Two months short of Inauguration Day, the excitement of a grand national convergence on the Capitol is already palpable. Officials are predicting that the largest inaugural crowd in history — as many as four million — will spill down the National Mall. Many may camp overnight to get a good spot by the forest of JumboTron screens affording most visitors the best sight of President-elect Barack Obama’s swearing-in, a speck of an event far off at the west front of the Capitol.
The celebration for the first African-American president could not be more exquisitely timed. It occurs during the 200th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth, on the day after the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, with the theme of the “new birth of freedom” foreseen by Lincoln at Gettysburg. The Capitol’s new $600 million visitors’ center already is abuzz with talk of the Obama era.
Stores are crammed with Obama paraphernalia (John McCain campaign shirts are half-price). Hotels are booked solid, though there’s a $51,000 suite offered at the Mayflower Hotel as a three-night special. Inaugural balls are selling out from here to Hawaii, Mr. Obama’s birth state.
The 240,000 tickets offered free to the public for the close-in, cordoned witness area are under lock and key to foil counterfeiters and scalpers, although some con artists already presume to offer a ticket for $4,000-plus on the Internet. This was embarrassing enough that eBay is refusing to carry the offers, and a bill has been hurriedly introduced to outlaw ticket scalping at presidential inaugurals. Some lawmakers, fearing the wrath of constituents, are planning lotteries for the 200 to 400 tickets that each has been apportioned.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/21/opinion/21fri4.html?th&emc=th
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