President Barack Obama!

Finally-- Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States!

Read/Watch Obama's Inaugural Speech

We can now safely bookmark the White House Web Page

I particularly like the section on Civil Rights... Scroll down the page..

UPDATE:
After angry complaints about not airing (gay) Rev. Gene Robinson’s Invocation at the “We Are One” Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial, and counter blaming between HBO and the Presidential Inaugural Committee, HBO has ADDED the full ceremony, including Robinson’s Invocation to the future broadcasts of the concert/celebration. You can view it online at:
http://www.hbo.com/weareone/
There will probably be a DVD and/or iTunes video soon which should also include the full ceremony...
(Maybe the Obama-haters in the gay community, mostly bitter Hillary supporters, who spread the lies about a Obama/HBO conspiracy to back stab the gay community will shut up and do some more constructive political organizing now..)

UPDATE:
All the commotion over who was praying at the inauguration events overshadowed the more fundamental issue of WHY religion and prayer are even part of a national public/civil event like the inauguration! Obama did at least mention the 15% or so of us who do NOT believe in any "god" at all, some Christianists were upset that Obama would question whether this was a Christian nation!

Greta has an atheist's perspective:
On Being an Atheist and Watching the Inauguration

"We Are One" Inauguration Concert

The Inauguration ceremonies got off to a great start today with the "We Are One" concert celebration at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. The Gay Rev. Gene Robinson gave the invocation. The concert featured performances by Bruce Springsteen, U2 and a bunch of others, but the highlight, for me, was when Peter Seeger and Bruce Springsteen led the 400,000 crowd in Woody Guthrie's THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND, the working class national anthem, including the rarely performed verses about the poor people at the "relief office" and the sign that said "private property, but on the other side it didn't say nothin', guess that side was made for you and me.."

Yes, a (former?) Communist (Pete Seeger) performed a song written by a Communist (Woody Guthrie) at the Obama Inauguration ceremony!


(HBO has pulled ALL the YouTube Video Clips of the "We Are One" Concert--guess they own it!)

UPDATE: For some reason, HBO did not air Rev. Gene Robinson's invocation!

Many people on the gay blogs are angry over Robinson's invocation not being shown on HBO (or any other network apparently), and some are blaming Obama. Folks, Obama had NOTHING to do with this. Do you really think he has the time to be micro-managing this event?? It may not be HBO's fault either, since they were to begin broadcasting at a set time, and for some reason, Robinson's invocation was scheduled about 10 minutes BEFORE the event officially started.. I don't know, but please. The LGBT community must STOP getting angry over things like this... I think we have more important issues to get worked up about!

This was a screw-up by whoever was putting this event together, but I doubt that it was a plot by Obama or HBO against gay people!

Here's a video of Rev. Gene Robinson's Invocation at (before?) the We Are One concert:

You can read the invocation here

I'm an atheist, and prefer that religion be kept OUT of public civil events, but I find nothing offensive in Robinson's prayer, it is a very inclusive "humanist" invocation, one which should be given on Tuesday in place of Rick Warren's Inaugural invocation. Too bad few people heard or saw it, not even Obama!

UPDATE: HBO Blames the Inauguration Committee for not airing Rev. Gene Robinson's Invocation
Why was the invocation (by the gay Rev. Robinson) put in the "pre-show" events???

Huffington Post: Gay Bishop Gene Robinson Left Out Of HBO Coverage

Gay Bishop to Give Inaugural Prayer

Gay Bishop to Give Inaugural Prayer

Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay man to be ordained as such in 2003, has been invited to deliver the invocation at the first Inaugural event the President-elect will attend this weekend.

The Episcopal bishop will offer the prayer at the Lincoln Memorial on Sunday, January 18. President-elect Obama and Vice President-elect Biden are both expected to attend.

Robinson has been a vocal critic of the choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation at the Inauguration. I thought too much was made of that choice by many in the gay community, and all the hoopla over it overshadowed the choice of Rev. Joseph Lowery to give the convocation (isn't that at least as "symbolic"??)

Anyway, maybe the choice of Robinson to give a prayer will asuage some of the anger in the gay community over Warren, but I doubt it will totally satisfy some of Obama's gay critics (the same ones who criticize Obama for not supporting gay marriage, but supported Hillary Clinton who was also vocally opposed to gay marriage...)

Now the anti-gay Obama haters will have their turn to boo the inauguration...