Obamapalooza

(Revelers throng to the Washington Monument for Obama's swearing-in.)

A four-day weekend of high expectations came to a gleeful close Tuesday, as Barack Obama was sworn in as President of the United States. Nearly two million people crowded the vast frozen common of the National Mall to watch the brief swearing-in ceremony, while thousands who held tickets to secure areas at the foot of Capitol Hill found themselves trapped in immobile hordes. Thousands spent the ceremony trapped underground in the Third Street tunnel under Pennsylvania Avenue, after being directed there by confused police.

For the record-shattering crowds who clustered around the twenty-one Jumbotrons erected on the Mall, Inauguration Day consisted of long, meandering walks around an overzealous network of security barricades punctuated by the high emotion of the ceremony itself. Revelers cheered and booed as past presidents and cabinet nominees filed into the bleachers above the inaugural podium. Both Presidents Bush and a wheel-chair bound Dick Cheney drew thunderous hisses and boos from the excited crowd, while Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Obamas received cheers and ululations each time they appeared on the enormous screens. After President Obama finished his oath, strangers hugged one another and people openly wept. When Reverend Joseph Lowery finished his benediction with a call and response of "amen," the call was answered with triumphant excitement.

Sunday's free concert on the Mall augured Tuesday's historical turnout. Half a million people filled the grounds around the Lincoln Memorial to watch Sunday's star-studded performance, more than the entire turnout to George W Bush's second inauguration in 2005.


(Spectators filled the west slope of the Washington Monument.)



(This man came from Jalisco to represent el espiritu Azteca.)



(After the concert, people flooded the streets around the White House.)

Monday, the Mall buzzed with excitement. Visitors took turns throwing shoes at effigies of former President Bush. Throughout DC, officials put finishing touches on complex and overlapping security precautions. Buildings around downtown were searched and sealed. Groups of National Guard troops occupied street corners along Florida Avenue and took up positions outside shuttered liquor stores. The historic U Street corridor filled with visitors who flooded restaurants, clubs and bars. Dozens stood in line outside Ben's Chili Bowl.

Hours before dawn on Tuesday, attendees began the long march towards the Mall or the sidewalks of Pennsylvania Avenue. The streets around the Capitol were closed, forcing uncoordinated streams of tens of thousands into chaotic confluences that left thousands stranded. Barricades and bottlenecks corralled masses of people without clear signs or informed officials to guide them. Happily, they were in a cheery mood.


(Thousands spent the swearing-in trapped in the "Tunnel of Doom.")



(Nearly two million filled the National Mall.)



(People climbed trees and portable toilets for a better view.)


While the atmosphere was jubilant, the crowd clearly harbored resentment towards eight years of Bush leadership. As current and former government officials streamed into the bleachers on Capitol Hill, the masses on the Mall booed vociferously as George HW Bush, George W Bush and Dick Cheney appeared on the Jumbotrons. When Bill and Hillary Clinton appeared, they cheered. President Obama's motorcade, his family and his cabinet nominees received shouts of praise. When the President appeared, the cheers were deafening. After Chief Justice John Roberts bungled the administration of the oath of office, Obama delivered his inaugural address with the surety and rhetorical confidence he demonstrated on the campaign trail, promising renewed national unity in the face of two wars and global economic collapse.



(President Obama takes the oath of office beside his wife Michelle.)


After the swearing-in concluded, exiting the Mall took hours. As crowds bled away, they revealed fields of detritus amounting to more litter than all the litter ever left on the Mall combined, the Park Police said today. While people waited to clear needless and redundant barricades, they were treated to a flyover by the Marine helicopter ferrying former President Bush to Edwards Air Force Base, where he caught a flight to Midland, Texas. Once clear of Mall, crowds dissipated quickly, catching Metro trains to distant hotels, filling bars and restaurants, and walking back to their neighborhoods.

During the Congressional luncheon immediately after the swearing-in, Senators Edward Kennedy and Robert Bird were taken to the hospital after Kennedy had a seizure. Senator Bird was so upset, he was also taken to the hospital as a precaution. After a forty minute delay caused by their departures, Obama left Capitol Hill in his new, highly armored limousine dubbed "The Beast." He seemed happy, despite the unfortunate interruption, and opted to walk portions of the parade route before arriving at the review stand opposite the White House. After appearances at ten inaugural balls, the President returned to the White House with his wife, where they drank champagne with a small cohort of guests.



(After the swearing-in, George W Bush took one last flight over DC.)



(The line into Capitol South Metro Station reached two blocks.)



(Many crowded the homes of local residents, eager to witness to history.)

Obama Arrives

(Obama's motorcade races to Blair House)

At the end of a six and half hour railroad trip from Philadelphia, President-elect Barack Obama arrived in Washington, DC just shy of seven this evening. The city was teeming with the first of an expected 1.5 to 3 million visitors. After appearances in Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore, where Obama appeared visibly moved by crowds turning out to witness his historic journey to the capital, the President-elect rolled into Union Station in a 1930's era blue caboose. Obamapalooza caught the motorcade as it roared away from the station to Blair House, where the Obamas will be staying until Tuesday's inauguration.


[Thanks to Sadie Kadlec and Evan Brown for shooting and cutting the video.]

Bush Declares State of Emergency

Using powers created after he failed to do anything before or after Hurricane Katrina slowly barreled into New Orleans, lame duck President George W Bush declared a state of emergency in advance of next Tuesday’s inauguration. It is the first time the federal government has declared that an emergency exists in advance of a political event.


(Bush visited storm-ravaged New Orleans four days after the hurricane hit.)

The move is little more than a bureaucratic step to free up federal money to reimburse the District of Columbia for inauguration expenditures. DC expects its final inauguration tab to run to $47 million, more than triple the 15$ million allocated by Congress. Bush’s emergency declaration is essentially an end run around the Legislative Branch, as getting additional funds from the nation’s lawmakers could take months.

Inaugural Security Picture Coming Into Focus

In a front-page article in Sunday's paper about beefed-up security at the inauguration, the Washington Post again missed the forest for the trees.

Based on figures compiled from the Post article, the total security presence for the 2009 inauguration will be 67% larger than for George W Bush’s 2005 inauguration, while total attendance, currently estimated to be between 1.5 million and 3 million, will be four to eight times larger. In other words, the proportional security presence at Barack Obama’s inauguration will be anywhere from half to nearly a quarter of that provided for Bush in 2005.

According to the figures reported by the Post, the FBI’s Washington Field Office will bring in a 20% larger force than is typical for an inauguration. The Park Police, which oversees the National Mall, will increase its force by 66%. The D.C. police presence, bolstered by 4,000 officers from outside the District, will be 25% larger than that at George Bush’s 2005 inauguration. Relative to this year’s expected turnout, those increases would be paltry without a massive increase in military personnel acting as security.

11,500 active duty troops will be in Washington on Inauguration Day, compared with 7,000 in 2005, a 64% jump. But if the 5,000 servicemen and women who traditionally participate in the inaugural parade are discounted as security, the size of the military’s security footprint, in real terms, will increase from 2,000 to 6,500, a 225% larger force than in 2005. According to the Post, 1,300 unarmed National Guard soldiers will bolster the ranks of 1,000 Park Police tasked with controlling the 309 acres of the National Mall. The remaining 5,000 military personnel – a full brigade – will assist “with crowd control, communications, security, medical care, logistics, weapons detection and other needs,” the Post reported.

That means Obama’s inauguration, with a substantially smaller security presence relative to crowd size, will be substantially more militarized. Given that inaugurations are exercises in symbolism, filling Washington with thousands of uniformed troops seems like a potential public relations gaff. Obama rode into office on a wave of public discontent with the Iraq War. The last time the National Guard flooded DC’s streets was 1968, during the race riots that exploded after the assassination of Martin Luther King. A militarized inauguration could evoke both.

“Last Call” Compromise

The DC Council succumbed to pressure from concerned US Senators and ecumenical and community groups last night and moved a special inauguration week “last call” in District bars to 4 a.m. from the 5 a.m. cutoff announced last week.

Under rules laid out in last night’s 9-4 vote, bars can remain open twenty-four hours from January 17-21, but may only serve alcohol until 4 a.m. Bars that wish to extend their hours past 2 a.m. weekdays and 3 a.m. weekends must pay a registration fee of $100 for bars and restaurants and $250 for nightclubs, the Washington Post reports.

The new 4 a.m. closing time is a compromise to vent off anger from various sources. Community groups said the DC Council rode roughshod over legally binding agreements between communities and bars about noise and operating hours when it announced last week without prior public notification that bars would have been able to serve alcohol until 5 a.m.

Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Bob Bennett (R-Utah) protested drawing police away from inauguration security to contend with drunken crowds on the streets of places like Adams Morgan. The Downtown Cluster of Congregations sided with Sens. Feinstein and Bennett noting that the current level of police presence in Adams Morgan hasn’t been able to prevent a string of recent homicides in the popular nightlife neighborhood.

Meanwhile, the bureaucratic disconnect between the DC Council and DC Metro remains. With the dust settled, the 4 a.m. “last call” compromise appears likely to stand, but Metro has yet to amend its hours of operation past 3 a.m. January 17, midnight January 18 and 19 and 2 a.m. January 20.

After celebrating late into the night in District bars during inauguration week, throngs of revelers trapped in the city by insufficient transportation infrastructure will have to find their way back to their lodgings on foot, in the dark, in late January, or wait for Metro to begin operating.

Feds Scurry to Dampen Camping Fears

The Washington Post reported this morning that camping will not be permitted on the Mall for the presidential inauguration, assuaging nervous Washingtonians that the projected three to five million attendees of the 2009 Inauguration might transform the center of the District into a makeshift campground.

US Park Police Spokesman Sgt Robert LaChance told reporters that it is "not legal to camp on the Mall" and that though it is open twenty-four hours a day, the 500 acre common in the heart of the city might be swept to check for bombs during the night, the Post reported. Sgt LaChance did not specify what exactly constitutes camping versus all night loitering.

In contrast to DC Mayor Adrian Fenty's comments that he expects Obama supporters to camp overnight for inauguration parade seating, Secret Service spokesman Malcolm D Wiley said that 7 am would be "the absolute earliest you can get to a sidewalk" along the parade route, the Post also reported.

Wiley also struck a more conservative tone about expected turnout to the inauguration. According to the Post, Wiley said, "we have nothing to suggest there will be four million." Mayor Fenty has put the estimated number of inauguration attendees at three to five million.

Forty Days and Forty Nights

Forty days and forty nights remain in the Bush presidency and planning for Inauguration Day is in full swing, but with three to five million people estimated to attend Barack Obama's history-making inauguration, Washington DC is scrambling to accommodate the largest crowd ever to descend on the US Capital.

At the low end of the District's projections, three million attendees would more than double the previous record of 1.2 million who came for Lyndon Johnson's 1965 inauguration.

Few of Washington's 95,000 hotel rooms remain available and hotels are booking out as far away as West Virginia. Local residents are renting their homes for astronomical prices -- apartments listed on Craigslist go for as much as $3,000 a night -- while area luxury hotels are offering special inauguration package deals running into the tens of thousands of dollars.

Despite objections raised by California and Utah Senators Dianne Feinstein and Bob Bennett, DC Mayor Adrian Fenty announced today that he will back the DC Council's decision to let bars and nightclubs remain open until five am during the inauguration weekend. DC Metro plans on running extended rush-hour service to provide bus and Metro transportation to the millions expected to arrive, while DC's non-voting US Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton has discussed opening the District's sports stadiums as spill-over public space where the Inauguration may be viewed on television.

Plans are afoot to reinforce DC's 4,000 strong police force with a brigade of up to 5,000 US troops and as many as 2,500 police from jurisdictions outside the District. But if five million people do arrive to witness Barack Obama's and George W Bush's first and final days as President, DC could descend into chaos of Woodstockian proportions.

In the case that the District's upper estimates prove true, an 11,500 strong security force would provide one soldier or police officer for every 470 people. At that ratio, police would be able to perform little other than crowd control while parking enforcement and emergency services would be deeply strained.

The US Park Service, which administers the National Mall, is unsure whether three million people can physically fit on the 500 acres of open grass between the Lincoln Memorial and the western steps of the US Capitol, where the swearing in takes place January 20, 2009 at noon. 1995's Million Man March brought 800,000 people to the slopes of Capitol Hill and stretched the majority of the 1.1 miles westward to the Washington Monument.

If projections hold true, and four to six times that number arrive on Inauguration Day, crowds likely will occupy the entirety of the Mall, spilling across Independence and Constitution Avenues, and covering the steps of the Lincoln Memorial where forty years ago Martin Luther King challenged the American status quo with his "I have a dream" speech.

To give the District's estimated projections perspective, the resident population of Washington DC is 580,000 people. Five million people, the District's upper estimate of potential attendees, represents nine times the resident population. If that number do come to the District on Inauguration Day, it would equate to fourteen million people descending on Manhattan for New Year's Eve, or the entire population of Brazil traveling to Mexico City to celebrate Cinco de Mayo.

It remains anyone's guess who is coming, where they will be staying, and what they will eat, drink or do while they are here. The fact is, Washington DC has never faced a logistical and infrastructural challenge as great as Inauguration 2009. Whatever happens, it is sure to make history.