Barack Obama Wins

Barack Obama has just become the 44th president of the United States.  Not that it would have any direct impact on this blogger, though for sure, indirectly his foreign policies may trickle down to yours truly.  What I find amazing and something that I can only hope for in my country is the swiftness with which the election results have been tabulated.  It is a joy and a beauty to watch.  I sat around and watched everything unfolding in fox news and I can only marvel at the efficiency of election results reporting.  Quite a far cry from the election counting that we have in the Philippines.

I was watching Recount in HBO the other day and I wondered if there will be anything of that sort in this year’s US elections.  Recount was a movie depicting the behind the scenes stories surrounding one of the most if not the most controversial elections in US history.  The actors then were Al Gore and George W. Bush.  The presidency went down to who won Florida.  It was a bit biased in my opinion, with the Republicans being portrayed as sleazy politicians who would use every advantage to their favor.  The Democrats were portrayed as do-gooders who were out to save America from ‘the Man’.

It isn’t the most objective piece on what happened during that election in my opinion, and it seems that the US elections this year was a far cry from the very controversial 2000 presidential elections.

Of course it can’t compare to the circus that we call elections here in the Philippines, what with all the guns, goons, and gold flying every which way, the dagdag bawas schemes, the vote buyings, the coercions and even the election-related violence.  What impressed me was how peaceful the elections were, the counting, the reporting.

I’m not sure if it proves that we’re a less civilized race, I just pray that there will come a time when we can have elections just like what the US had.