the extra arms on vishnu

This image is from a Time magazine article on the US presidential candidates' lucky charms.

These are Barack Obama's: a pair of Madonnas, a soldier's bracelet, a gambling chit ... and a tiny murti of Hanuman.

I can't even express how this makes me feel. So many people nowadays -- having grown up in a more globalized world, able to respectfully learn about different cultures and spiritualities -- have this sort of multiple overlap of not only identity but belief. And the idea that the next president would be one of those people instead of an idiot xenophobe?

I've been trying not to get my hopes up, but they seem stubbornly buoyant, all the same.