Green Tech Girl

The presidential inauguration was portrayed on the news around the world with much fanfare. Behind the scenes was a different story, sadly. As I mentioned in my post-inauguration update to my article on the inaugural environmental nightmare, almost 1,000 people ended up in medical tents at the event, mostly for hypothermia. Luckily, no-one died.

Now, controversy brews as thousands of ticket holders, many of whom campaigned tirelessly for Obama, tell harrowing tales of standing in lines for hours in the frigid air, only to miss the inauguration. Some were stuffed into the 3rd street tunnel, where it was reported on an online petition that “older people were fainting and people were urinating in the tunnel.”

Here are a few other comments from the petition:

From San Francisco, Purple Ticket, arrived 6:45 at 1st & D intersection. I hope that the District of Columbia will view these events as a Katrina Moment: a wake-up call for emergency response. Virtually all the resources were concentrated within the secure perimeter of the mall and the parade route, with absolutely no communication for the dangerously overcrowded throngs of ticket-holders outside, obediently waiting to gain admittance. There was absolutely no police presence, authority, or signage to direct the huge flow of pedestrian traffic that should have been well anticipated. I can’t help but wonder what would have happened had there been a calamity. We were all assured that Homeland Security had planned for any eventuality, but it is hard to believe they gave any thought to either the safety or the experience of the crowds outside the gates.

…

This was not only a very disappointing and uncomfortable experience, but an extremely dangerous one as well. We were very fortunate that no one was injured in the crush of the crowd. Please do not take this lightly and treat this as an inconvenience to the few who didn’t get in. It was a disaster that was narrowly avoided, mostly from luck and the good nature of the crowd and not from the actions of the authorities.

…

I worked for Obama during the primary and general elections and was truly excited to attend his election. After being at the 3rd and D intersection for a long time, we were directed by passing policemen to the 2nd street tunnel. We did not make it far out of the tunnel before we hit 11 am and realized we were not going to get in. My partner and I, both purple ticket holders, were confused, disappointed, and frustrated. Even, I am chagrined to say, reduced to tears by the ineptitude of the DC and Capitol cops, the Secret Service, and the non-existent inauguration officials. Any or all of these officials should feel ashamed of their lack of competence or willingness to regulate and solve the apparent problems of this situation. I celebrated Obama rising to the presidency that day, but I realized he’s going to have a long road ahead just to get these different officials heads out of their collective asses. And to reiterate one person’s comments I felt the worse for people who had traveled thousands of miles and spent loads of money to see this historic event. What do they do now? This is truly shameful.

Now Senator Dianne Feinstein is calling for hearings to look into this mess, as thousands of disgruntled Obama supporters commiserate online on Facebook and other venues.

What’s missing here, unfortunately, is someone stepping back and taking a simple look at the big picture. Didn’t anybody in Washington anticipate this? Because I did. I called it in my pre-inaugural blog when I wrote: Never mind the potential for chaos in such an environment. A million people, stuck in the frigid cold, with porta-potties as their bathrooms, and no place to take shelter?

It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that we had a case here of someone’s eyes being too big for their stomach. This event should have never been made so large to begin with!

I’d had conversations with friends before the event discussing how Washington, DC was the last place we’d want to be on January 20, because it was sure to be a nightmare. We are all extremely lucky nothing worse happened.

It’s not surprising that the heartbroken Obama supporters are loathe to blame him and his administration for the inaugural problems, and are blaming the police instead. However, I think this is pointing the finger in the wrong direction. It was wrong to put the police in that position in the first place. Someone at the top – and guess where the buck stops now? – should have said, “Hey, people, let’s scale this back a little bit.”

This is where I fault Obama for his ego. A more modest president would have never allowed such extravangance in the first place, history or no. Would John McCain have encouraged people to party like it’s 1999 in a recession, risking people’s lives to honor him in a massive state rally the likes of which is usually reserved for despots? History or no, our new president, who promises change and has told us it’s time to tighten our belts, needs to practice what he preaches.

So now we’ve blown a half a billion pounds of CO2 into the air in order to transport thousands of people to DC just so they could miss the inaguration. They had to pee on the ground in certain places due to lack of toilet facilities, and many suffered physical and emotional damage as a result.

Leadership, true leadership, on the part of Obama would have been to frame this entire event differently. No, he didn’t plan the event and I’m sure it was his handlers who created the whole hoopla in the first place. But as the man at the top, he needs to have the vision and humility to say, “let’s do things a little differently.”

Imagine what could have been – he could have told people to stay home, alleviate the burden on the environment, and watch the inauguration at home with family and friends. Imagine if he had said, “instead of having an expensive inaugural ball, I’m going to take this time to volunteer in a local homeless shelter.”

Obama talks a big game about service, putting out PSAs to get people to sign up for his USAservice.org website, which I really think is a front for creating a database to promote his reelection. (Otherwise why do you need to get people’s contact info right off the front page?)

I feel he could have shown us some true change with how he celebrated his inauguration. Instead, many are now calling it the Inaugural Katrina. Let’s hope a lesson has been learned here, and whoever gets sworn in four years from now does it differently.

Tags: Obama