Newly-elected U.S. president Barack Obama will face a daunting array of foreign policy challenges, from wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the global financial crisis to the need to shore up the country's frayed international image. While taxes, health care and the economy all played a role in the campaign before Tuesday's vote, national security issues such as the Iranian nuclear standoff and Middle East peace are likely to remain near the top of the agenda when Obama takes office from President George W. Bush on Jan 20.

"The mantra for the next administration has to be, 'Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it,'" said James Lindsay, who was a foreign policy aide to President Bill Clinton and is now with the University of Texas, Austin. "The new president-elect is going to have a full foreign policy inbox and decisions to make with enormous consequences for American security," added Lindsay. Foreign policy advisers say Obama, a Democrat who will become the first black U.S. president, has an understanding of world affairs rooted in a childhood spent partly in Indonesia and a quest to learn about his father's Kenyan heritage.

The Illinois senator, 47, will face pressing concerns even before he takes over from Bush, a Republican. On November 15, Bush will convene a summit in Washington to look at the global economic crisis. While Obama is unlikely to attend the meeting himself, it could give his economic team the chance to meet some of the visiting foreign officials on the sidelines of the conference. The Obama administration will also inherit the Iraq and Afghan wars and an intensifying effort to pursue al Qaeda militants on Pakistan's border with Afghanistan. Stopping Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon -- Tehran says its nuclear program is purely for civilian purposes -- and holding North Korea to its promise to dismantle its nuclear weapons program are also pressing issues.

Obama has a number of foreign policy advisers with roots in the Clinton administration, although he has also said he could work with Republicans. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel and Democratic Senator John Kerry are two names frequently mentioned as candidates for secretary of state. Obama, like his defeated Republican rival John McCain, has vowed a reinvigorated effort toward Middle East peace and promised staunch support for Israel. Obama foreign policy adviser Mark Lippert said fighting terrorism, dealing with militants along the Afghan-Pakistan border and killing or capturing Osama bin Laden are top national security priorities.

Obama has pledged to end the Iraq war and bolster the U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan. The ability to tackle deteriorating security in Afghanistan and pursue militants is "linked to the ability to make progress on political reconciliation in Iraq and the ability to draw down there," Lippert said. McCain agreed on the need for more forces in Afghanistan, but opposed a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, saying U.S. troops should remain there as long as they are needed.

Obama's willingness to talk directly to U.S. adversaries such as Iran and Syria was another major point of disagreement during the campaign. Obama said the Bush administration's resistance to engaging foes has limited its diplomatic options, a position which the McCain camp called naive. Obama opposed calls to oust Russia from the elite Group of Eight club of rich nations in response to Moscow's August war with Georgia, although he condemned the Russian invasion, triggered by Georgia's bid to reimpose control over breakaway South Ossetia.

One foreign policy priority Obama is likely to concentrate on is repairing ties with traditional allies, including many European countries, that were strained under the Bush administration. Some analysts believe Obama's huge popularity abroad could give him an initial advantage, although it will not be a panacea for challenges such as persuading Europe to contribute more troops in Afghanistan.

America voted in record numbers, standing in lines that snaked around blocks and in some places in pouring rain. Voters who queued up Tuesday and the millions who balloted early propelled 2008 to the highest turnout in generations, maybe a century. Preliminary projections based on 83 percent of the country's precincts tallied, indicate that more than 131 million Americans will have voted this year, easily outdistancing 2004's 122.3 million, which had been the highest grand total of voters before. That puts the 2008 turnout rate of eligible voters hovering around 64 percent, experts said. That's the best in at least 44 years, maybe more depending on who is doing the counting and how they count.

Curtis Gans, director of the nonpartisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate at American University and dean of turnout experts, said early numbers show 2008 to be about equal to or better than 1964, but not higher than 1960 which is the post-World War II high. Michael McDonald of George Mason University sees the numbers passing 1964 and dancing with 1960, the famed John F. Kennedy-Richard Nixon squeaker. If this year beats 1960, it would be the highest since 1908, when William Howard Taft beat William Jennings Bryan. What's most interesting about early results is not just how many people voted but the shifting demographic of American voters, said Stephen Ansolabehere, a political science professor at Harvard and MIT.

Using exit polling data, Ansolabehere determined that whites made up 74 percent of the 2008 electorate. That's down considerably from 81 percent in 2000 because of increase in black and Hispanic voting, he said. "That's a big shift in terms of demographic composition of the electorate," Ansolabehere said early Wednesday. Experts pointed to a weak economy and a lively campaign that promised a history-making result for the high turnout. North Carolina set a record for its highest turnout, because of close presidential, Senate and gubernatorial races, Gans said. Other states where turnout increased were Indiana, Delaware, Virginia and Alabama.

Ansolabehere said young voters didn't show up in the advertised wave, but others disagreed. "Young voters have dispelled the notion of an apathetic generation and proved the pundits, reporters and political parties wrong by voting in record numbers today," said Heather Smith, the executive director of Rock the Vote. "The Millennial generation is making their mark on politics and shaping our future." Wayne State University nursing student Audrey Glenn, 19, spent four hours waiting to cast her vote in Michigan, in part because Southfield election officials couldn't find her name on their lists. "But it was all worth it," she said.

Ann Canales, a 47-year-old single mother, emerged from her Texas polling place with a wide grin, accompanied by her 16-year-old son. "I've just been waiting for this day," said Canales, who voted for Barack Obama. Norma Storms, a 78-year-old resident of Raytown, Mo., said her driveway was filled with cars left by voters who couldn't get into nearby parking lots.  "I have never seen anything like this in all my born days," she said. "I am just astounded."  In some places the wait lasted hours, and lines stretched for half a mile.

"Well, I think I feel somehow strong and energized to stand here even without food and water," said Alexandria, Va., resident Ahmed Bowling, facing a very long line. "What matters is to cast my vote."

1. McCain has claimed that Barack Obama is against the use of nuclear power. This is not true.

2. McCain has released an ad which claims that Obama will raise taxes on electricity & on heating oil. This is not true. In fact Obama has proposed a $1000 per family rebate for oil heating costs.

3. McCain has claimed that his VP nominee Sarah Palin is "in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply." This is not true. Alaska does not supply 20% of America's energy supply, it actually only supplies 3 and a half percent.

4. McCain has claimed that Palin is the most knowledgeable person in America on the issue of energy. This is a ridiculous claim with absolutely no facts to back it up.

5. McCain has claimed that Palin never received any earmarks as Governor of Alaska. This is not true. Alaska has received more earmarks per capita than any other state in the nation during Palin's time as Governor.

6. McCain (and his advertisements) have claimed that Palin was against the so called "Bridge to Nowhere" but the fact is Palin was for the bridge before she was against it and although the project was eventually stopped (by congress, not by her) she still accepted the over $200 million for Alaska.

7. McCain's ad on the sex education bill in Illinois that Obama voted for (but which he did not sponsor and which actually never became law) is wildly misleading (ie: full of lies.) The bill was intended to help children be aware of "bad touch." In other words the bill was an anti-sexual predator bill and the McCain ad made it look like something else entirely.

8. McCain has repeatedly distorted Obama's tax plan. Obama's tax plan will cut taxes for everyone earning less than $250,000 but McCain (and his advertisements) say that Obama will "raise your taxes." That's not true unless you are rich or a corporation. The fact is that Obama is cutting taxes for the middle class far more than McCain is. Most of McCain's tax cuts go to the wealthy & to corporations.