Obaminaugurationomania - by Philip

Say what you like about Obama, but his name makes for some great wordplay. "Obamania." "Baracknophobia." "Hussein’t" you glad we have a new president? In a few years, someone will make a moderate amount of money selling a calendar with all of the punny headlines made from variations on our 44th president’s name.

Here are my musings on today’s inaugural festivities:

I have to start with Obama’s oath of office. Was it just nerves that caused the young Chief Justice Roberts to get the words wrong twice, or is it part of some vast right-wing conspiracy? You be the judge, because clearly Roberts isn’t very good at it.

Does it strike anyone else as odd that 2 of the 3 longest speeches were the opening and closing prayers? Rick Warren went so long that Obama actually looked up to see what the hell he was doing. Sorry, I mean what the “heck” he was doing. Warren even paused several times for applause – during a prayer. And the invocation unpredictably concluded with a long stream of rhyming jokes, just the way St. Paul closed all of his epistles to the Corinthians. I actually thought it was kind of cute, but I’m trying to stay in my curmudgeonly character here. Harumph.

What was with that enormous bow that Aretha Franklin was wearing on her head? She looked like a giant monochrome Christmas present.

Drinking game words: “sacrifice,” “44th,” and “ancestors.” If you had any of those words, you’re probably drunk right now.

How many thinly-veiled insults did Obama fire at Bush during his speech? “We will restore science to its rightful place.” “Our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions -- that time has surely passed.” “Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.” It can’t have been easy for President Bush to sit onstage with all that unfriendly rhetoric being hurled his way. Sure, he deserved all of it and more, but I’m just sayin’.

If you search for the transcript of Obama’s inauguration speech, several of the top results are escort service advertisements (mouse over several of the linked words on that page) and the #1 result at the moment is pinoylottowinner.com, proving once again that porn and gambling are always at the vanguard of technology.

Perhaps the most fun moment of the inauguration for me happened right after the speech when the first commentator said, "Well, it was a good speech, but it certainly wasn't a great speech." I whipped my head around to confirm that, yes, I had accidentally been watching the inauguration on Fox. I switched to MSNBC where a woman was gushing that this was the greatest inaugural speech of her lifetime – maybe ever. At least some things never change.