Obama Sells Out the Inauguration, Shame on Him

Inaugurations Matter. They set the tone. For students of history they are a measure of the expectations set, and later the expectations met. Lincoln in his second inaugural talked about the healing of the country, our better angels, Kennedy asked us famously what we can do for our country, Reagan brought optimism back to America, Clinton had us singing " Don't Stop" until we could stand it no longer. Barack Obama's first inaugural all made us feel like we accomplished a part of history by electing our first black President.

For this the second inauguration it is expected that Obama will set a course for the second term, one that hopefully is successful in achieving some of those things that only a second term President with no fears of reelection can achieve.

Unfortunately for me the first thing that we can remember about the second inauguration of Barack Obama will be his decision, his, to me, inexplicable decision, to reverse course and accept unlimited corporate contributions to cover the costs of the inauguration.

There is no real sense to write a whole dissertation about how hypocritical this is. This President, this party, that rails against the Citizens United case, that talks about the negative effects of money in politics has decided to accept unlimited corporate money to cover the cost of the inauguration.

The reasoning is simple enough one supposes. It saves Washington money, it is budget friendly. It also gives validity to those that give money, it gives the appearance of access and it proves that, in the end, perhaps money does mean everything.

No matter how long you think about this second inauguration, no matter how great a speech he gives, to me this will be inauguration that Barack Obama sold. He is still my President, he still can do great things, but it just to me makes it that much more unlikely that he can stand for anything. Anything at all.