Obama Highlights?

ckafrica · Post by **ckafrica** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 7:33 am

hey just asking if anyone feels anyparts of the inauguration was worth commenting on as I'm away from TV and too lazy to check the pundits.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 7:51 am

he talked about personal responsibility and government accountability. He threw in some subtle jabs at Bush's governing style. What else? no soundbites to remember and it was serious rather than light-hearted.
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Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 9:33 am

Interesting notes:

He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers - the last one is huge because traditionally politicians do not speak of us favorably.
He reiterated a commitment to pull out of Iraq.
He said that we needed to restore science to its rightful place in helping us to craft solutions to our problems.
He had an old civil rights leader read out part of the black national anthem.
He said that we weren't going to abandon the free market.

-Username17

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 10:16 am

The LGBA was in the parade, the first time such an organization of gay americans were invited to play.

Chief Justice Roberts fucked up the oath of office.

What else? Oh, apparently people cleaned up after the parade themselves, after watching it, they were so stirred.

-Crissa

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 2:37 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:Interesting notes:
He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers - the last one is huge because traditionally politicians do not speak of us favorably.
-Username17

I cannot stress how surprised I was to hear nonbelievers mentioned. Before I'd thought Obama was an excellent politician, but mentioning nonbelievers is such ballsy (and right) move that I actually did gain a bit of hope for the new president. Seriously, whoever writes his speeches is a fucking genius.

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 6:12 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:Interesting notes:
He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers

"Screw you, Scientologists" was left implied.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 7:58 pm

ubernoob wrote:
FrankTrollman wrote:Interesting notes:
He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers - the last one is huge because traditionally politicians do not speak of us favorably.
-Username17
I cannot stress how surprised I was to hear nonbelievers mentioned. Before I'd thought Obama was an excellent politician, but mentioning nonbelievers is such ballsy (and right) move that I actually did gain a bit of hope for the new president. Seriously, whoever writes his speeches is a fucking genius.

It's not the first time he's done that. Back in the primary when he and Clinton had a sitdown forum on religion with some minister, he very specifically pointed to the nonbelievers as a group that the religious need to get on board for charitable endeavors.

It's not that surprising, though, considering he was raised by an atheist.

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 9:21 pm

Neeeek wrote:It's not the first time he's done that. Back in the primary when he and Clinton had a sitdown forum on religion with some minister, he very specifically pointed to the nonbelievers as a group that the religious need to get on board for charitable endeavors.

It's not that surprising, though, considering he was raised by an atheist.

It's the first time I've seen it. I tend to duck my head out of most politics, but to actually endorse Nonbelievers as human beings that have rights too? In what is probably the most important news moment of the year? Yeah. I went from tentative Obama supporter to, "This man has the idea."

Not disagreeing, just elaborating on just how impressed I was that he was able to make a move like that that publicly.

zeruslord · Post by **zeruslord** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 12:49 am

They closed off 14th street. From the Mall to the Potomac. At the END of the ceremony. While everyone was trying to get out. There was a 20 foot gap for the entire mall to get out. Also, military police kept people off the Mall, which was half empty. Seriously, when Obama was sworn in, the Mall west of 14th was completely filled, but the south side of the Mall between 14th and the Capitol was empty. Whoever was in charge of the road closings and such seriously screwed the pooch.

Draco_Argentum · Post by **Draco_Argentum** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 7:53 am

Crissa wrote:Chief Justice Roberts fucked up the oath of office.

An important note since I've seen several news outlets here word it in a way that implies Obama fucked it up.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 8:06 am

The way my newspaper has it, the chief justice left out a word, but later corrected himself, and Obama repeated the version missing a word. Several individuals were quoted as saying that it was no big deal as long as Obama retakes the oath in private, but that it was a mild error on both sides.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 8:31 am

Avoraciopoctules wrote:The way my newspaper has it, the chief justice left out a word, but later corrected himself, and Obama repeated the version missing a word. Several individuals were quoted as saying that it was no big deal as long as Obama retakes the oath in private, but that it was a mild error on both sides.

Then your newspaper didn't watch the video.

Roberts screwed up (for the second time at that point, the first being when he talked over Obama's first sentence) by misplacing faithfully, and Obama (who clearly noticed the mess up) gave him a chance to fix it, but Roberts fucked it up again so Obama just improvised, trying to save the Chief Justice some face.

They redid the oath of office the next day, just to cover the bases.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 9:04 am

Hmm. Perhaps I should have watched the video after all. Thank you.

Tshern · Post by **Tshern** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 7:19 pm

ubernoob wrote:
FrankTrollman wrote:Interesting notes:
He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers - the last one is huge because traditionally politicians do not speak of us favorably.
-Username17
I cannot stress how surprised I was to hear nonbelievers mentioned. Before I'd thought Obama was an excellent politician, but mentioning nonbelievers is such ballsy (and right) move that I actually did gain a bit of hope for the new president. Seriously, whoever writes his speeches is a fucking genius.

Didn't he write the speech in question?

All in all, I am still very cynical about his oncoming presidency...

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 10:46 pm

The Nonbelievers part threw me for a curve as well. We watched the swearing in and his speech in my video editing class.

Watching it online was actually a good way to demonstrate the various image compression techniques that we were being described in class.

cthulhu · Post by **cthulhu** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:10 pm

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28784 <-- check the date on the byline.

Awesome.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 2:16 am

Tshern wrote: Didn't he write the speech in question?

He has a speech writing team, of which, as I understand it, Obama is the leader and best writer. But he does have people who help out.

Gelare · Post by **Gelare** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 2:31 am

Tshern wrote:Didn't he write the speech in question?

All in all, I am still very cynical about his oncoming presidency...

Dude, writing your own speeches is so 3000 B.C. Virtually no politician does that, ever, and Obama is no exception. He has input, sure, but everything is gone over with a fine-toothed comb by speechwriters who know exactly what psychological impulses will be triggered by any given word. It's not a science, exactly, but it's remarkably close, and these people are very trained in it.

Tshern · Post by **Tshern** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 3:47 am

I already knew he doesn't write his speeches, however, I heard somewhere that he made the inauguration speech mostly by himself. I suppose I either misheard or got wrong information.

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 4:04 am

I heard in a restaurant recently that there were over a thousand people trapped in the DC subway once the gov closed all exits.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 4:33 am

Obama, unlike presidents of the last century, does write his own speeches. Sure, there's a fine tooth comb and suggestions and policy wonks, but as it goes, he actually decides the turns of phrases and content.

It's one of the weird things about him, and one of the things which frustrate the middle DNC policy wonks who'd rather focus on this or that. But maybe that's why he doesn't usually go off script or screw up - they're written in his own tongue.

-Crissa

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 5:59 pm

The Presidential Oath

-Username17

the_taken · Post by **the_taken** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 10:47 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:The Presidential Oath

-Username17

Canada doesn't get videos from Colbert Nation. Is today's show (friday 22nd jan)?

tzor · Post by **tzor** » Sun Jan 25, 2009 12:33 am

FrankTrollman wrote:Interesting notes:
He mentioned that we are not just a Christian nation. Gave shout outs to Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Nonbelievers - the last one is huge because traditionally politicians do not speak of us favorably.

I don't want to nit pick but that's not what he said. He didn't say we were or were not an X nation, but a nation of X.

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers."

I still think this is important. John Adams tried to get a religious freedom clause in the Massachusetts constitution in part because he saw unfair laws against Jews in his own home state, and was soundly rebuffed.

Still the very notion of being a "Christian" nation has always been a joke. We are better described as having been a WASPian nation with very limited notions of what a proper "Christian" was.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sun Jan 25, 2009 1:16 am

I've seen a news story where various church-going are ticked over that nod to non-believers and, to a lesser extent, other religions.