President Barack Obama: He's Only Human

Barack Hussein Obama raised one hand and set another on a Bible once used by Abraham Lincoln--the man who signed the Emancipation Proclamation, giving the slaves their freedom--early Tuesday afternoon, swearing to uphold the Constitution as the 44th President of the United States.

It is always a historic occasion when a new President takes office. This time, what made it even more so is when a million people from the steps of the U.S. Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, and millions more around the world, got to see an African-American man do it.

President Obama came to power on the wings of hope and change, mandated to bring America out of eight years of darkness. Not since John F. Kennedy have so many people put so much expectations on one man's shoulders.

This is what bothers me. Obama is already a role model for those who never thought that anyone but a white male could govern the world's most powerful democracy--and that's just about everyone. He is not God, Jesus Christ or Superman. He can't walk on water, or leap over tall buildings in a single bound. All this adulation the new president is getting will be a big letdown if he stumbles.

With two wars and a recession, Obama will have his challenges. Will you love him when he has a foreign-policy crisis? You either lost your job, or still can't get one? Congress wouldn't pass important legislation? Or when one of his Cabinet nominees has a skeleton in his/her closet?

Still, this is a day people will remember for as long as there's a United States of America. A day when the forces of gloom and doom took a backseat to the sunlight of pride, accomplishment and faith in the future. Then it's back to reality. If President Barack Obama does nothing else during his term in office, history will show that he brought the nation and the world together for one shining moment.