The Morning After Obama

So he did it, Barack Obama did. And here's what I keep thinking. I keep thinking that if we're lucky and Barack Obama wins now, and if he wins again, then my kids will be 12 when he leaves office. If we're lucky, we'll see Obama's hair go gray and we'll watch the lines of the office etch themselves deep into his forehead. So it's been for every young president who's survived.

But while my kids may see him with gray hair, they won't necessarily see him as exceptional because of his race. They may see other candidates and compare those candidates to Obama and notice his words are more beautiful or make more sense, but they're not going to think, "Can you believe what you're seeing?" They're not going to think an African-American president is a triumph, they're going to think it's normal. They'll get to think that if we're very, very lucky.