Thanks HBO

Did you see the Inaugural Concert on tv today? It was great. HBO broadcast it free to everyone, not just subscribers like us. As Barack and Michelle Obama walked down the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to take their seats for the concert, huge feelings of relief washed over me. We are back from the brink. We are back to civilization.

When you combine the Obamas plus Bruce Springsteen


plus a choir


plus the Lincoln Memorial


you have tears spurting out of my eyes. Sorry.

James Taylor: "Shower the people you love with love"


"things are going to turn out better if you only will."


Bono, an "Irish boy from the north side of Dublin," sang "In the Name of Love."


"I get that."


There was also Denzel Washington, Laura Linney, Tom Hanks, Stevie Wonder, Mary J. Blige, Queen Latifah, Pete Seeger, John Cougar Mellencamp, and more.

Beautiful Beyonce sang "America the Beautiful."




Addendum: After the concert was over, I and other people were thinking, "Where was Bishop Gene Robinson?" It had been widely publicized that the openly gay bishop from New Hampshire was to begin the event with a prayer. It turns out that the Presidential Inauguration Committee decided not to include the prayer in the HBO broadcast. Grrrrrr.

Someone videotaped the Bishop delivering his prayer at the concert, and it is now on YouTube. I have been asked to read Gene Robinson's prayer next Sunday in church. You can see him deliver his eloquent prayer here: