THE EAGLE by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ringed with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

A man becomes a leader by popular acclamation if he has a vision which answers a need, deeply and widely felt, and if he has at his command the language which makes people realize how deeply and widely they feel their need of the vision. Such a leader may be the most dangerous and seductive of animals. He is a man of political ambition who professes to be, and convinces the public he is, above ambition and politics. THIS IS PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA our regal eagle who has swooped down to take America.