Obama’s Inaugural Address: Progressive and Presidential

Skies were overcast, and the temperature was a chilly 40 degrees in Washington on Monday when President Barack Obama took the oath of office and began his inaugural address. Given his own cool reserve and his first-term penchant for pursuing a tepid, middle-right governing agenda, I didn’t expect to get much warmth from him this go ‘round.

I was surprised. In these major speechifying moments, Obama’s rhetoric has always soared, but this time his agenda and political resolve did, for he seemed to have reached deep within himself and found an FDR-ish hotspot. (A brief digression for this histori...