Big problems, high hopes await first black U.S. president

As the Obamas sat in the center of a front row pew, next to Vice President-elect Joseph Biden and his wife, Jill, the keynote speaker, Bishop T.D. Jakes of the Windsor Village United Methodist Church in Houston, read a Biblical passage from Daniel 3:19. He then offered some lessons clearly aimed both to brace and hearten the president-elect: “In time of crisis, good men must stand up”; “You cannot change what you will not confront”; and “You cannot enjoy the light without enduring the heat.”

Shortly before 10 a.m., the Obamas arrived at the White House, accompanied by the Bidens. The Obamas were met at the door by the Bushes. The two men shook hands and with their wives posed for a picture before going inside for a traditional coffee and a final few moments for the Bushes in the home they have occupied the past eight years.

Bush and Obama left the White House at 10:47 and, pausing only momentarily for photographers, entered the limousine that would take them to the Capitol. They arrived there 10 minutes later.

Aides said Obama was expected to emphasize personal responsibility in his speech.

“He is going to be counting on the American people to come together,” Colin Powell, the former military leader and secretary of state, said in an appearance on MSNBC on Tuesday morning. “We all have to do something to help the country move forward under the leadership of this new president.”

As a black American who grew up in a segregated nation, Powell said the inauguration was looming as a powerful and emotional moment for African Americans.

“You almost start tearing up,” he said.

The crowd that stretched down the mall was festive and enthusiastic. They were bundled against the cold, with the temperature just above 20 degrees Fahrenheit at 9 a.m., and the forecast calling for it to remain in the low 30s.

Obama’s assumption of the presidency capped a remarkable rise for a man first elected to national office in 2004, winning a Senate seat in a year when he also delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in Boston.

To win the presidency, he defeated Clinton in a pitched presidential primary battle and then beat Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona in a general election conducted against the backdrop of a national economic collapse.

Although Obama did not emphasize his black American heritage as a candidate, the symbolism was evident and was reinforced by the fact that the swearing-in was taking place the day following the national holiday to mark the birth of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

Obama takes office less than a month before the bicentennial of the birth of Lincoln, another Illinoisan who took the office at a time of national turmoil and a man whom Obama clearly looks to as an inspiration for his own presidency.

“Today is about validation of the dream Dr. King enunciated 45 years ago on the steps on the Lincoln Memorial,” U.S. Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, the No. 3 Democrat in the House and the highest ranking black lawmaker in Congress, said Tuesday.

Responding to warnings that the huge crowd could cause long waits and security screen checkpoints, people packed Washington’s subway trains by 5:30 a.m., filling all the parking lots at the outer stations; the subways had carried more than 400,000 riders by 8 a.m. An accident halted service on one of the main lines around 10 a.m.

Shortly after 7 a.m., as the sun rose above the Capitol dome, there was a glittering burst of flashbulbs as the teeming crowd collectively snapped thousands of photos of the dramatic moment. Around the Capitol, ticket gates opened for the long lines that were already waiting.

Before long the Mall was packed with people for as far as the eye could see; by 9 a.m., the eastern half of the Mall, closer to the Capitol, was completely full.

(Associated Press)

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