Question: Subsequent to my question about Club’s telephone tips in Maureen Dowd’s article, "Mitt Romney is the president of white male America” in New York Times (Nov. 10), I was interested in the usage of “the Ones” in the following sentence:

> 
> 
> > 
> > “Just like the Bushes before him, Romney tried to portray himself as
> >  more American than his Democratic opponent. But America’s gallimaufry
> >  wasn’t knuckling under to the gentry this time. 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> 
> 
> If 2008 was about exalting ***the One***, 2012 was about the
>  disenchanted Democratic base deciding: “We are ***the Ones*** we’ve
>  been waiting for.”
> 
> 
> 

There is no explanation about “*the One" and "the Ones*” in this paragraph, and before and after this sentence. Although I surmise “the Ones” means We, awaken populace – middle class, colored, ethnic, college students, working females, and you can name it, I don’t know what it exactly mean. 

Are “the One" and "the Ones” self-explanatory to native speakers, when “one” and "ones" are written with the capital O. 

What are the exact definitions of “the One / Ones”? Is the difference (upper case O vs lower case O) discernable in audio, i.e. when they are read out?

Answer: 
It seems to me that by "**the One**", Dowd means Obama as a kind of savior because he was so persuasive about his vision of change in the American government. Romney, she says, tried to portray himself as a rival "**the One**" and his GOP colleagues as his assistant "**the Ones**". The gallimaufry (the melange that is the American voting populace and especially *the disenchanted Democratic base*), however, she says, have decided that they, the American people and the disenchanted Democrats, are "**the Ones**". They didn't cross over and vote for Romney and the GOP.
"Exalting the One" means "praising a chosen person", implying that the person the people would vote for would be able to solve their problems. 

"We are the Ones" indeed refers to the people, implying that there is no charismatic leader who can help the people, it is the people themselves who can work out the solutions.

To my understanding, "The One" refers to terms like "the one and only" or "the chosen one", which are both associated with a person having unique qualities and who rises above all others.