Since the beginning of the presidential campaigns, Barak Obama, D-Ill. and John McCain, R-Ariz., have been in a perpetual fight for the most powerful position in the world.  On Tuesday night, in a landslide vote, Barak Obama was elected as the 44^th president of the United States. 

Obama received 349 of the 512 electoral votes, leaving McCain with only 163.  However, the election didn’t always look like a sure-fire win for either side.  In fact, this election was one of the most controversial the United States has seen in decades, especially on Cornerstone’s campus.

Many students voiced their opinion in classes, conversations in the Corum and even on the “Corner Stone.”  Now, with the polls closed and the winner announced, the debate has changed from ‘who will win’ to ‘was the right man chosen.’

“It will be interesting to see what happens,” said Laurie McLaughlin, senior.  “I hope the change that is promised is a good one.”

Many students are confident that Obama will follow through on his commitments and are looking forward to the changes that will result.

“I’m looking forward to the beginning of the pendulum swinging back the other way from the Republican [dominance] that America has been in the past,” said Jon Shotwell, senior.

Also, now the House and the Senate are democratically dominant.  Shotwell looks forward to the change that will bring as well, specifically in the area of poverty.

“I think that having the majority of Democrats [in the House and the Senate], it will shrink the poverty gap between the rich and poor,” Shotwell said.  “When Republicans are dominating the House and the Senate, the poverty gap increases; when Democrats are running the show, poverty decreases.”

Ryan Kielbasa, former Cornerstone student, was able to attend the rally for Obama in Chicago on Tuesday.  He said being there was “almost unreal.”

“You could feel in the air that something amazing had just happened,” Kielbasa said.  “I saw people of different minorities; they had hope in their eyes.  It’s clear to them that he symbolized just how far we’ve come in our country.”

On the other end of the spectrum, some of the students who voted for McCain are worried about what the next four years will bring.

“I don’t know how a senator with no experience who spent a good portion of his life not in the U.S. is going to help our country,” said Ashley DeWitt, junior.

Other students question what will happen to the moral structure of the country.

“The majority of politicians who were elected seem to lean in the opposite direction of my moral code,” said Lauren Root, sophomore.  “I’m just afraid of certain things I believe this country was founded on being completely ripped from us.”

Regardless of if we are satisfied with our new president, we must come together and truly remain the “United” States of America.

In his CUBE posting, President Stowell addressed this issue.

“For all of us, he is our president, and as such, it is time to put our own preferences behind us and to rally in support of our country’s choice,” Stowell said.