The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Washington

Barack Obama swept to an historic victory as America's first black president, but pleaded for time to heal and transform the superpower as he faced up Wednesday to the task of forging his promised change.

"At this defining moment, change has come to America," Obama told 240,000 euphoric supporters, many in tears, at a rally late Tuesday after defeating Republican John McCain .Obama, 47, will be inaugurated as the 44th US president on January 20, and inherit an economy mired in financial crisis, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and a nuclear showdown with Iran.

"Even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime, two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century," said Obama.

"The road ahead will be long, our climb will be steep, we may not get there in one year or even one term, but America-I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there," Obama said in his home town of Chicago.

"I promise you-we as a people will get there." Senator Obama solidified traditional Democratic states and cut deep into the Republican territory which his rival needed to control to win the White House.

Democrats also made huge strides in Congress, boosting their majority in the Senate by five seats, with results still pending in four states, and by 20 seats in the lower House of Representatives.

Obama's win was greeted with euphoria across the United States and reverberated around the world .

New York's Times Square exploded in joy and a screaming crowd gathered outside the White House. In Kenya, where Obama's father was born, President Mwai Kibaki declared a national holiday.

Celebrations erupted from the bars of London and Sydney, with parties spilling onto the streets from Berlin to Havana and from Paris to the small Japanese town of Obama.

McCain, the 72-year-old Arizona senator, was gracious in defeat after a bitter protracted campaign, acknowledging that the election of his rival was a moment to cherish for African Americans.

"The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly," he said. "Though we fell short, the failure is mine, not yours," he told a crowd of supporters in Phoenix in his home state of Arizona.

President George W. Bush who has been in control through eight turbulent years also congratulated Obama.

"What an awesome night for you, your family and your supporters. Laura and I called to congratulate you and your good bride," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino quoted the president as saying in a phone call to Obama.

Obama's inauguration will complete a stunning ascent to the pinnacle of US and global politics from national obscurity just four years ago.

Obama is promising to renew bruised ties with US allies, and to engage some of the United States' fiercest foes such as Iran and North Korea. He has vowed to tackle climate change and ensure health care for all Americans.

His presidency also marks a stunning social shift, with Obama-the son of Kenyan father and white mother from Kansas-the first African American president of a nation still riven by racial divides .

Forty-five years after civil rights icon Martin Luther King laid out his "dream" of racial equality, Obama's election broke new barriers and may have helped heal some of the moral wounds left by slavery and the US civil war.

When he launched his campaign on a chilly day in Illinois in February 2007, Obama forged a mantra of change which powered him through the longest, most costly US presidential campaign in history.

His success looked likely after he captured Pennsylvania, a key battleground which was McCain's best hope of winning a Democratic state and keeping his rival from the White House.

And in a sweet moment for Democrats, Obama also seized the key midwestern states of Ohio, Iowa and Indiana as well as the southwestern state of New Mexico, all states won by Bush in 2004.

He later added Ohio, the decisive state which swept Bush to victory in 2004 and another Republican state, Virginia, which had not voted Democrat since 1964. He also won Florida, scene of the 2000 recount debacle.

McCain had argued Obama was too inexperienced to be US commander in chief and would pursue "socialist" redistribution policies that would leave the economy mired in recession.

As of early Wednesday he had won 28 states, including the district of Columbia, for 349 electoral votes.

McCain had won 20 states but had not broken out of the Republican heartland and the south for 159 electoral votes.

In the Senate, Democrats wrested control of five Republican seats including in the traditionally Republican state of Virginia, followed by New Hampshire, North Carolina and New Mexico.

They reached a 56 seat majority in the 100-seat chamber but were unlikely to win the 60 seats they need for a filibuster-proff majority that would mean they could avoid Republican obstruction tactics.

Democrats also won 20 seats in the House of Representatives, solidifying their majority to 258 against 177 of the Republicans, according to data from NBC news.

His storied election behind him and weighty problems in his face, Barack Obama turned Wednesday to the task of building an administration in times of crisis as Americans and the world absorbed his history-shattering achievement as the first black leader ascending to the presidency.

With just 76 days until the inauguration, Obama is expected to move quickly to begin assembling a White House staff and selecting Cabinet nominees. Campaign officials said Illinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel was the front-runner to be Obama's chief of staff. The advisers spoke on a condition of anonymity because the announcement had not yet been made. Obama planned daily briefings, starting Thursday.

With these moves and many others to come upon him quickly, Obama enjoyed an everyman day-after in his hometown of Chicago on Wednesday after an electric night of celebration, anchored by his victory rally of 125,000 in Chicago and joyful outpourings of his supporters across the country. The president-elect saw his two young daughters off to school, a simple pleasure he's missed during nearly two years of virtually nonstop travel, and then a workout.

President Bush pledged "complete cooperation" in the transition and called Obama's victory a "triumph of the American story."