Lookin' for a Leader, Neil Young (2006)

Walkin' among our people
There's someone who's straight and strong
To lead us from desolation
And a broken world gone wrong

I'm making an exception today in my song selection criteria because today is Election Day in the United States of America - a day in which we have a very real, albeit on some level surreal, opportunity as a nation to stop going down the tragic path we've been on for too many years and elect a president worthy of the title.

Neil Young's Lookin' for a Leader with its 100-voice choir crying out in hope, was about as prescient as a rock song can be, tapping Barack Obama as that leader at a time when nothing in the zeitgeist suggested anything of the sort could ever occur. In a few short hours we will learn the results of two years of hard-fought and masterful campaigning to secure what is right for the United States and the rest of the world.

The classic outsider and stranger in a strange land, Sen. Obama is most likely the one person who has what it takes to transcend the noxious and entrenched self-interest that has passed for governing these past 8 years. If he pulls it off, and all indications are that he will, the euphoria that will set in may last for weeks. I - and so many, many others - want to be proud to be American again.

When I'm finished writing this I will be headed out for my late-afternoon shift at the polls, where I'll be handing out sample Democratic party ballots and ensuring that voters are treated properly. Incredibly, it is sunny and in the 70s here in the battleground State of Ohio where, God willing, we will be one of a number of states that will put Barack Obama over the top and into the White House.