Barack Obama and Mitt Romney fought hard for the U.S. presidency and their supporters spent hundreds of millions to help them win the worst job in the world.
Let's not kid ourselves - being the so-called leader of the free world has never been fun and it's downright horrible now.
For Obama, he inherited two wars, a shattered world economy, and a horribly divided country when he swept to his historic victory in 2008.
Not only is the occupant of the Oval Office unable to single-handedly heal those hurts, the President is burdened by massive global forces (European economic uncertainty) and bold, new players increasingly throwing their weight around (India and China).
This isn't one of those Decline of the American Empire moments, however.
The United States still has plenty of power and is capble of bringing great benefit and deep harm to the world, and to Canada in particular as its neighbour and largest trading partner.
It's the office of the President that lacks in power and reach, thanks to the extent of globalization, where the potential collapse of the Greek economy is seen as a threat to the world's economic welfare and could further hamper America's slow and agonizing road to recovery after the 2008 economic crisis.
But it's deeper than that.
The land of the free and the home of the brave is undergoing rapid change, polarizing the population. Although Obama burst onto the natonal stage with his famous speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention about there being no red states and no blue states, only the United States, his idealism didn't match reality. Despite the close votes in Florida, Ohio and a handful of other states, most states were won handily by one candidate or the other. The disdain Democrats have for Republicans and vice versa now runs much deeper than just a philosophical disagreement over the liberal or conservative perspective on government and society. Americans, never the most tolerant of people, now openly despise fellow Americans with opposing viewpoints.
Race, of course, is ever present, especially with the white population continuing to dwindle in number, and broadly speaking, white voters are not in lockstep with Hispanic, black and Asians at the ballot box.
Politics is the art of the possible, as the old saying goes, but for American politicians, including the most important one of all, unifying the country seems increasingly impossible.
It's hard to lead when not only does a large number of your constituents disagree with your ideals, they hate you personally.
Even if Romney had won, that's what he would have faced and that's the problem Obama faces heading into his second term.
"We're all in this together," Obama tweeted when his victory was declared but with so many millions out of work, so much wealth increasingly concentrated in the hands of so few, so much anger across the nation and so many problems buffeting the country and the President from all sides, it sounds more like a dream than a hope.
managing editor, Neil Godbout
