Barack Obama Deserves A Second Term – Spectator Blogs

No matter the result of today’s Presidential election, it will not be Morning in America tomorrow. Of course the successful candidate will talk of America’s essential greatness. He will promise a fresh era of co-operation and respect in Washington (this time for real). Hope will be on the agenda and perhaps, if the final polls of this poll-driven election are mistaken, change will be too.

But neither Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney are well-positioned to deliver either hope or change. This has not been a happy campaign in a happy country and, regardless of the result, there will be no fresh political dawn tomorrow. The path ahead is tough and unremitting and the next President has less room for manoevre – or error – than either campaign has been modest enough to admit.

Yet the campaign – the most expensive and extravagant yet – has been illuminating too. If the long haul to the White House does anything it has a habit of revealing which candidate may be better suited to the tests of office.