Barack Obama made history again on Tuesday night. It is the first time in the post war era that US voters have returned an incumbent president to serve a second term three times in a row. Not since the Great Depression has that happened. Eisenhower served two terms but then was followed by five presidents who all only served one term. And for those who want to get picky about it Johnson finished Kennedy's term before serving only one of his own and Nixon began to serve his second term but....well we all know what happened to him.
Beyond that one minor piece of history what else does Obama's re-election mean? Well continuity will be the main thing. Since starting to watch the election coverage over a range of different news channels on Tuesday evening I've listened to a lot of analysts try to suggest many different things, the most outrageous of all being Obama's second term will be that of a lame duck president. This is highly unlikely although how much social and domestic change takes place in the US over the next four years is open for debate. What is certain is that Obama will continue to pursue the economic policies of the last four years and that's where the continuity comes in.
Much has been made of the so-called fiscal cliff the US economy is facing, whereby a series of tax breaks introduced by President Bush in 2001 are due to expire at the end of this year just as the government is to make spending cuts of $620 billion (£380 billion). Should both things happen at the same time the US economy would most likely be plunged into recession. Obama's first priority will be to try to avoid the economy falling over the edge of this cliff and having won the election he has a better chance of doing so. Had he lost, US bond yields and the global economy would have been plunged into an uncertain run into Christmas. The consequences for the US and world economy would have been quite terrifying.
The fact that he won the election will at least give him the ability to persuade, argue and in some cases strong arm cantankerous congressmen into some form of agreement over tax and spending priorities, something that has proved impossible over the last few years. Granted Obama won't have it easy and the Republicans have obstructed much of what he has tried to do already. But with a fresh mandate he can claim the backing of the country so while there will undoubtedly be a lot of noise and while I wouldn't expect the spirit of bi-partisan politics to last more than until the end of the week, it is unlikely the US will fall off its self imposed cliff.
That's only the start for the US though. The country has a huge budget deficit, unemployment at 7.9% equates to around 23 million people out of work and American's largest economic competitor, China, doesn't really play by the same rules. The US economy's reliance on the eurozone as a prime export market is also problematic given the eurozone crisis isn't going to go away anytime soon, particularly given Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, herself faces re-election next year. How Mitt Romney would have handled all of this is unclear but his economic proposals during the election didn't stack up at all and it seems likely that most European leaders will be heaving a sigh of relief that Obama is still the man they will be doing business with for the next four years.
Rescuing the US economy will be a big enough job on its own. The circumstances Obama has faced, and continues to face, are vastly different to those faced by Bill Clinton in the 1990s and it is unlikely he will have created 23 million jobs and balanced the Federal Budget by the time he leaves office. But a growing economy that is perhaps at least creating more jobs and showing signs of pulling itself back up onto its feet will be a fairly reasonable legacy for Obama if he can achieve it.
That won't be enough for Obama the man though and despite the suggestion that he will be a lame duck president from his opponents on Wednesday morning he is in the strongest position a Democratic president has been since the 1960s.
Bill Clinton's second term was marred by a sex scandal that wrecked any legislative agenda he might have hoped to push through. Obama finds himself in a somewhat stronger position. Unlike in 1998, the Democrats hold the Senate even if they don't hold the House of Representatives. That's better than Clinton's position but it may not be enough, look at the huge fights that took place in Congress when Obama tried to push his health reforms.
Meanwhile, once the euphoria over the election has died down America will remember that it is deeply divided over a huge range of issues many of which date back to the Civil War of the 19th century and many of which could lead to another one in the future if the country continues on the path it has trodden for the last thirty years.
Given the parlous state of the economy there really isn't much money for Obama to go on a spending spree, so any US citizens expecting a wide ranging platform of domestic and social reforms is likely to be disappointed. To make matters worse, Medicaid, according to some, is almost bankrupt and spending priorities are also likely to be determined by the number of people due to retire in America in the next few years. What Obama chooses to do however may get derailed by the international picture as much as by the economic climate.
On the international front, Obama has the eurozone crisis to contend with, Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, China and, of course, Israel. If he manages to protect the US economy from the worst of the eurozone crisis, gets American troops out of Afghanistan on time, develops a mutually beneficial relationship with the new leadership of China, avoids a nuclear war in the Middle East by encouraging Iran back to the negotiating table, finds a way to support the Syrian uprising without getting embroiled in a phoney war with Russia and becomes the first US president to resolve the Israeli/Palestinian conflict he may qualify for the title Messiah. After all once you're been president where else do you go?