Bild: Obama by Kris Kros

On 4 November 2008 Barack Obama has won the 2008 U.S. presidential election, defeating John McCain. Obama won 338 and McCain 161 of the electoral votes. (Source NY Times, 5 November 2008)

In the House of Representatives the Democrats expand their majority to 246 seats, the Republicans maintain 163 seats.

In the U.S. Senate the Democrats have now 56 seats, the Republicans now have 40 seats.

Reactions from the European side are provided on the following sites:

• "Wie der nächste US-Präsident mit Europa umgehen sollte", Deutsche Welle, 3 November 2008
• "A new President for a new American age", The Independent, 6 November 2008
• "US election: An election night chat with 'Joe the plumber'", Guardian, 5 November 2008
  
  

Bild: Joe the Plumber in Elyria today by ronnie44052

• A good interactive overview of the results can be found here.

• More background information during the last days of campaigning were given through the following sites that provide interesting information even after the election:
  • "Why Obama has pulled ahead on the economic issues", Mark Weisbrot on OtherNews, 29 October 2008
  • "Polishing the Rust Belt", National Journal, by Bruce Stokes, 1 November 2008
  • Hamilton and Leval on Obama's prime-time advertising campaign
  • Election Monitoring from GMFUS
  • Erika Mann will be in Washington for the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) between 12-14 December 2008. She will also be part of the 65th EP/US Congress Interparliamentary Meeting (TLD) scheduled to take place from 6-8 December in Miami, Florida.
  • "The Climate Gap and the 2008 Presidential Campaign," by Kenneth P. Green, Article on TCS Daily, January 3, 2008