Well, the inauguration is over. President Obama (tee hee) took the oath of office ¹, gave a phenomenal address, and with a lot of time-honored pomp and circumstance ², we have a new president.

I’m obviously bothered by Rick Warren’s presence in the festivities, and I found his invocation to be far too Christian a prayer, not terribly fitting for such an occasion. (For a primer on reasonable public service prayer, see Bishop Gene Robinson’s un-televised invocation of Sunday night.)

We're counting on you, Mr. President. Don't let us down.

But this afternoon the game is changes. The lead up between November 4th and January 20th was the equivalent of a political scrimmage, a testing of each side to see what we can expect from each other in the real season. President Obama showed us that his support for our cause is negotiable, especially if there’s a major gain to be had by putting our rights aside. In return, we hopefully have shown him that that isn’t okay, and that we’ll make noise if it comes to it.

In other words, we should bear what we’ve learned in mind, but proceed with a certain amount of trust for what President Obama has said.

President Obama has pledged to support hate crime laws such as the Matthew Shepard Act, support the ENDA for both orientation and gender identity, expand adoption rights, end DADT, oppose legislation like DOMA, and support civil unions. He says he’s on our side and though he doesn’t exactly support marriage equality, he’s not talking about ripping our families apart either.

But there’s more to today’s events than just what it means for LGBT Americans. Politics aside, the fact that a majority of voting Americans voted for an African American man is huge. President Obama’s parents wouldn’t have been able to marry in at least 18 states when he was born, and now he’s in the Oval Office. I watched with the rest of the nation today as we took a big step toward full inclusion of African Americans.

The reactions of people, especially people of color, has been a sight to behold. One picture I found (below, courtesy AP) strikes me as an important piece of this day. The picture is of Farrington James, a man without a home, crying as he watched the inauguration from the Lord’s Place homeless shelter in West Palm Beach. For many like Mr. James, this is more than just a change from GWB. It’s the fulfillment of a promise that they hardly dared to believe.

Yes, Mr. James. It really did happen.

As I said in yesterday’s post, the election of Barack Obama isn’t the end of racism. But every once in a while you get a clear sign that we’re getting there. I daresay that Mr. James got that sign today.

¹ By the way, it wasn’t President Obama who messed up the oath. Chief Justice Roberts mixed up some words and Obama stumbled and waited for him to correct himself. Then Roberts made another mistake. ⇧

² By the way, did you catch Anthony McGill, that fine piece of clarinetist? I’d like to get some pointers on proper tonguing technique from him sometime, if you know what I mean! ⇧