, and an American mother, and spent a lot of his childhood in Indonesia before returning to Honolulu. Obama moved to New York city to pursue a degree in Political Science, and graduated in 1983 with an honours degree specializing in International relations. In 1988, Obama enrolled into Harvard Law school, where he became the first African American to be elected president of the Harvard Law Review, a very highly esteemed journal, and one of the most prestigious academic law journals in the country. Starting in 1992, Obama worked as an appointed lecturer of constitutional law at the University of Chicago.
After an academically charged career, Obama campaigned to become the Senator of Illinois, and won the elections for state senator three times in sucession. During his time as senator, Obama carried out a lot of work increasing tax credits to low-income workers, and reforming death penalty laws.
After his time in Illinois, Obama campaigned for U.S Senator, and after winning by popular vote, was sworn in in 2005. During his time as a U.S Senator, Obama touched on many sensitive issues such as the environment, and the war in Iraq, introducing the Iraq War De-escalation Act of 2007, a bill targeted towards cutting off the dispatch of 21,000 new troops into Iraq, and removing a number of the troops presently there by March 2008.
In February 2007, Obama announced that he would run in the Presidential elections of 2008. His popularity rose due to his charisma as a public speaker, and his vision of a better future, which included plans to end the Iraq war, and to provide affordable universal healthcare for all sectors of the population.
After winning the election on the evening of the 4th of November 2008, Obama pledged in his speech that "change is coming to America". Hopefully this change will be for the better, and the future shall be a brighter one for America.
