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Tag: biden inauguration
Inaugural poet Amanda Gorman

#EndorseThis: Amanda Gorman's 'The Hill We Climb' Will Leave You Spellbound

Poetry rewards repeated attention -- especially when it is spoken aloud, like The Hill We Climb, the extraordinary six minutes of verse recited yesterday by Amanda Gorman that entranced millions of Americans at yesterday's presidential inauguration.

The youngest person ever to deliver a poem at a U.S. presidential inauguration, Gorman's beautiful language and dramatic delivery left her millions of listeners in awe. Dressed in a vibrant yellow coat, braids in a bun with a bold red hat, the 22 year-old writer perfectly evoked the themes enunciated by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on that historic day.

She brought something very special to this symbolic moment when hate and division lost, while democracy prevailed --- even though it was pushed to the very edge. Watch for the first time or watch again -- you won't be disappointed.

National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman at Presidential Inaugurationwww.youtube.com


The Hill We Climb

When day comes we ask ourselves,
where can we find light in this never-ending shade?
The loss we carry,
a sea we must wade
We've braved the belly of the beast
We've learned that quiet isn't always peace
And the norms and notions
of what just is
Isn't always just-ice
And yet the dawn is ours
before we knew it
Somehow we do it
Somehow we've weathered and witnessed
a nation that isn't broken
but simply unfinished
We the successors of a country and a time
Where a skinny Black girl
descended from slaves and raised by a single mother
can dream of becoming president
only to find herself reciting for one
And yes we are far from polished
far from pristine
but that doesn't mean we are
striving to form a union that is perfect
We are striving to forge a union with purpose
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and
conditions of man
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us
but what stands before us
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first,
we must first put our differences aside
We lay down our arms
so we can reach out our arms
to one another
We seek harm to none and harmony for all
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true:
That even as we grieved, we grew
That even as we hurt, we hoped
That even as we tired, we tried
That we'll forever be tied together, victorious
Not because we will never again know defeat
but because we will never again sow division
Scripture tells us to envision
that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree
And no one shall make them afraid
If we're to live up to our own time
Then victory won't lie in the blade
But in all the bridges we've made
That is the promised glade
The hill we climb
If only we dare
It's because being American is more than a pride we inherit,
it's the past we step into
and how we repair it
We've seen a force that would shatter our nation
rather than share it
Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy
And this effort very nearly succeeded
But while democracy can be periodically delayed
it can never be permanently defeated
In this truth
in this faith we trust
For while we have our eyes on the future
history has its eyes on us
This is the era of just redemption
We feared at its inception
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs
of such a terrifying hour
but within it we found the power
to author a new chapter
To offer hope and laughter to ourselves
So while once we asked,
how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe?
Now we assert
How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?
We will not march back to what was
but move to what shall be
A country that is bruised but whole,
benevolent but bold,
fierce and free
We will not be turned around
or interrupted by intimidation
because we know our inaction and inertia
will be the inheritance of the next generation
Our blunders become their burdens
But one thing is certain:
If we merge mercy with might,
and might with right,
then love becomes our legacy
and change our children's birthright
So let us leave behind a country
better than the one we were left with
Every breath from my bronze-pounded chest,
we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one
We will rise from the gold-limbed hills of the west,
we will rise from the windswept northeast
where our forefathers first realized revolution
We will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the midwestern states,
we will rise from the sunbaked south
We will rebuild, reconcile and recover
and every known nook of our nation and
every corner called our country,
our people diverse and beautiful will emerge,
battered and beautiful
When day comes we step out of the shade,
aflame and unafraid
The new dawn blooms as we free it
For there is always light,
if only we're brave enough to see it
If only we're brave enough to be it

Andrew Garbarino

Some Republican Freshmen Pledge To Work With Biden

Just 17 of the 44 newly sworn-in Republican members of Congress signed a letter on Wednesday congratulating President-elect Joe Biden and pledging to work with him to find common ground. But even most of these lawmakers who now urge unity voted to overturn his victory just two weeks ago.

In their letter, the "freshmen class" Republicans wrote that they "are hopeful that — despite our ideological differences — we may work together on behalf of the American people we are each so fortunate to serve." They cited COVID-19 relief, pre-existing conditions, infrastructure, antitrust enforcement, and the economy as potential areas for collaboration.

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As Biden Takes Office, QAnon Cultists Struggle With New Reality

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters

Supporters of the false QAnon conspiracy theory are struggling to respond to President Joe Biden taking office.

The conspiracy theory has been centered around former President Donald Trump and a secret plot to take down his perceived enemies, the "deep state," and a cabal of satan-worshipping pedophiles. Supporters of the conspiracy theory, which has gained an extensive influence in the American political process and hampered the response to the coronavirus pandemic, had been in denial about Biden's victory throughout the transition. They repeatedly claimed that somehow Trump would stay in office -- possibly via military means and martial law -- even when he made clear otherwise.

That denial about Biden's presidency carried through in the morning hours of Inauguration Day (though there were signs by the day before of a splintering in support for the conspiracy theory).

First, QAnon supporters began to claim that the number of American flags behind Trump at his farewell speech at Joint Base Andrews was a signal to QAnon.

Some QAnon followers also suggested a line in Eric Trump's farewell message saying "the best is yet to come" proved the conspiracy theory.

Multiple QAnon influencers even claimed that as he took office, Biden would reveal he was part of the conspiracy theory all along.

Obviously, none of this happened, and Biden has now been sworn in as the 46th president of the United States. Leading up to and following the inauguration ceremony, some QAnon supporters began to worry that they had been deceived and others denied that it was possible. Other QAnon influencers are still urging supporters to still believe in the conspiracy theory, with some claiming the military may step in to prevent Biden's presidency (or seeming to suggest people will commit violence to stop it), a sign that the conspiracy theory in some form is likely here to stay -- even if its central figure is no longer president.

President Joe Biden delivering his inaugural address.

Biden's Speech Confronts Capitol Riot And Calls For End To ‘Uncivil War’

Reprinted with permission from ProPublica

It's becomeaProPublicatraditionfor our president Richard Tofel, who wrote a book on President Kennedy's inaugural address, to offer an instant analysis of suchspeeches. Here are his thoughts on President Biden's address.

If President Joe Biden's inaugural address was drafted more than two weeks ago, it was certainly rewritten after the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Biden's setting of the scene as "our winter of peril and significant possibilities" may have been the speech's original theme, but its more stark call for an end to "this uncivil war" was surely more recent.

The predecessor most on Biden's mind on this historic occasion was clearly Abraham Lincoln, and the moment was not Lincoln's second inaugural prophecy at the Civil War's end, but his desperate pleas to avoid it ("We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.") at its beginning. Biden quoted Lincoln twice, once from the moment of his signing the Emancipation Proclamation, once from his eulogy at Gettysburg eight months later referring to those who gave "the last full measure of devotion" in the nation's service.

Lincoln was not the only president on whom Biden drew. In this speech — an extended call for unity — the new president hearkened to a tradition first and most memorably encapsulated in Jefferson's declaration, at his first inaugural, that "we are all republicans, we are all federalists."

But Jefferson had followed his assertion of bipartisanship with a sentiment that Biden, after the insurrection two weeks earlier, would not echo: "If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it." Biden, instead, insisted that "disagreement must not lead to disunion."

And he minced no words about where the threat comes from: "political extremism, white supremacy, domestic terrorism." Having thus made clear his belief that race was central to the events of Jan. 6, and implicitly to much of Trumpism, Biden offered no quarter on racial equality. "A cry for racial justice 400 years in the making moves us. The dream of justice for all will be deferred no longer," he said.

While that may be nonnegotiable, Biden pleaded repeatedly and directly with the American people for unity even without consensus. A politician for more than a half century, he asserted that "politics doesn't have to be a raging fire, destroying everything in its path." He asserted that this was not a "foolish fantasy," and seemed to recognize that his appeal will fall on some deaf ears. Yet he seems genuinely to believe that there may be "enough of us" for some restoration of civility to be possible. While no one ever wants to quote former President Richard Nixon, he essentially repeated the call in Nixon's inaugural, after the upheavals of 1968, to "lower our voices."

A man of obvious and deep faith, Biden invoked St. Augustine and a recourse to the "common objects of our love." And where the inaugurals of Presidents Dwight Eisenhower and the first George Bush had offered their own handcrafted prayers, Biden led a silent prayer for the 400,000 dead of the pandemic, clearly in the hope that in this the nation might find common ground.

Among the only harsh words in the address came when Biden drew a hard line against what defenders of the previous inaugural at first called "alternative facts." In this, he was biting: "There is truth and there are lies, lies told for power and profit."

It had always seemed likely that Biden would break a tradition extending back seven presidents, to Jimmy Carter in 1977, of thanking his predecessor. Even former President Donald Trump had observed this, citing both Barack and Michelle Obama "for their gracious aid throughout this transition. They have been magnificent." Biden clearly couldn't say that, and didn't. Instead, he thanked his predecessors, Presidents Clinton, Bush 43 and Obama, for their presence, while saluting the fragile and absent Carter, now aged 96.

Beyond the completely unexpected, the great challenge for President Biden, as today made even more clear, is whether his belief that there are indeed "enough of us" willing to abjure "uncivil war" or worse will prove sound, or whether too many will join the previous president in simply absenting themselves from our common endeavors, or worse.