Initial Inauguration Observations

--I thought the speech was an interesting mix of anachronistic, sometimes scriptural language, and topicality. (ie, "So it has been. So it must be," followed by references to Wall Street and home foreclosures.) The idea, I assume, was to help place our current challenges in the broad historical sweep of American progress. I think it was quite effective in parts. Not a home run, but pretty good.

--Are we as a country really going to enter a "new era of responsibility?" It's a nice idea. Doesn't seem very likely. Am I allowed to be cynical today?

--Of course, I'm GenX, and we're the last ones who are likely to respond to a call for collective effort. The Millennials presumably are eager to enlist. The big question is the narcissistic Boomers: Can Obama convince them that this is the great effort they and they alone are capable of taking on? Perhaps instead of invoking pioneers of the west, and Revolutionaries at Valley Forge, Obama should have sprinkled his speech with references to the great heroic generation who changed the world in the 1960s and 1970s.

--This is appropos of nothing, but in the film "Milk," Dianne Feinstein's character is constantly refered to, and occasionally even spoken to, but is always off-screen. I found it kind of odd.

--A Jew, a black man, an Asian-American, and a woman... was that a seriously diverse musical group or what? (Of course, they had to play a white man's composition.)

--Get out of my way, I'm Aretha!