A Day for the History Books

Wednesday was a historic day, the kind I got into this business to see up close, the kind of day that belongs in the history books. 

It began for me in my hotel lobby, where I had a morning chat with John Lewis, the famously brave civil-rights marcher turned Georgia congressman. "I haven't stopped crying for days," he told me.

My day ended after midnight in a hot but happy nightclub crowd, as I listened to Kanye West proclaim his "confidence" and "high self-esteem, steam, steam—I am so confident I am my own echo!"

Between those moments, I watched in the Pepsi Center as the Democratic Party nominated the descendant of African goat herders to be president of the United States. Is this a great country or what?

If you read me on a regular basis, you know that I do my best not to take sides. But I love politics, history and my country, and reporting about all three. And I couldn't help but be moved by what I am seeing here.

If you know American history, you know that Obama's nomination is the social equivalent of landing a man on the moon. And for that accomplishment all of us—but especially African-Americans—have every right to a teary, mile-high celebration.

There is another article to be rewritten—on another day—about the pitfalls and perils of self-referential, self-indulgent "identity politics" based on race, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation. For decades, the Democrats have been obsessed with it, often to their detriment. And there has been plenty of that displayed to excess here. It is the special honor and burden of Democratic Party to be the engine of identity politics since the 1960s.