Inauguration 2009: Charlotte Goes to Washington
January 20, 2009 at 10:00 am | Posted in Coming Up | 2 Comments
Stay in touch with WFAE and NPR for complete coverage of one of the most momentous days in our nation’s history.
Charlotte Blogs is your source for all of the happenings surrounding Inauguration Day. We’re following Charlotte-area residents as they travel to the nation’s capital. Look here for first-hand accounts from Charlotteans on the ground in Washington- we’ll have commentary, photos, video and more.
Writer and commentator Mary C. Curtis will be blogging for WFAE about all of the celebrations from Washington. Stay in touch here for the latest.
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Charlotte Talks 
Ha! Too funny what that guy just said, there was an Onion headline “Black Man Given Nation’s Worst Job”
Comment by Peggy— January 20, 2009 #
Greetings,
Today we inaugurate a new President.
He is not a prince who has been anointed to be king but instead is the man who won the popular and electoral votes of the United States of America.
I campaigned and voted for this man because I saw in him the qualities necessary to lead our great nation – an articulate, intelligent, considerate and focused man who is unflappable yet nuanced, a man with a vision for the people of this nation, this planet and all of its inhabitants.
I believe this man will consider the unknown and unknowable as he contemplates our collective path, yet be decisive when the time arrives.
Our new President will be accountable for his actions. For the first time in a long time, he will ask us to sacrifice, collectively, all of us. It is time for America to understand that sacrifice by a few for the many is unacceptable for all. And I am not talking about military service, I am talking about our collective consumptive ways, our collective ambivalence for the planet, our collective disregard for those less fortunate, less skilled, less likely to succeed than the vast majority of us. It is time we ceased coveting things and instead coveted life, the people unknown to us, our differences and the small planet we inhabit for we are all accountable. If we do these things we will insure a better future for all Americans and, by extension, the world at large.
So today, as we gather on the mall in DC, around TVs in our places of work, home or that third place where we engage in civil society and democracy – be it farmers at the corner store, mothers at Panera Bread after dropping the kids off at school, men in the tool section at Home Depot or on an outdoor court for a pickup game of basketball – let us remember that Barack Obama is a man of the people, for the people and by the people. He knows he cannot do it alone, he knows he needs us to change the world. Having seen the mountain moved with my own eyes the past eighteen months in coffee shops, in casual encounters along the street, across fine conference tables with corporate titans, on front door steps, in barber shops and at humble dining tables around the southeastern United States, I am confident we can, collectively, build a better America and better world.
We will lay the cornerstone of that change today at noon when Barack Hussein Obama is sworn into office as President of The United States of America.
I look forward to the future, uncertain of the outcome but confident in the leader we selected, a leader of the people, by the people and for the people.
Jack McKinley
January 20th, 2009
Comment by Jack— January 20, 2009 #