Please note that any vagueness in this account is done to protect the identity of patient and medics as required by HIPPA regulations.

I often look at the crisis management side of major events given that for several years I was a volunteer in an ambulance corps, and my 26-year-old daughter is a full-time paid paramedic.

The Inauguration of our 44th President Barack Obama was incredible for its lack of crisis.  

More than one million people standing shoulder to shoulder for hours upon hours in the cold to witness the historic inauguration.  

Thousands upon thousands of people never even made it on to the Mall.  Yet, there were no demonstrations, no major medical emergencies, and no necessity of emergency fire and police aid.  In spite of the thousands of people waiting to witness, this event, who didn’t get inside, things were calm and peaceful.   No need for fire hoses to quell the angry spirits of Limbaugh fans and other hate groups clamoring immediately on TV and the Internet for the failure of Obama’s presidency.

Yes, after the inauguration, Senator Ted Kennedy had a seizure due, according to his doctors, to his brain cancer and exhaustion.  He was speedily transported to the hospital, and we all wish him well.  My son, his wife and many of my friends from all over the country the country were on the Mall as witnesses to this historic event.  I was even lucky enough to celebrate at Nectar’s [photos to come later].  

While we witnessed and cherished the day, my paramedic daughter was on roaming ambulance sent from location to location on a 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. shift.  I rang her late last night just after her shift ended to share our feelings about the day. Had she and her ambulance partner had any opportunity to see or hear any portion of the inauguration?  Yes, they were watching Vice President Biden being sworn in on a big screen TV in Circuit City where they had stopped for a pit stop, when they were called out for an emergency.  

She said they went lights and sirens to rescue a middle-aged woman allegedly having a stroke.  When they arrived the woman was lying on the floor and incredibly disorientated.  She could not get her breath, was unable to speak, and seemed not to know what day it was.  Her young daughter was standing in a corner crying, terrified by what was happening to Mommy, and a neighbor friend was standing by.

While my daughter began to assess and treat the woman, the other paramedic made sure the daughter was OK to leave with the neigbor.  A possible stroke in middle-aged woman is clearly an unusual event, so the two paramedics moved as quickly as possible to get the woman to a hospital, as she was so unresponsive and incoherent.  

As they rushed lights and sirens to a large stroke center emergency room, my daughter tried repeatedly to calm her patient, asking her once again if she knew where she was, finally getting a response of “yes, in the ambulance”.  

“Do you know what month this is,” the paramedic asked.  The patient answered affirmatively that it is January.  

“And, do you know what day it is,” the medic prodded.

“Yes,” the woman wept, “today is a horrible day because the wrong man is being sworn in as our President.”

Old fears and hatred die hard.  

(Cross-posted on Broadsides.org and CounterPunch.org)

Oh America, you celebrate better than most. But why must you always celebrate with your blinders on? Why must you celebrate the end to the “race wars” with a nasty kick at the queers? Why must you speak of toil while keeping the toilers at bay?

I’m confused, America. I want to attend your parties but I smell of horseshit and I wouldn’t be allowed in. Besides, I can’t stop thinking about the servers at your parties. How do they feel about your $200 million inauguration? Would you like my dignity with that?, they ask.

I want you to think about class. I want you to wonder why it takes a billion dollars to win the presidency. I want you to wonder why Steven Spielberg and not Cindy Sheehan gets a seat at your party.

I want to believe. I want to say, “Yes, we can.”

I want to cry with you, America, when you feel like you’ve reached the top step. But I see many, many more steps to come. And so I cry for the 40 million of us with no health insurance. Or for the 3 million of us who lost our jobs recently. Or for the soldiers like Vermont’s own, Thomas Hermann, who ran for Congress – unsuccessfully – to really (truly) stop the war but found out last week that he’s being called back to serve yet another tour in Iraq under Obama’s army.

I want to believe, America. I’d like to celebrate. I’d like to wear the proud smile of those who pretend they’ve crossed the finish line of democracy but I can’t be fooled. For it is only the finish line of privilege that they’ve crossed. They have won, for sure. But we have lost. For we have no insurance. We have no jobs. We have no economic equality. And we have no tickets to the glittering inaugural balls.

America, I want you to listen to all of Martin Luther King’s speeches. He was making demands. He was righteously angry. He was right.

Listen to his words: “We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.”

And if “amen” can be said to anyone or anything, it is not to the Rick Warrens and his homophobic rants in the name of the Jesus in his mind, it is to the words of the people who have truly risked something, fought for something, and denied themselves something so that those with nothing had a seat at the table of basic human dignity.

This is no time to celebrate, America. This is a time to push forward with all our might. And to reject false prophets. And to demand what is truly ours: Dignity. Truth. And Happiness. For all, not just those who can afford it or a seat next to it.

Oh yes, I have a dream, too, America. And it’s all about a victory in our next, glorious war: The War on Class.

Ready. Aim. Organize.

The following letter appeared in today’s Rutland Herald and warrants discussion.  I am a huge fan of the iPhone, but it’s important we don’t lose track of what’s below the surface here.  Kudos to Ralph Montefusco for submitting a letter.

Workers may get a break

RALPH J. MONTEFUSCO

(Communications Workers of America)

Burlington

( – promoted by odum)

Here is a follow up or a continuation and it is still outrageous.. . ….. Labor Commissioner Patricia Moulton Powden’s “think of it as a radio contest ” quip was mentioned in a diary five days back and ridiculed editorially by the Times Argus .It seemed an off the cuff remark that certainly wasn’t official operating procedure and perhaps was regretted as insensitive by the person that made it .Wrong,in the Free Press the VT. Labor Dept. not only repeats its advice but offers it as one of seven helpful tips on how to initiate a claim .Perhaps the un-employed should donate to the Governor’s Inauguration Ball to be heard rather than dial multiple times “just like a radio contest “.

For those who are newly unemployed and need to initiate a claim:

• Call the Initial Claims line at 1-877-214-3330.

• Try multiple times an hour versus once every few hours. Think of it like a radio contest and call multiple times. Hitting the “redial” button on your phone increases your chances of connecting as soon as a line becomes free

http://www.burlingtonfreepress…

Hello all:

It is the dawn, at long last, of a new age.  For the first time in probably forty years years I actually cheered about an American president.  It was amazing to watch so many millions coming to be part of the first Afro-American to become president.  I almost choked up with emotion when Obama spoke about how it is “not a matter of how big or small government is, but how it works.”  That was a beautiful slap at the Bushies.  

In Vermont, it is not working well.  Douglas is cutting back all he can, including Catamount Health Care and perhaps others as well.  While it has some galling rules and regulations, and it is quite expensive, it is still something.  People, like me, already teetering on the edge of no insurance, are petrified that they will lose it completely under “Governor Scissorhands,” cutting it to shreds.  It is about time to stand up and let them know that affordable health care is a human right and not a commodity solely for profit. It is more than time for a single-payer system.  

To help try to cure our sick health care system and bring about a single-payer system, I have joined the Vermont worker’s center on their Health Care is a “Human Right campaign.”  I wanted to ask how to post an announcement up on here about several upcoming events dealing with this issue on here.  Am sure that many here would be into it.  

Here’s the general run of the announcement: Public Forum at the old Labor Hall in Barre, on 29 January at 7:30 pm (refreshments, kid friendly, etc)to discuss the problems of our health care system.  There will be a number of speakers (I am one of them) testifying about their ordeal before a panel of various community leaders.  There will be a question and answer time afterward.  It could be quite lively:) This is also a prelude to help build support for a rally on May 1st at the statehouse for affordable, single-payer health care.  As someone that has been through our inhuman health care system, it is long past its time.  For more information about these two events please go to the Vermont Worker’s center website at www.workerscenter.org or call (802) 316-7827.

[Actually not by Jack anymore, although he did me the great favor of posting the first draft for me. — NanuqFC]

Thanks to tickets provided by the Inaugural Committee by virtue of my having been a member of the Electoral College for Vermont, I was 100 yards from the podium in front of the Capitol.

From the nearest-to-DC Arlington stop on the Metro (we left at 6 a.m.), it took us 3.5 hours to get to our seats, then another two hours to wait for the festivities to begin (temperature: 19 degrees). It was crowded, Metro stations closed as trains emptied near the Capitol, then re-opened. Some people with tickets who had started earlier than we did ended up not getting in to the ticketed area (capacity: 240,000 people, sitting and standing).

It was a genial and sometimes joyful crowd. Streets from Metro stations were wall-to-wall people of all colors and from all states, all heading in the same direction.

As Inauguration time neared, on the Jumbotron screen ahead and to our right, the soon-to-be-President was shown walking down a hallway in the Capitol building, looking perhaps a bit daunted by the tasks ahead, by the gift and burden of a people’s belief in his abilities to bring about what he has promised: change. Not afraid, not at all, but serious and in full recognition of how difficult it will be and of all the hopes and tears riding on his shoulders.

Occasional chants of “O-bama! O-bama! O-bama!” and “Yes. We. Can!” filtered forward from the mass of millions occupying the National Mall toward the steps of the Capitol. We turned around and saw a sea of red, white and blue as they all waved their flags. The Reflecting Pool was frozen solid enough for handfuls of people to venture out on it.

More details on the flip.

Aretha Franklin put soul into “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.” YoYo Ma and Itszak Perlman plus others despite the cold made John Williams arrangement of “Simple Gifts” sound special.

When Rick Warren began giving the “invocation,” my spouse and I stood up, turned our backs, and I raised my rainbow scarf in silent, non-disruptive protest of the man’s publicly expressed bigoted beliefs about marriage equality. There was not much reaction from the people around us. A 30-something woman sitting arm-in arm with a man about the same age smiled and nodded at us. An older black man with a long-lensed camera in the row right behind us said, “Protest all you want, but could you move a little that way so I can get this shot?”

Warren’s words were fairly predictable and not especially offensive, unless you were not a Christian — he made no space for anyone of any other religion to be part of his invocation, ending with what some Christians call the “Our Father” and others call “The Lord’s Prayer.”

Cheers greeted former Vice President Al Gore and former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. The grassroots rabble on the Mall actually booed when soon-to-be-former Vice President Dick Cheney was wheeled onto the Capitol balcony in a wheel chair, and when George W. Bush finally showed up. Most people in our section did not boo and were willing to give at least the office its due and stood when the departing President was announced.

It was amazing to hear Barack Obama take the Oath. And in his inauguration speech he clearly repudiated the past 8 years of fear and fascism. It was being a witness, being part of the crowd, breathing the air, sharing the joy, smiling at strangers in hours-long lines, and having them smile back. Confessing to other first-time DC visitors and local residents alike that I had cried at my first close-up sight of the Capitol the day before. Best button: “I Was There! Barack Obama’s Inauguration” and variations on that theme.

One of my temporary flat-mates reported that the folks on the National Mall also booed Joe Lieberman (tough crowd!). Before she got out of the National Mall, the helicopter carrying FORMER President George Bush flew low overhead. The crowd sang to the departing W: “Na na nah na, Na na nah na, Hey, he-ey, goo-oodbye!”

It took 2 hours to get from our seats back to Arlington, and we were so cold, having stood and sat in the cold for 8-plus hours, that all we wanted was warmth, a bathroom, and some food, in that order. We watched the parade on TV.

Best close-up celebrity sighting: in the security line for over an hour a few people ahead of us stood actress Alfre Woodard. I went over to say how much I appreciated her work as a fan from Vermont. She asked where, and I gave the answer I give to anyone I assume hasn’t a clue about the state: “Up near the Canadian border.” “But where?” she asked again. “East of St. Albans, if you know where that is,” I said. “I know St. Albans,” she said. We wished each other the joy of the day and resumed our places in the slow ooze of the crowd toward the security gates. Also present (by report) in our section of seats: Actors Jamie Foxx and Haille Berry.

It was a most amazing day, and I am glad and proud to have been a part of it.

NanuqFC

The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood. – MLK, Jr.

Bonus celebrity sighting: Waiting to meet a friend outside Union Station on Wednesday afternoon, I saw Jesse Jackson headed into the station followed by a red cap pushing a luggage trolley.