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No tickets, no problem: the view from the back of the inauguration crowd
An estimated 1.5 to 2 million people converged on the Mall on Tuesday, many waiting since before dawn just to be on the scene when Barack Obama took the oath of office.
Several hours before the inauguration began, a sea of people shuffled along the few open streets, funneling their way from bus and Metro stops to the Mall. The air was cold, the wind was bitter at times and the sheer numbers of people kept pedestrian traffic moving at a shuffle, yet the overall mood was cheerful and excited.
For those who didn't have tickets, the situation was both free and distant. The Mall is two miles long and most of it was packed with non-ticketed onlookers who walked in without having to go through security. That meant that the “no chairs, no bags, no coolers, no signs” rules didn't apply so thousands of people threw down blankets, hoisted flags or giant decorated umbrellas, set up chairs and raised their signs and banners with impunity.
On the downside, the only view of the action was from the giant Jumbotron screens set up at regular intervals between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial. In the hours before the ceremony began, the screens showed replays of Sunday's inaugural concert, prompting spectators to dance and sing along as they waited.
As the dignitaries began to arrive, their entrances were shown on the giant screens and loud cheers erupted from the Democratic crowd for Sen. Hillary Clinton, Rep. Nancy Pelosi and former President Jimmy Carter, while President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were loudly booed.
The Rev. Rick Warren also received some boos when he approached the podium for the invocation. Warren has drawn criticism for his antiabortion and anti-gay stands and was a controversial choice for Obama's inauguration.
But as Sen. Joe Biden stepped forward to take the vice president's oath of office, all hostility faded from the crowds. The mood only increased from there when Obama placed his hand on the Bible and became the 44th president of the United States.
In his speech, Obama called on Americans to step up to bring about change and the enthusiastic crowd cheered at every stop. But his loudest applause came from his reference to Bush's policies on national security.
“As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake.”
The crowd went wild and as tv cameras flashed on Bush's reaction, the cheers changed to brief laughter and jeers before the speech resumed.
Afterwards, all of those people still had to get off the Mall and back outside the inauguration perimeter, an undertaking that took upwards of two hours because of the numbers of people and the street closures. But the cold onlookers shuffling along were rewarded by a chance to see Bush's helicopter flying low overhead, taking the 43rd president out of the city. As expected, his departure drew the loudest applause of the day.
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