I found the unicorns and the rainbows bloody hilarious.

I am delighted that Obama was elected, and am, like many others, full of hope. But like many others, I've been disappointed in the past: Labour's first few months in office, after I'd spent afternoons wheeling my daughter's pushchair round in the pissing-down rain to deliver leaflets for them, made me feel so angry and politically disenfranchised that I flirted with joining the SWP. Little did I know that there was far worse to come, and that refusing to move away from Tory disaters such as university tuition fees, PPPs and the Millennium Dome would be the least of their sins.

Like Obama, New Labour represented an active turning away from a certain set of values and a turning towards something new and dynamic. Of course, it all proved to be smoke and mirrors, and some of us that had misgivings about the direction New Labour was taking still believed in a funny way that they were only playing down certain key Labour values because this made the party more electable in a post-Thatcher political climate, and once they got in we'd see a few more flashes of red. But of course, we were deluded. They'd already sold their souls; the Clause IV moment had happened. Elvis had left the building.

So why do I feel hopeful now? Maybe I'm like Charlie Brown with the football, but it's certainly more than the colour of Obama's skin. True, a number of his policies are more to the right than i'd like, but America, where socialism is still a dirty word, generally is a far more right-wing country than Britian. But Obama talks about wealth redistribution, and gets elected! For me, this is a monumental shift for the America I know. I have relatives who have always believed that personal philanthropy is a better social system than the welfare state - that people should be free to choose how much they wish to contribute to the common good, rather than have that choice forced upon them by government. These are also people who perceive qualities in a presidential candidate such as education, worldliness and erudition as "too European". But they are also people whose kids are going into jobs without decent healthcare benefits, and who are unable to get mortgages, and they are scared. I think they voted for Obama because they think he might have some answers to those problems. This, in itself, represents an important ideological shift: ordinary Americans have realised that the free market doesn't hold all the answers.

As a socialist, do I think Obama represents my views? No, I don't. But do I think that he has the potential to effect significant social change in a country like America? Well, let's just say I hope so.