Talk:First inauguration of Barack Obama

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First inauguration of Barack Obama is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Misplaced Pages community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.

This article appeared on Misplaced Pages's Main Page as Today's featured article on January 20, 2013.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
February 13, 2009	Good article nominee	Listed
March 7, 2009	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
March 20, 2009	Peer review	Reviewed
May 2, 2009	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
June 26, 2009	Peer review	Reviewed
August 3, 2009	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
February 20, 2010	Featured article candidate	Promoted
January 20, 2013	Today's featured article	Main Page
A fact from this article appeared on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on December 23, 2008.The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that the Barack Obama 2009 presidential inauguration* is scheduled for four days of celebration, with Washington, D.C. bars authorized to stay open until 5:00 a.m.?*
A news item involving this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the "In the news" column on January 20, 2009.
Facts from this article were featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on January 20, 2011, January 20, 2016, January 20, 2019, January 20, 2022, and January 20, 2023.
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Archives

Archive 1 (2008–2009)

Assassination Attempt

Didn't someone try to shoot him at his inauguration? Someone told me that when Obama was walking on the street someone popped up with a gun but got tackled by security. Emperor001 (talk) 22:33, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

False alarm terror attack

Does this description of a false alarm deserve reporting? Reuters had something on it too, I believe, at the time of the inauguration. Bsimmons666 (talk) 02:25, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I added a sentence.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:18, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Deleted info from article about condition of Mall grounds

I removed the info from the article regarding the condition of the Mall grounds, since the paragraph where this info was inserted focuses mostly on crowd counts, with a lesser mention about the mishandling of crowd control related to the widely-reported "Purple Ticket" incident. With the number of people who were on the Mall grounds to witness the inauguration, it goes without saying that the vegetation on the grounds would have been damaged. To reinsert the removed content, it needs to made relevant to crowd control theme of the paragraph, rather than placing undue weight on something not more directly related to the inauguration itself. As an example of of the viewpoint expressed here, I gather that the removed content could equally apply to the yearly Independence Day event that takes place on the Mall, but the condition of the Mall grounds is not the focus (or germane) to that event, either. →Lwalt 17:40, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Merger Proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Following this discussion, small amount of information was merged. Cnilep (talk) 19:48, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

It was suggested in January, 2009 that the standalone article Purple Tunnel of Doom be merged into this one. I think that would be appropriate to the topic's importance, when seen in retrospect. betsythedevine (talk) 19:07, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Support - either merge the page to this one or delete it. The nickname appears to have only existed temporarily in discussions of the inauguration. Cnilep (talk) 19:49, 18 June 2010 (UTC)
Support - merge as proposed. Freikorp (talk) 06:52, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Comment I would only support a merge of the Purple Tunnel of Doom article into this one only if the content is handled the same as the issue we had a while back about the condition of the Mall (see my comments above about Mall condition issue). The Purple Tunnel of Doom incident was merely incidential to the inaugural event. When this inauguration article was edited to get it to Featured Article status, we had to cut out a lot of excess informtation about the Purple Tunnel of Doom to what's in the article now. From what I can determine, the Purple Tunnel of Doom article is a fork of this article, since a lot what you see there used to be in this article. That expose added a lot of weight in the discussion of the inauguration with multiple paragraphs, and the mention of the incident was edited to what's now in the article. The expose of the Purple Tunnel incident would not be in context and germane with a discussion of a presidential inauguration, just like the damaged condition of the Mall.

So...if the proposal is to move all contents of Purple Tunnel of Doom article to this article, I will only support a Delete of the Purple Tunnel article, since that article is really a fork of this inauguration article. The current mention and revision about the Purple Tunnel incident in the BHO inauguration article should be sufficient since it's within the context of the inaugural event. →Lwalt 13:06, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Presidential Oath

The section regarding the oath flub as revised by another editor could mislead a reader to think that someone was talking over someone and was rude to the person. Since I couldn't recall precisely what I had actually heard when I attended the inaugural ceremony at The Mall, I decided to find a recording of the event. I revisited this event by watching the C-SPAN video and listened to the recording for this exchange.

Here's what I found by listening to the C-SPAN recording:

35:04 Roberts started citing the oath to Obama, saying "I, Barrack Hussein Obama...."

35:05 Obama stumbled over his own name. He inserted the word "swear" after "Barrack," and then backtracked and stated "I, Barrack Hussein Obama do solemnly swear...."

35:10 Roberts then cited "that I will execute the Office of President to the United States faithfully...."

Obama then said "and I'll execute...." (35:15) before pausing and waiting for Roberts to correct the phrase about executing the Office of President of the United States.

While Roberts tried to correct his mistake in citing the oath, Obama jumped right in (35:21), saying "the Office of President of the United States faithfully...." right after Roberts said "Office...."

Sources:

Video: C-SPAN (2009-01-20), President Obama 2009 Inaugural Ceremony, http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/283479-1
Transcript: ABC News (2009-01-20), The inaugural oath: Chief Justice slip up, http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2009/01/the-inuagural-o/
Transcript: United Press International (2009-01-20), The oath of office taken by Pres. Obama, http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/01/20/The-oath-of-office-taken-by-Pres-Obama/UPI-40181232472806/

I listened to the video first, and then cross-referenced that by looking for transcripts from news organizations (interestingly, though, one transcript stated that Obama said "I will execute," but I heard "I'll execute" on the C-SPAN recording). From what I've found on the C-SPAN video, Obama did not talk over Roberts. So, to state in a general sense that Obama "spoke over him" (referring to Roberts) is not accurate, as this implied that Obama and Roberts were speaking at the same time. As revised, this seemed to be the opinion of the writer, which could looked upon as one point of view.

This section will be revised to reflect a summary of what occurred during this event because, as edited, readers could be mislead to believe that people were speaking over one another. Besides, I thought that this issue was resolved long ago when the editors came to a consensus for putting together this section, since the focus was supposed to be the oath flubbing by Roberts. →Lwalt 22:10, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Move request

Per Obama's re-election, move page and associated talk page to First inauguration of Barack Obama. Tktru (talk) 09:23, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

Why was the 'move' mechanizism removed from this article? GoodDay (talk) 03:50, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

Support, although, it's not until January 20, 2013. GoodDay (talk) 20:54, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

Strongly support, as the second-inauguration article will be actively edited well before January 20; the present title should become a disambig page between the two inauguration articles (like Inauguration of George W. Bush). I'm not 100% sure why the "move" mechanism is missing, but I suspect it's due to the general article probation on all Obama-related articles (see top of this talk page). --RBBrittain (talk) 23:36, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

I have added the move request to WP:RM/TR so admins can look into it. If that doesn't work, I'll try it another way. --RBBrittain (talk) 00:07, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Although this move has already been completed, it did not follow the guideline at WP:FIXDABLINKS --

A code of honor for creating disambiguation pages is to fix all resulting mis-directed links.

Before moving an article to a qualified name (in order to create a disambiguation page at the base name, to move an existing disambiguation page to that name, or to redirect that name to a disambiguation page), click on What links here to find all of the incoming links. Repair all of those incoming links to use the new article name.

It would be appreciated if users interested in this topic would go back and fix all the pages that contain links to "Inauguration of Barack Obama" so that they take the reader to the correct article. Thank you. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 11:55, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Done. TJRC (talk) 01:21, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

Weather conditions

I could not find in the article what was the weather like that day. In my opinion, such comprehensive article should contain this sort of information, for one thing, because of the character of the event (i.e. open-air event, assembly of a large number of people). Thank you for adding this information. 94.113.5.35 (talk) 12:54, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

"No Bible was present during the retake of the inauguration."

Removed by myself, summary So what? No one would be interested in this if not for the fringe theories about Obama, and, since we ignore fringe theories here, the sentence doesn't serve any valid encyclopedic purpose
Reverted by TonyTheTiger (talk · contribs), summary rv content removal. As a tertiary resource, we summarize 2ndary sources

Okay, cool, let's do that consensus thingy. I think it's overly broad to simply say "we summarize secondary sources". We also decide which pieces of information presented in secondary sources. I'm not saying we should be white-washing history or anything. But clearly we don't report every single thing every secondary source says; instead, we consider various criteria as to the encyclopedic relevance of a point. I don't find the lack of a Bible encyclopedically relevant. We wouldn't be discussing it if it were George Bush or Bill Clinton, and while certainly fringe theories can be discussed on Misplaced Pages—in this case at Barack Obama religion conspiracy theories—material shouldn't be included in related articles if it only means anything to purveyors of fringe theories. The encyclopedic weight of the sentence "No Bible was present during the retake of the inauguration" is far lower than the ideological weight, which, in my opinion, makes it unsuitable for inclusion in an article. — PinkAmpers & 11:18, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

- Have you noted that Oath of office of the President of the United States has a special section devoted to "Oath of office of the President of the United States#Use of Bibles". Use of Bibles is considered encyclopedic for this topic.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:56, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

"forebears"?

The Wikisource text of Mr Obama's First Inaugural Address spells the word as "forbearers." This follows the transcription released to the press before the address, and the transcription originally published by The New York Times (but not The Washington Post) but later corrected to "forebears." It has never been clear who was responsible for the variant spelling; Mr Obama has been reported to have written the speech on his Blackberry without spell correction. The etymology of the word "forebears" has the prefix "fore" to indicate "coming before" and the usual expression of Lincoln and other eloquent rhetoric is "forefathers" but Mr Obama apparently wished to avoid sexism and so chose another word. However, the usual meaning of "forbear" is to abstain not precede. According to Google corpus, "forbearer" has been used in place of "forebear" a few times, but greatly outnumbered in that meaning by "forebear." Since when you listen to the audio of the speech, Mr Obama does not enunciate the last syllable of "forbearers," should the historical text use the spelling "forebears" or "forbearers"? http://en.wikisource.org/Barack_Obama's_First_Inaugural_Address — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.187.163.144 (talk) 20:34, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

I would suggest asking at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Barack Obama or Talk:Barack Obama.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 22:28, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

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Reactions to prayer

I removed the following from the Prayer section:

Conservatives, including Rush Limbaugh decried Lowery's benediction, which quoted from "Lift Every Voice and Sing" (the "Black National Anthem"), as racist, while Democrats disagreed. Another of Lowery's rhymes, "When black will not be asked to get in back", borrowing (along with other lines in his conclusion) from the Big Bill Broonzy song "Black, Brown and White", particularly offended the likes of Limbaugh who felt that Obama's ascension on that day symbolized the fact that America had come to that point already.

References

Seelye, Katharine (January 20, 2009). "Live Blog: The Inauguration of Barack Obama". The New York Times. Retrieved April 15, 2009.
^ Schilling, Chelsea (January 20, 2009). "Inaugural prayer slam prompts Obama smile: Rush Limbaugh: Lowery 'just insulted this country'". WorldNetDaily. Retrieved March 7, 2009.
"Viewers Offer Mixed Reactions to Reverend Lowery's Inaugural Benediction". HCD Research. January 26, 2009. Retrieved March 7, 2009.
"When black will not be asked to get back". The Economist. January 21, 2009. Retrieved June 18, 2009.
Remnick, David (February 15, 2010). "The Promise". newyorker.com. Retrieved May 29, 2017.

There are several issues with the sourcing:

WorldNetDaily is not a reliable source. Although it may accurately portray Limbaugh's opinion, there is not indication that this is a significant viewpoint per WP:WEIGHT.
HCD Research is published by Press Release Point, a PR site that allows clients to submit press releases with no vetting or oversight. At best it is a primary source for the raw survey data, and "Democrats disagreed" is a gross oversimplification of that data.
The Economist mentions a positive reaction to the benediction by an unnamed "liberal blogger/pastor" but does not say anything about racism.
The New Yorker discusses the benediction but, again, does not mention racism.

Although there are several sources that may be used to discuss general reactions to the benediction, there is not strong RS support for the racism narrative; in fact these sources do not mention anyone other than Limbaugh getting offended. This is a fringe viewpoint that should not be covered here. –dlthewave ☎ 23:25, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

I am not an expert on politics. Experts on this issue would probably respond to an WP:RFC.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 00:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

You don't need to be an expert on politics to check whether or not the sources support the claims that are being made. An RfC seems unnecessary at this time. –dlthewave ☎ 05:32, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Note about protesters

I think that there should be a small note about the few protesters at the inauguration: https://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/21/us/politics/21web-protests.html Victor Grigas (talk) 23:39, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

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