Hilzoy had a great post last night about the changes she’s seen just in the past decade and why the climate is different now than it was in the 1980s and 1990s:

Race Since the 80s

Fantastic post.  Thank you.

I’m gushy right now watching all of this and hearing the words “President Obama” over and over on TV.

By the way… we got our website back at precisely 12:00PM today.  It was always “our” website, though it didn’t feel like it until an hour and a half ago.

What is our website?

Why it is http://www.whitehouse.gov of course.

Completely indexed and laid out out in full, and the switch took place at PRECISELY 12PM Eastern Time, before Obama had even taken the oath (he was already President when he took it, because the transfer of power occurs at noon, oath or not).

Huh, it’s almost like the candidate won or something.

No kidding.  Some just can’t seem to let go for even one second.

Oh well, so it goes.

BTW, Dana… President Obama.  Yeah, President Obama.

Did I mention… President Obama.

Because that’s what he’s called now.  More specifically, if you are ever in his presence, you should call him “Mr. President”, because that’s what we do.

I did appreciate hearing 2 MILLION PEOPLE singing “Nah Nah Nah Nah, Nah Nah Nah Nah, Hey Hey Hey, Goodbye!” in unison for the first time ever in any Presidential Inauguration in my lifetime.

You know you suck ass when you are such a lousy president that decades of protocol gets thrown out the door because the people just want to remind you of how bad you suck as you walk out the door.

I’ve been thinking really hard for some absolutely devastating trollish comment. Can’t do it.
I simply and truly wish you all here congratulations for your victory, and hope that the satisfaction you feel on this historic day will continue, and that you will work as hard as you blog to support President Obama and his administration.

FUCK.

Ted Kennedy just got rushed out of the Inaugural Luncheon on a stretcher, because he went into a seizure.

This sucks ass.

DOUBLE FUCK.

Senator Robert Byrd AND Senator Ted Kennedy BOTH collapsed in the middle of the Inaugural Luncheon, and both are being treated right now.

This blows.

Man, it really seems like we’re always behind the eight ball.

Yeah.

I’m in tears right now, because I cannot possibly be mad at either one of these fellows for something totally out of their hands, but the selfish part of me hates seeing this happen on such a huge day for our party.

It’s like having the best outdoor birthday party in the world when you’re a kid, and right when you think it can’t be any better, it starts pouring hail.

I hope both of the Senators pull through OK.  I know neither has much time left, but I really don’t want to see them go just yet.

More specifically, if you are ever in his presence, you should call him “Mr. President”, because that’s what we do.

Though I would like to remind the Outrage Police ahead of time (not meaning you) that calling him “Mr. Obama” is just as correct and just as respectful.  We don’t have royal titles, what with this being America and all, so it’s totally permissible to just use “Mr.”

That was just lovely.  Thank you.  One of the many reasons to feel good about today.

Though I would like to remind the Outrage Police ahead of time (not meaning you) that calling him “Mr. Obama” is just as correct and just as respectful.  We don’t have royal titles, what with this being America and all, so it’s totally permissible to just use “Mr.”

True enough, I see your point.  And while we don’t have formal enforceable titles, there is some sense of protocol in which the customary titles are always honored, even towards presidents we dislike.

I often heard folks like Olbermann refer to Bush as “Mr. Bush”, and I never had an issue with it, but I’ve noticed that nobody referred to him that way in his direct presence.  None of the WH press folks ever called him “Mr. Bush” - always “Mr. President”.  Same for every POTUS before him.

I don’t think there’s any reason why people couldn’t refer to them as “Mr. (last name)”, but for whatever reason, those who go in their presence just never seem to do that.  I’ve never heard anyone refer to Bush as “Mr. Bush” when addressing him face to face.

Though they may throw shoes at you if you suck bad enough.

Mnemosyne,
I wanted to note that though we don’t have heritable titles, elected officials do have proper titles that should be used while addressing them, if you care to be proper. For example: Mr. or Mad. Justice, or for the Gov. of Virginia, your Excellency, or for a President: Mr or Mrs. President. Protocol requires titles be used in various places and spaces, and writers when addressing the office use them as well. During my time writing about Bush I very often referred to him as President Bush, or Mr. President. Referring to the office is classy in my book, but hey we have that amendment that says we can call them what we want…

Ted Kennedy just got rushed out of the Inaugural Luncheon on a stretcher, because he went into a seizure. This sucks ass.

Given his career, I’d say inaugurating a black president represents a triumphal note. At age 76, it does give a certain grace to his life.

I often heard folks like Olbermann refer to Bush as “Mr. Bush”, and I never had an issue with it, but I’ve noticed that nobody referred to him that way in his direct presence.

There is a difference between what’s proper when addressing the president either directly or in correspondence, and how you can refer to him when writing or speaking about him.

I’m just remembering all of the faux outrage when Olbermann referred to “Mr. Bush” when it’s perfectly proper for him to do so.  It’s also perfectly proper to refer to “Mr. Obama” when speaking about him, not to him.

Funny story from Miss Manners, who used to work at the White House.  She remembers going to a state dinner where some of the guests kept grabbing President Kennedy by the hand and calling him “Jack.”  In contrast, the Attorney General (“who as a sideline happened to be the President’s brother”) greeted him by saying, “Good evening, Mr. President.”

Personally, I don’t have much of a care about these Miss Manners-esque, “what is the proper way to refer to the man who’s currently president?” stuff. It’s the role of reporters and other people dealing with the public to worry about whether they’ve addressed him as “Mr. President” or not. Unless, of course, I want to rub it in the face of some right-wingers who’s still having trouble accepting reality.

Bush, I might note, was a big stickler for insisting that everyone, including longtime friends, call him “Mr. President.”

RIP Racism in America
7/4/1776 - 1/20/09.

<a >Here are some thumbtack observations</a> on President Martin Luther King, ex-VP Henry Potter, Chief Justice Yoda and more.

I really wasn’t completely flippant. It means a lot to me, too.

RIP Racism in America
7/4/1776 - 1/20/09.

Ummm… no.

I think more accurate would be something like:

01/20/09: giant leap for racial progress in America

What happened today most certainly can be seen as an epic win AGAINST racism, but it isn’t the end all, be all.  Not by a long shot.

We’ll “be there” when we have some semblance of equal representation of all races throughout every influential sphere of society.

That doesn’t necessarily mean 50 black Senators, 50 white Senators.

More like 13 African-American senators, 18 Hispanic senators, 4 Asian-American senators, 2 or 3 senators of other non-white descent.  Oh, and 51 female senators (though that isn’t about racism but rather patriarchal misogyny).  And 9 or 10 LGBT senators.

And that’s all just based on current demographic date.  The numbers will be lower for straight, white males after the 2010 census.

And it isn’t just U.S. Senators, either, though that’s an easy one to dissect.

Point being… there is only one black U.S. Senator today, and only 17 female U.S. Senators today.  And that ain’t true equality.  By a longshot.

We’ll be a lot closer to the point of “racism is dead” when the power in this nation is evenly distributed in both public and private spheres proportionally to the various non-white straight male demographics.

Speaking of building on what others have done, there was an amazing moment in the address today, when President Obama said:

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed — why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent Mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

and whoever was producing the telecast cut to Congressman John Lewis.

So, let me get this straight—for two consecutive years at your predominantly white high school, the top scholarship winners were black. And in your junior year, the black winner was greeted with “near-deafening applause”—by the predominantly white student body. That’s by your own testimony. And let’s assume that by “predominantly white” you mean 80%, while the rest were black. That would suggest a black student would be the top scholarship earner only once every five years. So two consecutive years would be an odds-defying feat.

And yet somehow, “structural obstacles exist”... although you do concede that they are not “insurmountable.” I guess that’s some nod to reality.

That would suggest a black student would be the top scholarship earner only once every five years. So two consecutive years would be an odds-defying feat.

You really don’t understand statistics, do you?

He also doesn’t understand that those black students had to work twice as hard to achieve what was often given to those who are legacies, whose parents belong to exclusive organizations, etc.

“They call me President Obama.”

You lucked out with your first black president, do you know?

You just have to imagine how the establishment, like say the Washington Post imagined the first black president: Harold Ford Jr.

>>He also doesn’t understand that those black students had to work twice as hard to achieve what was often given to those who are legacies, whose parents belong to exclusive organizations, etc.

Nice. Way to further prove my point. Let’s accept your thesis that whites have an advantage in winning scholarships. In a school with an 80/20 white/black population, you might see whites winning the top scholarship position 90% of the time, instead of 80%, in proportion with their percent of the population.

In that case, a black student should win the top position once a decade. So the fact that a black student won two years in a row is even *more* unlikely under your scenario, further undermining Jesse Taylor’s contention that “structural obstacles exist.”

Jesse’s black?

I seriously didn’t know, but I guess I’m just dumb. Maybe the occasional pic of yourself, Jesse, wouldn’t be out of place in a thread or two. Unless you have reasons not to, I guess.

Ms Kate -you are way off on this one. I certainly dont deny white privilege exists and is unfortunate.  That being said, one place where it is clearly to your detriment to be white is in the college admission/scholarship process.  Colleges, community organizations, foundations, corporations, Universities, etc throw money at merely above average (not superstar) black kids. A similarly above average white kid wouldn’t get a second look.  I went through this whole process about 10 years ago at a very competitive high school with a fairly sizable black middle/upper class population who performed very well academically. The disparity in scholarship money and prestigious university acceptances between white and black kids of equal merit was massive.

We don’t have royal titles, what with this being America and all, so it’s totally permissible to just use “Mr.”

Granted, but President isn’t a royal title any more than Professor is: it’s an honorific.

IP MASKER: KILLSCRIPT

IP MASKER: KILLSCRIPT

>>Randomizer, my disertation [sic] involved some heavy duty statistics. 

Really, Miss Kate? Where? This is what you said:

>>He also doesn’t understand that those black students had to work twice as hard to achieve what was often given to those who are legacies, whose parents belong to exclusive organizations, etc.

As for the rest of your argument, I won’t be intimidated by your knowledge of stats from making obvious observations akin to “when you toss a coin, 50% of the time it will come up heads.” And I don’t need to run a Durbin-Watson test for serial correlation to figure that out, so put away your random likelihood functions and parametric assumptions.