TIME magazine on Wednesday named its Person of the Year in 2008. No surprise here as United States President-Elect Barack Obama received the famous P.R. prize. After all, he is the first black president of America. Ask any African-American citizen about him and they will all answer that they weren’t expecting to see this happen in their lifetime.

Even Time magazine told its readers that it is unlikely that they were surprised to see Mr. Obama's face on the cover. It’s not the first time when Obama is featured on the magazine’s cover. Actually it’s his 15th time in the past two years.

The weekly American magazine said that it picked Barack Obama as its Person of the Year because he showed confidence in sketching an “ambitious future in a gloomy hour” and gave American citizens hope.  

Although there were other big names proposed for the prize, Obama probably won by a landslide. After reading the list of the other finalists, you’ll understand why Obama won so easily:
U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson,
French President Nicolas Sarkozy,
Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin and
Zhang Yimou, the creative director of August's Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing.

TIME said that Obama’s win of “one of the craziest elections in American history” - during which he overcame his lack of experience, a funny name, two candidates who are political institutions and the racial divide - made all the difference in the contest for the TIME magazine People of the Year. The winner of the prize is selected from a list of persons who most affected the news and people’s lives, for good or ill.

Last year, the prize went to Russia’s then President and current Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin.

In an interview with Time magazine, Obama said that the decisive victory against his main opponent in the race for the White House, Republican Senator John McCain, doesn’t give him a very strong mandate for change from the American people.

"I don't think that Americans want hubris from their next president,” Obama told Time.

As for the economy, Obama said that Americans should expect 2009 to be a tough year, but, if the right choices are made, the economy might get better in 2010. The President Elect described the situation as “a difficult hole that we've dug ourselves into."

Time magazine began picking its Man of the Year since 1927 and since then it has designated a man, woman or group every year. The title was changed to Person of the Year in 1999 to be more inclusive but it showed its limits when the computer was picked in one year.

The prize doesn’t necessarily goes to persons like Obama. Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin were also Man of the Year for their impact on people’s lives although in this case it was negative.

The list of people “who mattered” in the contest for Person of the Year 2008 included: released Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt, Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, the former CEO of the bank Lehman Brothers and Tina Fey, who impersonated Sarah Palin during the election campaign.