Guardian UK: Magical spell that will open a new American era

Magical spell that will open a new American era

Jonathan Freedland in Washington
The Guardian, Tuesday 20 January 2009


Today a magic spell will be performed. A man who 12 weeks ago was a mere political candidate will be transformed with the incantation of a few words, before a vast crowd and a television audience in the hundreds of millions if not billions, into the head of state, even the embodiment, of the most powerful nation on earth.

It is an act of political alchemy that happens every time a new president is inaugurated, but rarely has the moment been as anticipated as this one. Washington DC, usually a city of strait-laced, sober-suited types has acquired the atmosphere of a child's bedroom in the first hours of Christmas morning. There are snow flurries outside, tacky decorations everywhere - and the resolve to wake up early, so as not to miss a moment of the great day.

The excitement is intense and has been building for days, increasing with each coachload of newcomers that arrives in the city. Women wear woolly hats against the cold, the word OBAMA spelled out in diamante letters. Street-hawkers sell T-shirts bearing Obama's face, alongside ever more grandiose slogans. One shows a beatific president-to-be under the quasi-biblical declaration: "And he shall be called Barack Obama."

The street merchandise, the nightly parties, the rare sighting of Hollywood A-listers among the policy wonks and thinktankers - that happens every four years. But no one would deny the extra fervour this time.

The most obvious explanation is written on the faces of African-Americans who have travelled so far to be here. "This moment won't come again," said Robert Davis, 63, who had travelled from Cincinnati, Ohio. "There may be another black American president, but this will always be the first time." .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/20/barack-obama-inauguration