It wasn't easy. It took a candidate of remarkable intelligence,
discipline and ease, organizing a truly exemplary campaign. It took the
worst financial catastrophe since the Great Depression; the worst
foreign policy debacle in Iraq since Vietnam. It took the
self-immolation of John McCain. It took Americans deciding not to fall
for the old politics of division -- not this time.

But this victory is grounded in far more than the campaign or the
candidate. This is a country disfigured by slavery from the start. The
Constitution even dictated that slaves would count as three-fifths of a
person for apportionment (even though they couldn't vote). 150 years of
slavery; 100 years of legal apartheid, known as segregation; a slow and
hard struggle to overcome.

Yet this same country was founded on an idea -- that all men (and
now women) are created equal, endowed with inalienable rights to life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That same Constitution that
counted slaves as less than human guaranteed the right to speech and
assembly, freedom of and freedom from religion. Each generation has
been given the opportunity and the mandate to struggle to extend
freedom and to make America better.

Many sacrificed; many died to get to this day. Obama, as he knows,
stands on the shoulders of giants. So this is a time to celebrate
ourselves and to honor those who came before. Hallelujah

And now the work begins. Obama inherits the desert
-- with the situation far more dire than many, even now, understand.
Manufacturing is at levels not seen since the deep recession in 1980.
Consumers are cutting back spending. The banking system is still
reeling from losses and shocks. The recession now has gone global.
Homeowners have lost $5 trillion in housing values.

So forget about the routine chattering class babble about how
America is a "center right" nation and Obama must "govern from the
center." (For a good mashup of quotes from ThinkProgress, go here. David Sirota tracks the "center-right watch" from ourfuture.org, here.)
With independents and moderates looking more Democratic and liberal on
issue after issue, the claim that this is a center-right nation was
misleading even before this election. Americans are voting for a
northern, liberal, Ivy League educated, African American, former
college professor to be president, someone who campaigned on raising
taxes on the wealthy, affordable health care for all, investing in new
energy, getting out of Iraq and against trickle down economics.
Conservative nation?

Govern from the center? Americans voted overwhelmingly for change.
And to be successful, Obama will have to be bold. In reality, the
center has moved. Bob Rubin now is for a large, deficit financed fiscal
stimulus. Conservative SEC Chair Chris Cox now tells us
"self-regulation" doesn't work, and calls for re-regulating the banks.
Alan Greenspan admits his ideology blinded him to reality -- or at
least that he got it wrong. "We're all populists now," says Will
Marshall, a leader of the Democratic Leadership Council, the Wall
Street wing of the party.

Mandates are not given; they are claimed. Majorities do not form;
they are forged. The center is not frozen; it is molded by events,
moved by leaders and movements.

But this beltway clamor about the center serves as a warning to
progressives. The entrenched forces of the status quo are already in
motion. Obama takes office as the Reagan era comes to a close,
bankrupted by its own failures. But change, as Obama says, isn't easy.

Even the best presidents need to be pushed to act. Even the most
calcified Congresses can be driven to move. The best of the New Deal --
Social Security, the Wagner Act that gave workers the right to
organize, Fair Labor Standards that gave us the weekend -- came not
from Roosevelt's first 100 days, but two years later, in what became
known as the Second New Deal. And that was driven in large part by an
active and mobilized labor movement, and by the growing political
threat posed by a populist left -- Huey Long, Father Coughlin, Francis
Townsend -- that gave Roosevelt both reason and excuse to move. "I
agree with you," Roosevelt reportedly told labor's Sidney Hillman, "now
go out, and make me to do it."

Obama will need that same kind of pressure. We will need to build an
independent progressive movement to push for reform, to challenge those
who stand in the way. So celebrate tonight. And then get ready to work.