There’s really only one word to describe what happened Wednesday in Denver, Colo.

And the same word will apply tonight when more than 70,000 will squeeze into a football stadium in the Mile High City.

They will not be there for a sporting event. Neither were the folks who gathered at the Pepsi Center (Denver’s version of the Wachovia Center) nearby on Wednesday.

They were there to witness history.

Sen. Barack Obama officially became the nominee of the Democratic Party to be president of the United States.

Despite no small amount of drama and angst about exactly how the Democrats would arrive at that end, how they would salve the bruised feelings of those who supported the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, it was a foregone conclusion that Obama would be the nominee.

It did not make the moment any less historic.

Barack Obama becomes the first person of color to be nominated for the highest office in the land by a major political party.

Tonight he will stride to the podium exactly 45 years to the day after the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King did likewise in a sweltering Washington, D.C., and delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech.

On Wednesday, Barack Obama fulfilled King’s words.

It says much about how far the nation has come.

But the notoriety surrounding Obama’s candidacy, and the lingering doubts about the nation’s willingness to support a black candidate, tell us how far we still have to go.

For now, we all should enjoy the moment. We should revel in the democratic process. Note that is with a small d. The same process will be repeated next week when Republicans gather in Minneapolis/St. Paul to officially anoint John McCain as their candidate.

Yesterday Democrats strived mightily once again to unite behind Obama. They started with a roll call vote, then allowed Hillary Clinton, who was denied the opportunity to become the first woman to be nominated for president by a major party, to lead the New York delegation in asking that the move to back Obama be made by unanimous acclimation.

Then her husband, the last Democrat to reside at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, also made it clear he was backing Obama, in the process sweeping aside comments from earlier in the campaign in which he openly questioned whether the Illinois senator was ready to be president. Bill Clinton used all of his oratorical skills to praise the man who had vanquished his wife in a brutally contested race.

Del. Sen. Joe Biden then took the stage, poked fun at himself and his knack for being long-winded, and used one word to answer the appeal to be the party’s vice-presidential candidate: Yes.

Then there was one final twist. Obama himself joined Biden on the stage. He will return to the spotlight to formally acccept the nomination tonight.

King spoke of a country that has yet to fully live up to its creed, that all men are created equal.

That has been especially true of the two major presidential parties and their nominees for president. Until yesterday they all had one thing in common.

Barack Obama changed all that.

Forty-five years ago, King spoke of a dream.

Yesterday and later today in Denver, Colo., Barack Obama will embody it.