IT has been more than a week since Barack Obama won the race to be the 44th President of the United States of America and the euphoria I felt when his predicted victory was confirmed has yet to diminish.

That confession is doubly significant, as the momentous event came days before the 90th anniversary of the end of the First World War.

I have admitted in this column that I am fascinated, yet paradoxically horrified by the Great War, as it was grotesquely labelled. There’s absolutely nothing “great” about war, especially one which featured appalling incompetence on the part of military leaders and the wholesale slaughter of millions of brave men. My collection of books and films of trench warfare are constant reminders of the sacrifices made by British servicemen and women and their allies. So, Senator Obama’s triumph did much to lift the gloom which annually settles around me on Armistice Day.

It is not difficult to find a reason for the happiness, and relief, which greeted the news of the Democratic candidate’s win. President-elect Obama looks, and speaks, like a man destined for greatness.

The fact he has come this far in comparatively so short a time is truly amazing, and that is without taking into consideration his colour. The one quality above all his others which had me praying for his victory is his honesty, which is unusual in politics, particularly at the summit. He knows he has inherited a poisoned chalice yet appears to be relishing the challenge.

One eminent journalist, writing for a quality newspaper, described how, along with the most serious economic problems since the depression of the 1930s, President-elect Obama had to deal with poison spread globally by the Bush administration, which had created a tidal wave of anti-Americanism. As dear old Mother England has had to suffer some of that hostility, thanks to Tony Blair’s backing of the Bush incursion into Iraq, it is to be hoped Senator Obama succeeds in restoring his country’s credibility among regimes who have come to regard America, and we Brits, with a mixture of suspicion and fear.

I am old enough to remember JFK and the joy his presidential victory brought in its wake. In fact, it is not difficult to view Senator Obama as the “new” John Fitzgerald Kennedy. He is relatively young, charismatic, a polished orator, with a beautiful wife and adorable children. Like Kennedy, he wears a mantle of quiet authority and self-confidence, which comes from inner strength. However, those who remember the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, 45 years ago this month, will doubtless share my concern about the personal safety of Barack Hussein Obama.

America is a wonderful country and the vast majority of its citizens are fiercely patriotic. Sadly, it also has more than its fair share of “whackos”, a significant proportion among white supremacists.

The election of Barack Obama went a long way to removing the shameful stigma of bigotry. However, the responsibility of keeping the new defender of Western democracy safe from his enemies within will be a heavy one. Pray God, whoever has that job is up to it.