President Gives Strident Second Inogural Message

President Obama is the only President besides Franklin Roosevelt to take the oath of office four times, because Roberts flubbed it four years ago.  President Obama is only the second President since 1956 to win both of his elections by a majority of the popular vote.  Clinton and Bush 43 never achieved that.  Many on the right are aledgedly claiming that the President gave some sort of socialist manifesto today because the speech was so visionary and forward looking.  Of course others say that the President 'felt more like a winner" this time around, because people claimed that the President by necessity had to give a rather "dark" speech four years ago.  Tonight the President danced romantically with Michelle, wearing a red dress.  Today Melique was in "plum" and Shasha was in purple.  If any member of the first family wears a dress the designer of that dress automatically gets a dramatic spurt in business, naturally.  People still like Joe Byden better in congress than they do the President.  This is one day where even the Republicans in the House are under social pressure to act civilly.

It is now our generation’s task to carry on what those pioneers began.  For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers, and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts.  Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law – for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.  Our journey is not complete until no citizen is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote.  Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity; until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country. 

For now decisions are upon us, and we cannot afford delay.  We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate. 

We must act, knowing that our work will be imperfect.  We must act, knowing that today’s victories will be only partial, and that it will be up to those who stand here in four years, and forty years, and four hundred years hence to advance the timeless spirit once conferred to us in a spare Philadelphia hall.

We, the people, still believe that every citizen deserves a basic measure of security and dignity.  We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit.  But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future.  For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty, and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn.  We do not believe that in this country, freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few. 

We, the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war.  Our brave men and women in uniform, tempered by the flames of battle, are unmatched in skill and courage.  Our citizens, seared by the memory of those we have lost, know too well the price that is paid for liberty.  The knowledge of their sacrifice will keep us forever vigilant against those who would do us harm.  But we are also heirs to those who won the peace and not just the war, who turned sworn enemies into the surest of friends, and we must carry those lessons into this time as well.

Just as this photo looks at distant things as seen from our patio, so we too should take the opportunity during a period of psychic "clear weather" to look off in the distance and see where we are headed and what awaits us.  It's better to prepare for a conflict when you know the game plan. President Obama gave a strident, "challenging" speech today.  They said it was brief but he wearted it before nine.  According to the date shot thing I tool 77 snap shots, not counting the ones I deleted.  The President was definitely firing on all cyllenders and not backing down from the second term but clearly laid out the challenges of the road ahead.  It was the first time gay rights have been mentioned in an inogural address.  He offered a defense of "apology" if you will (that word being used in its theological sense here) for his positions taken lately on the important issues of our day and laid it all out pretty plain.  There were also shades of JFK and our founding fathers and Abraham Lincoln in this speech.  I think it's one of the best speeches in my lifetime, and only Kennedy's 1961 speech is more of a Classic.  I intend to download the text and advise all of you to do the same and study it over.

The Baltimore Ravens surprised everybody by beating the New England Patriots last night in Foxborough.  I thought the game would be so lopsided in favor of the Patriots I wasn't even going to watch the thing.  Happily I was very wrong.  I didn't read the tea leaves correctly at all well in this case.  There was one point in the game where in an eleven minute period the Ravens scored a touchdown three times.  So right there were 21 unanswered points.  I've kind of been a fan of the Ravens harkening back to the time when they used to be the Cleveland Browns.  I think with the Revens in the game it will be a much more interesting game than it otherwise would be.  I had thought the Ravens were in some kind of a late season slump.  That's what they were all saying.  But I hadn't been close enough attention to their actual performance in the play-offs themselves.  The team is definitely peaking at the right time with all of their players finally healthy.

A new troubling factor in the news these days is the spread is Al Qaeda into the African country of Mali where they are fomenting a civil there, and we may have yet another Sudan situation there.  Clearly Al Qaeda is not defeated and President Obama's failure to mention this in his Inoguarl Address today was a glaring oversight.  More stuff occurs concerning Algeria in this comentary from last Saturday..  I was just watching ice hockey on KNBC.  It was the LA Kings in black and the Chicago Blackhawks in white and Chicago was leading four to nothing but then the Kings scored a late score in the second period, which was basically the period I watched the majority of.  Of course the NHL season has only been underway the past week or so. (The Black Hawks ended up beating the Kings five to two)  Before that it was Leo Le Port and a question about why Windows 3.1 won’t shut down. ( - )  I kicked the can down the road for a while on the cigarette verses coffee question and after getting two from Bill opted for the cigarettes, since it’s a warm day.  Someone obviously was in here because I noticed that the new coffee stains had been mopped up.  We had quesedas for lunch.  It was two plus carrot salad and after waiting over fifteen minutes I gave up on their giving out any more.  We had a rich beef soup and cantaloupe for desert.  I don’t intend to blog today.  The Algerian main army stormed that gas plant compound and killed 31 terrorists but also 23 hostages, or something.  Obviously the Algerian government doesn’t put the premium on human life that we do in this country.  I continue to be surprised the television news hasn’t covered it.

We had oatmeal for breakfast.  It’s the first time in perhaps months I’ve actually seen the coffee cart out in the room at the same time as the cereal cart.  Eventually we had scrambled eggs and dry toast.  Then I checked the tape thing one more time with a roll.  Both drives definitely do not work.  They both failed at once.  I cleaned off the other head.  The room was already filled with people when I went down to Dr. Levy’s class.  The chairs were in another part of the room, including the sofas, perhaps to be closer to the fireplace.  But the content was rather vapid.  But I did get a chance to talk about various computer activities such as video games, and Google Documents, which I was promoting for Marie to use on her new laptop in the remote chance she doesn’t have any writing software.  Dr. Levy still is trying to get rid of those two laptops with the hard drives and the mother boards removed.  He was going to pass out a new thing on different types of aging, but soon ran out of sheets.  He also promised us we were going to follow up on that eight aspects of life page.  Somehow I knew he’d never do that and he didn’t.  Instead he wanted to organize a trip to Seal Beach where we can eat roast beef sandwiches in the green park area they have there.  I mentioned going to the Bowers Museum.  Dr. Levy promised next week he’d have coffee and filters for me.  I won’t hold him to that.  The class was terminated rather suddenly when Marie got a phone call and the rest of us had to go silent while Marie took her call.  Then Dr. Levy and the rest of us kind of tip toed out of the room.  If Marie wants my help with anything computer- - I’m going to have to know what she knows and what she doesn’t.