New Presidential Limo to Debut at Inauguration

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President-elect Barack Obama is getting a new ride to go with his new address on Jan. 20.

General Motors Corp. recently delivered to the U.S. Secret Service a brand new presidential limousine, replacing the 2006 model Cadillac DTS presidential limousine that President George W. Bush has used.

The new limousine, dubbed the 2009 Cadillac Presidential Limousine, makes its debut on Inauguration Day. It's the first presidential limousine not to carry a specific model name, said GM spokesman David Caldwell. - Detroit News

A Free Room for the Inauguration

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Yes, there's a catch, and no, you probably can't apply.

If you receive catalogues and junk mail from travel sites, or some high-end retailers, you've seen the offers. The biggest suites, complete with food, drink and amenities. This deal was offered by the JW Marriot in downtown DC on the parade route:

January 18, 19, and 20: 300 rooms, 4 suites, $200,000 of food and drink, and an incredible view of the parade. Attendees will watch from a heated tent on the Marriott roof. Price tag: $1,000,000. The person who bought added to the package a prayer breakfast and luncheon on the 19th (to celebrate Martin Luther King's birthday) and two balls (one adult, one youth) on the 20th. He will also be providing gowns, tuxedos and hairstylists for the Balls.

What's he charging the attendees? Nothing.

Earl Stafford of Fairfax County decided to make this "The People's Inaugural". While he owns a military-related company in Centerville, he is funding this through his foundation.

He said:

"We wanted to . . . bless those who otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to be a part of the great celebration, the inauguration and the festivities," he said in an interview yesterday. "Our objective is to bring in a cross-section of society -- those who are distressed, those who are terminally ill, those who are socially and economically disadvantaged, those veterans who are wounded and served our country."

Entire National Mall will be open to the public on Inauguration Day

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From an e-mail:

As the Executive Director of the Presidential Inaugural Committee, I can tell you that we're already hard at work making sure this Inauguration will be the most open and accessible in history in keeping with President-elect Obama's and Vice President-elect Biden's commitment to change business as usual in Washington.

And because you took the time to sign up for updates on our website, I wanted you to be among the first to hear about an announcement we made just a couple of hours ago.

For the first time in history, the entire length of the National Mall -- from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial -- will be open to the public on Inauguration Day. We believe that as many Americans as possible should be able to come together in celebration of our common values, shared aspirations, and the hope and optimism that brought us to this moment of change.

This will be an Inauguration for all Americans. And in the weeks to come, we'll announce further information about events that allow for Americans just like you -- in Washington, DC and across the country -- to participate like never before.

Thank you,

Emmett

Emmett Beliveau
Executive Director
Presidential Inaugural Committee 2009

You can read more from the Presidential Inauguration Committee and sign up for their e-mail list on their website.

Are All Inaugural Balls Created Equal?

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There seems to be some confusion among which events are considered to be "official" inaugural balls and which are just regular balls. But one thing is for sure, there will be a lot of them.

What denotes an official ball from an unofficial one is if it is sanctioned by the Presidential Inauguration Committee (PIC), and if so that means that the President will make an appearance at the ball.

Some state societies are planning balls already, but these are not official balls.

Memory is a bit cloudy for most of us who have done this sort of thing before, because the last Democratic inauguration was 12 years ago.

What are the balls like? Well, they can vary greatly. In 1997 I only attended the California Ball, which had entertainment by the Doobie Brothers and served boxed lunches. It wasn't great. But I was told that the Arkansas-Tennessee Ball with Hootie and the Blowfish (they were big back then) hosted at Union Station was a lot of fun, as was the MTV youth ball. MTV will be hosting a ball again in 2009 as reported on DCW last week. For a bit of insight on some of the balls from 1997, you can read the Washington Post's summary here.

So what's the best ball to attend? Well, only you can answer that. Many unofficial balls will still be a hot ticket and just as fun (or more?) than some official balls. My recommendation is to go to a) go to a ball that has a connection to where you are from, b) or to a ball where you'll know the most people or c) any ball that you can manage to get a ticket to get into.

As of this writing, the PIC hasn't announced any of its official balls just yet.

You can get a list of all of the Inauguration Week balls and events from our DemConWatch Inauguration Calendar.

DC Council OK's Inauguration Week becoming Spring BreaK

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Seeing that the Inauguration will be a week of parties unlike any other time, the DC Council has approved a measure to temporarily lift the "last call" at area bars. The thinking is that local business can further increase sales during the week's festivities by allowing people to drink well into the early morning hour of 5:00 a.m.

So if you don't have a hotel yet, no worries - you can just keep partying until the next day!

What's So Funny About Peace, Love and Inaugural Balls?

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Elvis Costello to Headline The Creative Coalition's Inaugural Ball

WASHINGTON, DC (December 1, 2008) – The Creative Coalition announced today that Elvis Costello will be the featured musical guest at their Inaugural Ball on Tuesday evening, January 20, 2009 to commemorate the Presidential inauguration. The Ball is a benefit gala for The Creative Coalition (the nonprofit, nonpartisan, 501(c)(3) advocacy arm of the arts and entertainment communities). Confirmed hosts in attendance include Members of Congress, leaders from the entertainment industry, business, policy and media.

Click on www.thecreativecoalition.org for sponsorship or ticket information.

WHAT: The Creative Coalition's 2009 Inaugural Ball with a special performance by Elvis Costello

WHO: Confirmed hosts in attendance include: Co-Presidents of The Creative Coalition Tim Daly and Tony Goldwyn, Anne Hathaway, Spike Lee, Tim Robbins, Kerry Washington, Susan Sarandon, Jane Krakowski, Alfre Woodard, Barry Levinson, Dana Delany, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Peter Sarsgaard, Wendie Malick, Josh Lucas, Matthew Modine, Rachael Leigh Cook, Alan Cumming, Connie Britton, Richard Schiff, Ellen Burstyn, Giancarlo Esposito, Gloria Reuben, Lynn Whitfield, Tamara Tunie, Tom Fontana, Sue Kramer, Kim Raver, Maura Tierney and more.

Congressional Hosts include: Senator Max Baucus, Senator Richard Burr, Senator Benjamin Cardin, Senator Robert Casey, Jr., Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Senator Chuck Grassley, Senator Frank Lautenberg, Senator Patrick Leahy, Senator Barbara S. Mikulski, Senator Ben Nelson, Senator Bernard Sanders, Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, Senator Arlen Specter, Congressman John Spratt, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Congressman Gary Ackerman, Congressman Joe Baca, Congressman Howard Berman, Congressman Alan Boyd, Congressman Michael C. Burgess, M.D., Congressman Lois Capps, Congressman, Congressman Russ Carnahan, Congressman Mike Capuano, Dennis Cardoza, Congressman Christopher Carney, Congresswoman Donna Christensen, Congresswoman Yvette Clarke, Congressman John Conyers, Jr., Congressman Danny Davis, Congressman Peter DeFazio, Congressman Norm Dicks, Congressman Lloyd Doggett, Congresswoman Donna Edwards, Congresswoman Chaka Fattah, Congressman Barney Frank, Congressman Jim Gerlach, Congressman Charlie Gonzalez, Congressman Bart Gordon, Congressman Gene Green, Congressman Raul Grijalva, Congressman Luis Guiterrez, Congresswoman Jane Harman, Congressman Maurice Hinchey, Congressman Mike Honda, Congressman Darrell Issa, Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., Congressman Jim Langevin, Congressman Steven LaTourette, Congresswoman Barbara Lee, Congresswoman Nita Lowey, Congresswoman Betty McCollum, Congressman Jim McDermott, Congressman Gregory Meeks, Congressman Dennis Moore, Congressman Jim Moran, Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard, Congressman Adam Schiff, Congresswoman Hilda Solis, Congressman Pete Stark, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey

WHEN: Tuesday evening, January 20, 2009
9:00 pm

WHERE: Harman Center for the Arts
610 F Street, NW
Washington, DC

This and many other events are listed in our Inauguration Calendar of Events.

Inauguration travel advice

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The New York Times gives an overview of the lodging and travel situation:

Most downtown hotels are either sold out Jan. 20 or charging exorbitant prices and requiring at least three-night minimum stays. Rooms at Washington bed-and-breakfasts are going for $800 a night. And the suburbs are booking up fast.
...
There are about 95,000 hotel rooms in the Washington area, including Fairfax and Arlington, Va. A few were still showing availability in a recent search at Destination D.C.’s Web site, www.washington.org, but rooms weren’t cheap. The Kellogg Conference Hotel, located on the campus of Gallaudet University, listed rooms from $618.75 a night from Jan. 17 to Jan. 21. Starting rates at the Hilton Washington Embassy Row were listed from $949.
...
There’s also Craigslist.com, where entrepreneurial Washingtonians have begun to list their homes for rent. Concerned about scammers? Vacation rental sites like Homeaway.com and VRBO.com still have some availability for the inaugural week and offer a $5,000 guarantee if the listing does not exist or you are wrongfully denied access to a vacation rental property for your stay.

Preview of the Inauguration Site

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On Wednesday I had a chance to walk over to the U.S. Capitol and take photos of the grounds. As you'll see, the podium is still being constructed - and the areas that are said to be ticketed span quite farther than they have in the past.

There are a good assortment of views here, including the view from First Street and Third Street (both of which are said to be tickets areas). You can click here to get an idea of what Barack Obama's view will be like from the podium. There are lots of photos on staging and construction - for the full album, click here.

Wednesday was also the day that grounds workers were putting up the Capitol Christmas Tree.

It's A Ball

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MTV will be throwing an inaugural ball.

They've decided to call it "Be the Change Inaugural Ball" and they'll be broadcasting it live.

They did this once before, in 1993, when both the Clintons and Gores attended for part of the evening. Performers included the Eagles and U2.

MTV held a party, not a ball, in 1997. They didn't do anything for either of the Bush inaugurals.

This year, they'll be teaming up with ServiceNation, an organization which helps to mobilize grassroots efforts.

"ServiceNation looks forward to partnering with MTV on a historic inaugural event that will call on all Americans to act on their idealism and answer President-elect Obama's call to serve," said Michelle Nunn, CEO, Points of Light Institute. "By uniting Americans on the common ground of service, we can roll up our sleeves and help solve the nation's great challenges and inspire every American to be the change they wish to see in the world."

I've not yet found out how to get tickets, but I haven't given up. THIS looks like fun!

Inauguration: Big party on the National Mall

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What to do with 2 to 4 million people?

The Obama inauguration will feature a massive celebration on the National Mall, the newly formed Presidential Inaugural Committee announced on Tuesday.
...
The Mall event--designed to provide a low cost, accessible venue for the possibly millions of people who will come here for the Jan. 20 inauguration--will be created along the lines of other mega Obama events at Invesco Field in Denver, Grant Park in Chicago and in Berlin, near the Brandenburg Gate. - Chicago Sun-Times

Inauguration Committee needs volunteers

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The official Obama Presidential Inauguration Committee is looking for volunteers:

The Presidential Inaugural Committee is seeking volunteers for Inaugural events. Thank you for signing up now to volunteer.

How You Can Help: We need volunteers with different skills and backgrounds to assist with Inaugural events.

Click here for the volunteer web sign-up site.

Americans making plans for inauguration

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From Florida:

TAMPA - Carolyn Collins sat on her couch the night Barack Obama was elected president and thought about her late parents, who had drilled into her that she had the right to vote.

Then she thought about her 18-year-old grandson, who had called her with pride the day he got his voter registration card. Suddenly, Collins said, "my hands flew up and the tears began flowing."

The next day she put her name on five different lists of people seeking tickets to Obama's inauguration, set for Jan. 20. Active in Florida A&M University alumni groups and the Hillsborough County chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, she's hopeful. But tickets or no tickets, she and her husband are heading to Washington to get as close as they can to the ceremony.

"We just want to be there," she said.

From New York:

When Susan Gilbert was 10, her parents bundled their seven children into the family car and drove to Washington to witness John F. Kennedy's funeral procession.

Forty-five years later, on Jan. 20, most of those brothers and sisters, plus many from the family's next generation, expect to gather again in the nation's capital, this time for Barack Obama's inauguration.

"My parents are deceased but they would have been out there working for Obama," said Gilbert, principal of Siwanoy elementary school in Pelham. "My mother is smiling, I know. ... I'm doing it for them."

And from North Carolina:

Pattie Brew, daughter of a North Carolina sharecropper, had let almost a century go by without casting a vote for president or joining the inaugural crowds only three miles from her home in the nation's capital.

"I never had no interest in it because my vote don't matter anyway, so I never even took the time to fool with it," said the 97-year-old woman known as Mother Brew. "I knew white people had the right of way here, you know."

But on Nov. 4, she slipped on white gloves and pearls and found her way to a polling booth. And on Jan. 20, she wants to see the country's first inauguration of a black president — not from a couch at home but from somewhere closer by.

"So much history in this, honey," Brew said. "You gonna get me a ticket?

All American Inaugural Ball tickets go on sale today

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And for the low low price of $175 you can get in.

Washington, DC. BREAKING NEWS: Tickets to the latest Presidential Inaugural Ball are being released for sale to the general public today, Tuesday, November 25 at 10:00am Eastern time.

The All American Inaugural Ball is on Inauguration day, January 20, 2009, taking place at the Westin Washington DC, City Center, which has hosted multiple Inaugural Balls in the past.

The All American Inaugural Ball, which runs from 9:00pm until 2:00am, celebrates the swearing in of the newly elected President and Vice President of the United States. It is a toast to American culture featuring multiple areas of entertainment and attractions, which represent the diversity, energy and promise of American society. It also features wide screens with live simulcasts of the other major Inaugural Balls and swearing-in activities
Tickets to the All American Inaugural Ball include all food and beverages as well as access to the multiple forms of entertainment and attractions. A large block of tickets has been reserved for major contributors and party leaders. The remaining tickets will be released to the general public at 10:00am on Tuesday, November 25, 2008. Tickets will start at $175 per person (inclusive of all food and beverage) and will increase as new blocks of tickets are
released. Tickets are expected to sell out quickly.

For more information about, or to purchase tickets to, the All American Inaugural Ball visit
http://www.allamericanball.com

For this and other events be sure to check our Inauguration Calendar of events.

Inauguration: Looking to duplicate Invesco or Grant Park

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The Obama inauguration planners are looking for some splashy events that will be accessible to a lot of people, a sort of Invesco Field or Grant Park-on-the-mall.

80,000 or so at Invesco, 250, 000 at Grant Park, but we're talking at least a couple of million here. - Chicago Sun-Times

Also:

Chicagoans Penny Pritzker, John Rogers and William Daley will be among the Obama inauguration co-chairs, with the Presidential Inauguration Committee headquarters up and running in southwest Washington. Fund-raising calls have already started for the Jan. 20 event expected to draw millions to the city.

Inauguration Watch: News Update

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• The Washington Metro's web site for the Inauguration is up and running.
  
• Legislation banning the sale of Inaugaration tickets was not taken up in the Senate this week. Sen. Feinstein hopes it will be passed in December. - Hotline
• Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland has 55,000 requests for 400 Inauguration tickets.
  
• Bill Daley is expected to play a prominent role on the inaugural committee. - NY Times
• 1300 groups have applied to take part in the Inaugural parade.
• Hotels all across the DC Metro area are just about sold out.
  
• Which is why Sen. Bob Casey says Inauguration visitors should stay in Pennsylvania. - Washington Post

DC Metro to Sell Obama Inauguration Fare Cards

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Metro spokesperson Steven Taubenkibel confirmed that the commemorative SmarTrip cards should be available for sale in early January, while special paper Metro farecards marking the inauguration will be sold somewhat earlier, in late December.

There was some discussion at the board meeting about the cost and availability of the commemorative SmarTrip cards. Currently, Metro plans to sell them for $10 per card, with no value added to the card at the time of initial purchase, which would make them $5 more expensive than regular SmarTrip cards. They may also be hard to come by, as Metro will only have an initial order of 35,000 on hand to begin with, though Taubenkibel said the agency hopes to have more available as time permits. The short time period during which the cards have had to be ordered, produced, and eventually shipped to D.C. and processed was cited as the main reason for their higher price and small number. - DCist

Anybody in DC kind enough to send us one of these will be added to the DemConWatch Wall of Fame (not yet constructed).

Inauguration Ticket Update

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Ticket scalpers beware:

Senator Dianne Feinstein , chairman of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC), introduced legislation prohibiting the sale and counterfeiting of inaugural tickets.

The bill would make it unlawful to sell or attempt to sell tickets to the presidential inaugural swearing-in ceremony. It also would be illegal to create a fraudulent ticket or forge a ticket to the inauguration. Those who violate the law would face fines of up to $100,000 and imprisonment for up to one year. - JCCIC

There's a scramble for DC's tickets:

Seems that Mayor Adrian M. Fenty’s administration is in charge of building the parade viewing stands in front of the White House--for Obama and the media--and in front of City Hall at 1350 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. Fenty then will receive 150 tickets to distribute to staff and others.

How the mayor divvies up the tickets is what’s under dispute. As has been the case often during Fenty’s nearly two years in office, the D.C. Council is feeling snubbed. Rumors have circulated among members that Fenty is planning to give the 13 council members no more than 30 tickets in all. - Washington Post

House members are not going to be happy:

House Members each will get 198 tickets for the inauguration — a number dwarfed by the thousands of requests received by many offices since the Nov. 4 election. - Roll Call

and Sen. Schumer will hold a statewide Internet lottery to give away tickets. - WCBS-TV

4 Million Expected for Inauguration

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It's going to be crowded in DC in January:

District and federal officials are preparing for as many as 4 million people for the inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama, a crowd that would be three or four times larger than previous big events on the Mall.

Only a fraction of those people will be close enough to get a good look at the action. But officials are planning extra JumboTrons at the Mall and along the inaugural parade route so that spectators can feel a part of the historic day.

"The Mall actually may be the best seat in the house. . . . It'll kind of be like the world's biggest stage and auditorium on January 20th," said Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D), adding that the crowd projections have emerged in briefings conducted by federal and local officials. - Washington Post

Obama Advance head picked to run Inauguration

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President-elect Barack Obama has plucked the director of advance for his campaign to run the Presidential Inaugural Committee, according to sources close to the planning operation.

Obama's choice for the committee's executive director, Emmett Beliveau, is a former attorney at Patton Boggs and the son of prominent Maine attorney and Democrat Severin Beliveau. The younger Beliveau, a graduate of Georgetown Law School, also worked on the campaigns of Al Gore and John Kerry.

Beliveau, 31, is not an unlikely choice. President George W. Bush's pick for executive director of the committee was Greg Jenkins, deputy assistant to the president and director of presidential advance. - Washington Post

eBay/StubHub Prohibiting the Sale of Inauguration Tickets

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Statement from Senator Feinstein:

WASHINGTON, DC - Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC), today applauded eBay/StubHub for banning the sale of inaugural swearing-in ceremony tickets on any of its websites, including eBay, StubHub and Kijiji.

"I want to thank eBay/StubHub for not allowing the sale of inaugural swearing-in ceremony tickets on any of its websites,"Senator Feinstein said. "They have led the way and I hope other Internet companies will follow."

Somebody may want to tell StubHub to remove this:

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