Inauguraton is not the place for protest

Protesters are vowing to conduct a series of demonstrations to disrupt the inauguration of Donald Trump on Jan. 20. I wish they would reconsider.

A presidential inauguration does not signify that all Americans are of one accord or that the disagreements of the election campaign is over. It merely means that the United States is transferring executive power from one elected president to the next elected president. Trump opponents will complain that a majority of Americans did not vote for Trump. True enough, but hardly unprecedented. Presidents elected in 2000, 1992, 1960, 1912 and 1876 were all "minority" presidents. What made them president was not the final tally of every single vote but the national consensus that they had achieved the required majority of electoral votes (or in the 1876 election, a majority of the U.S. House's vote).

John F. Kennedy's 1960 inaugural address (considered by many the greatest inaugural address ever) began, "We observe today not a victory of party but a celebration of freedom, symbolizing an end as well as a beginning, signifying renewal as well as change. ..."

Those who seek to disrupt an inauguration are not disrupting the newly elected president, who probably will see nothing of the protesters. They are disrupting the peaceful transfer of power, the "celebration of freedom," the "renewal as well as change" that characterizes American democracy.

So make your plans to oppose Trump appointees, block Trump policy changes, stymie Trump initiatives and prevail in the 2018 and 2020 elections, but let this transfer of executive power take place peacefully and deliberately. This "celebration of freedom" is not the time or the place to object to political change.

A new Obama attitude for a second term

President Obama's second inaugural speech is being hailed as decidedly ideological, perhaps even a signpost toward more liberal policies to come. I watched the speech and thought it was a good but not great speech — blessedly short (unlike too many big speeches) and far-reaching in its scope. It struck me as a more political than a statesman-like speech, one that laid out policy ambitions foremost but also aspired to the great national ideals of this country.

Some have called it a "civil rights speech," and it had that element, with mentions of seminal events in the struggle for the civil rights of women, black Americans, and gays. But it also had allusions to the historic moments of the past, from the Declaration of Independence and the Constitutional Convention to the Civil War. Obama embraced the principles that guided the Founding Fathers and Abraham Lincoln, but he warned that the principles of those great moments must not leave a nation stagnant, mired in the world of the 18th or 19th century. While standing by our historic values and principles, America must address modern issues that would never have occurred to Washington or Lincoln, he suggested.

The speech laid out an itinerary of liberal causes, from gay rights to climate change, but did not forsake negotiation or compromise on these issues. While making clear his objectives, the president did not list any non-negotiable demands. He clearly sees his election victory as an opportunity to be more liberal (let's use the "L-word" and not euphemistic "progressive") in his second term.

As the crowds go home and the inaugural platform is torn down, we will see whether the more assertive Obama can find a way to deal with a divided Congress to achieve his goals and also to fix the runaway national debt and chronic budget deficit.

Changes in attitudes, changes in ... looks

Readers of The Wilson Daily Times' print edition may have noticed some changes recently, and I'm not referring to the absence of veteran staff writers. Tuesday's edition provides a good example: The entire front page was taken up by a national story — admittedly a big, historic national story, but a national story reported by The Associated Press (with no attribution on the front page) nonetheless. The paper delayed publication by more than an hour to get the new president's swearing-in into Tuesday's afternoon edition. Although there was a pretty major local story — the biggest snowfall in Wilson in at least four years — no local news made it to the front page.

That's a 180-degree shift from the principles laid down for years at the newspaper, that local news is the first priority because it is news that no other news provider (Internet, cable or broadcast) had. It was a principle reinforced — actually mandated — by consultants advising the publisher. For the last couple of years that I was running the newsroom, we insisted on an all-local front every day. Even the front-page "teasers" referring to items inside the paper had to refer to local stories.

We caught some grief over this policy in the 2005 London subway bombing as we stuck to our policy of maintaining an all-local front page. On this occasion, if memory serves, we did "tease" the international story at the top of the page.

No doubt, Barack Obama's inauguration is a seismic event, but it's an event that every major news service in the country had flooded the market. For years, this and other good local newspapers have thrived on localizing national/international stories, but it's not necessary to "be there" to get a good story. An example: When UNC basketball coach Dean Smith announced his retirement, my sports editor insisted on being there to cover the story. He wanted to be able to say he was there for the big event. His story was, frankly, not as good as the AP's coverage, and by going to Chapel Hill, he missed the best stories — the local angles about "Mama D.," the Wilson woman who had cooked meals for Smith's teams for most of his tenure, and other Wilson residents who had played for or been close to Smith over the years. Those local angles could have given real life to the entirely predictable praise lavished on Smith in the main story.

Readers of the print version of the local story might also have noticed another change: The newspaper's two-deck nameplate, which was part of the 2003 redesign, has been altered to a colorful one-deck version of The Wilson Daily Times. I found the change amusing, as I had objected to the narrow, two-deck nameplate during the redesign process. My preference for the more customary full-width, one-line nameplate was both a personal preference and a commitment to  the paper's tradition, going back nearly 100 years. But I lost that argument and went forward with the nameplate the publisher and design consultant wanted.

So what's changed now? I don't know.

I am told that a new redesign is being planned that will entail a change in the paper's name to The Wilson Times. I'm also told that the redesign will coincide with a shift to morning delivery sometime this spring. It will be interesting to see how readers react to these changes.

Historic inauguration day boosts pride

It has truly happened. A black man has been inaugurated president of the United States of America, a country where 50 years ago his African father could not have voted, eaten in a restaurant, obtained a decent job or slept in a  motel in many cities of this country. The reality of what this nation has achieved — not just what Barack Obama has achieved (though his achievement is great) — is staggering. Throughout the ceremonies today, as I watched on television, seeing civil rights heroes like Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, the reality of this achievement sunk in.

A throng estimated at up to 2 million packed the National Mall for this ceremony. Some shed tears at the magnitude of the event. Others, including the new president himself, took pride in a nation's accomplishment.

This is a new president, a new administration, a new political era. In an inaugural speech that sometimes sounded like a campaign stump speech and sometimes like a State of the Union address, Obama called on the American people to work together to overcome the troubles that face us. He also expressed confidence in the principles and character of the American people and their ability to overcome difficulties, as they have so many times in the past. He invited other nations to sit down and work together to solve the problems that confront the globe, and he expressed confidence that tribal, ethnic and religious differences of the past would succumb to the common interests of the human race.

The 19-minute speech set the right tone for an administration that promises to emphasize compromise and common interests, not divisiveness, but it lacked the high principled pronouncements of John F. Kennedy's 1961 speech.

The great news of this inauguration, other than its historic nature, might be the active involvement of millions of people from all over the country who came to witness history in the making. It is truly extraordinary that so many people place so much pride and hope in this one man, who, being one man, will ultimately fail to meet all the expectations piled before him. But the smooth transfer of power today, the honoring of political adversaries and what I thought was the most impressive moment of the day — Obama embracing former President Bush as the latter prepared to board a helicopter and leave town — speaks well of this new president's new beginning.

A holiday and an inauguration day

I'm missing the Martin Luther King Jr. breakfast today. For most of the years that the holiday has been celebrated in Wilson, I have worked either as a reporter at the breakfast or back at the newspaper office, putting out the day's edition. A couple of times I attended the breakfast without any work responsibilities, just to be there and see all the folks who attended. The jam-packed Darden Alumni Center always was filled with good will and good conversation among a wide diversity of Wilson residents.

Today's MLK holiday holds special significance in that it comes a day before the inauguration of our nation's first African-American president, creating a two-day celebration of America's civil rights pioneers and this nation's conquest of the racial divide. Speakers at MLK celebrations across the country will remind listeners that racism has not ended and that racial minorities in this great nation still face huge hurdles, and they will be right. But this day cannot pass without acknowledging the significance of Barak Obama's election to the nation's highest office.

Obama has achieved what even King was reluctant to imagine — election of a black man to the most powerful office in America by an electorate dominated by white voters. Obama won many votes because he was black. Large numbers of voters, both black and white, were eager to vote for black president. But many more Americans voted for him because of his policies, his inspiring speeches, his management of his campaign, his personality, his leadership style and what King famously called "the content of his character" — without regard to race.

This is a huge achievement for Obama personally and for America as a nation, an achievement that cannot be taken lightly. Obama's inauguration Tuesday might not signify the beginning of post-racial politics, but it is undoubtedly an opening into that promised land. Much depends on the degree of Obama's success as president. He takes office amid the greatest economic crisis since the 1930s and at a time of serious international threats to U.S. security.

African-Americans across the country, both those who played roles in the civil rights struggles of the 1960s and those too young to remember the 1960s, will celebrate today and tomorrow, and they have every right to do so. But as both George W. Bush and John McCain have pointed out, Obama's success is an inspiration, a validation and a point of pride for all Americans, echoing Obama's own famous words from 2004 that there is not a black America, a white America, a Latino America; there is only the United States of America.