How should Americans view the presidential election that is being held in their country today? With pride or with concern? The great paradox in this tense race between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney for the most important job in the world is that Americans are going to the voting booths with mixed feelings. Americans can, without a doubt, look at the two candidates with pride. The current president is an African-American and his challenger is a Mormon. For young Americans, this seems natural. Older Americans, however, are rubbing their eyes in disbelief. Not so long ago, in 1955, there was racial segregation on buses in Alabama. An African-American woman, Rosa Parks, refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in Montgomery, the state capital. Obama entered the White House 53 years after Parks' action. The America that he wanted to change had already changed before his arrival. Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, would also be surprised to see one of his co-religionists so close to becoming president. Smith was forced to move with his followers a number of times due to persecution and he was later murdered, along with his brother, by an angry mob. But the 2012 presidential election has shown a deepening polarization in America. There is a chasm between the America of Tampa (the site of the Republican National Convention) and the America of Charlotte (the site of the Democratic National Convention). Americans are going to the polls as a divided people. In a recent cover story, Time magazine asked, "What would Lincoln do-" Abraham Lincoln would have responded with his famous quote: "A house divided against itself cannot stand." Lincoln, who fought to preserve the unity of his nation, knew that the "house" (America) would not fall. America is a special country. It is a nation of values. Unlike other global powers, America does not just export goods, it also exports values. Obama's greatest failure has been that his adoption of Lincoln's vision has led to opposite results. A president is not meant to touch the foundation of America, only the furniture. Obama did not understand this. He wanted to change not only his party, but the entire nation. In a campaign speech in Pennsylvania, Romney promised to return America to its rightful place. America, Romney explained, does not need to settle for the current situation. "We build, we aspire, we dream, we listen to the voice inside that says we can do better," Romney said. Obama is a politician who well understands from where he will get his electoral support. He is a president with a vision of America as conciliatory and apologetic. An Obama America is one that leads from behind and distributes food stamps. An Obama America is a socialist welfare state, a country that looks in the mirror and sees a European nation. "Vote. Vote. Voting is the best revenge," Obama said in a recent speech in Ohio. This verbal gaffe was significant because it revealed the world view of a man who four years ago promised to bring a new style of politics, one of unity. Revenge? For what? Obama, of course, blames the Republican majority in the House of Representatives for polarization in America, but this majority only came into being in the 2010 midterm election as a result of disappointment with Obama's first two years in office. It took Americans only that short amount of time to realize that the foundation of the country was being harmed without any improvement to the economy. The negative campaign that Obama has run against Romney is another inidcator that Obama is far from being an agent of unity. In fact, it is Romney who has stayed positive in his campaign, illustrated by the fact that he has not hammered the president over what took place in Libya in September. Obama, who was considered a political messiah four years ago, is in a tight election battle because of the legacy of his first term in office. The job of the next president will be to unite a divided America. It is ironic that a fan of Lincoln has caused so much disunity.
