Obama won a decisive victory in the Iowa Democratic Caucuses yesterday, bringing him one step closer to the White House. Presidential candidates Sen. Hillary Clinton and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards campaigned hard to win the Iowa caucuses, but they both came up short.

Iowa was the crucial first step leading to the New Hampshire primaries on Monday. “They said this day would never come. They said our sights were set too high. … But on this January night, on this defining moment in history, you have done what the cynics said we couldn’t do. You did what the state of New Hampshire can do in five days,” Obama said.


Obama, 46, is bidding to become the first black president. He garnered about 38 percent of the vote, comfortably ahead of former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady.

If elected, Obama vowed, “I’ll be a president that ends this war in Iraq and finally brings our troops home, who restores our moral standing, who understands that 9-11 is not a way a way to scare up votes but a challenge that should unite America and the world against the common threats of the 21st Century.”
“Hope is the bedrock of this nation, the belief that our destiny will not be written for us but by us, by all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is but who have the courage to remake the world as it should be,” he said. “That is what we started here in Iowa and that is the message we can now carry to New Hampshire and beyond.”

He appeared at the rally with his wife, Michelle, whom he called “the love of my life,” and daughters Malia and Sasha.