The moment of the night: CNN was playing on the huge screens in the park. We watched as Wolf Blitzer called the states and the huge panel of pundits pronounced on whatever struck their fancy. Some time after Ohio was called, they turned the volume of the TVs down and shrunk the image of CNN to show pictures of the crowd that was present at Grant park. There was a whisper behind us that several networks had called the election for Obama. I was with a group of newly minted political scientists and since all of our phones were down and we could not confirm via the blogs and election maps that we've all become addicted to, we doubted. The crowd murmured and shifted.

Then, a guy came out onto the stage and said into the microphone, "Mic check 1, 2, 3. Mic check 1, 2. Mic check for the President Elect of the United States of America."

The crowd exploded. 250,000 of us, jumping up and down, dancing, crying. Strangers hugged. Everyone suffused in the momentous emotion of the moment.