Obama Takes Oath, Again... Without a Bible!

[curiosityandthecat]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 567187.ece

January 22, 2009
Philippe Naughton

He's sorted out the legalities, but could Barack Obama have made the first political mistake of his presidency?

After constitutional law experts questioned the validity of his swearing-in because of a fluffed line in the oath of office, Mr Obama moved quickly to quash speculation that his presidency was in any way illegitimate.

John Roberts, the Chief Justice charged who helped bungle the oath on Tuesday, was summoned to the White House and, in front of a small pool of reporters, Mr Obama carefully and accurately repeated the 35-word oath prescribed by Article 2 of the Constitution.

The problem was, no-one thought to bring a Bible and Mr Obama decided to go ahead without one.

Legally, that was fine â€" the Constitution makes no mention of the Bible. Politically, it may prove to be a problem.

"The Obama boobery with the oath, led to a second oath. But the Bible, like the once disdained flag lapel pin, was nowhere to be seen," sniped the Hillaryis44 blog, referring to a row during the presidential campaign over a missing lapel pin.

"Expect a third oath when bitter small town gun- and Bible-toting America finds out."

Mr Obama's likely reaction in the event of a backlash will be that he did not consider last night's oath to be the one that counts. The White House counsel, Greg Craig, said last night that the Administration believed that Mr Obama was "sworn in appropriately" on Tuesday.

"Yet the oath appears in the Constitution itself and out of the abundance of caution, because there was one word out of sequence, Chief Justice John Roberts will administer the oath a second time," he added.

On Tuesday, Mr Obama was sworn in with his left hand on the Bible used by his great political hero, Abraham Lincoln, on his first inauguration in 1861. That book was returned to the Library of Congress straight afterwards.

It is not clear whether Mr Roberts, the Supreme Court Chief Justice, had been expected to bring a Bible with him but it might come as a shock to some of Mr Obama's more devout supporters â€" he and his family are regular churchgoers â€" that no Bible was available last night and the ceremony went ahead without one.

The second oath was taken in the White House Map Room, witnessed not by a crowd of two million but four members of the White House press corps. “We decided that because it was so much fun ...,” Mr Obama joked as the reporters filed in.

No TV camera crews or news photographers â€" although pictures were taken by a White House photographer â€" and even Michelle Obama, the President's wife, was absent.

Mr Roberts put on his black robe.

“Are you ready to take the oath?” he said.

"Yes, I am,” Mr Obama said. “And we’re going to do it very slowly.”

Mr Roberts then led Mr Obama through the oath without any missteps.

"The retaking of the oath went without a hitch and Obama was successfully sworn in, a second time, as president of the United States Of America. But this time he done it without his left hand on the bible," reported the Atheist News weblog.

"Obviously this is not that much of a big deal and the second taking of the oath was just, as the White House lawyer put it, "out of the abundance of caution". But it is refreshing to see that Obama doesn't attach much important to religious pomp and ceremony."

Legally, it doesn't matter, but DAMN does it feel good!

[keith2004]

Deep down i think Obama is an Atheist like his father....politically he can never admit this...but i think he is just one of the many educated Politicians who are non-believers, but just go through the motions

[oldschooldoc]

:idea:
Deep down i think Obama is an Atheist like his father....politically he can never admit this...but i think he is just one of the many educated Politicians who are non-believers, but just go through the motions

I believe this as well. In fact, just Tuesday me and my dad had a conversation about that.

[Will]

"Expect a third oath when bitter small town gun- and Bible-toting America finds out."

"Small town gun- and Bible-toting America" can suck a lemon for all I care. They're probably the single biggest problem with the US, and marginalizing them seems the appropriate response to their backward beliefs and overt hatred.

[VanReal]

:idea:
Deep down i think Obama is an Atheist like his father....politically he can never admit this...but i think he is just one of the many educated Politicians who are non-believers, but just go through the motions

He kind of said as much in his 2006 speech on religion and politics.  It's pretty interesting, he kind of slams the Christians a bit for being so broad and inconsistent between differing denominations, and even talks about how we'd call social services if we saw Abraham on a rooftop with a knife to his son's throat because God told him to sacrifice him, hehe.  He also says that he was not a believer and came to his cristianity not by means of a "catching the holy ghost" but rather as a conscious decision.  A good decision because he would not have made it as a non-believer, doubtfully even to the senate.  Just kind of an interesting speech.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2Kh-xzerjE

[Whitney]

I think the only people who are going to notice that he didn't use the Bible for his second swearing in are those who wish he hadn't used one the first time and fundamentalists who would consider forgetting the bible an impeachable offence.  

It's very obvious that he isn't the kind of Christian that causes most of the problems; like 90% of America he probably just went to church because it was the socially (and politically, in his case) right thing to do.  However, I don't want to assume to know what his personal beliefs are; but I wouldn't blame him for just going to church to be seen at church.  Maybe he never really did go to church or went but didn't pay attention and that is why he wasn't aware of what his reverend friend was preaching till the news went wacko over it.  Still, it's really hard to know without being able to talk to him personally.

I do think he views the church as at least tool which can be used for good; otherwise he wouldn't have done most of his community organizing through churches and wouldn't be supporting faith based initiatives.

[wazzz]

 good thing he didn't

[Wechtlein Uns]

ok...

[jrosebud]

dale mcgowan mentioned something about obama and religion that i found interesting.  he noted that after the election (about a month ago) obama stopped attending church regularly.

[curiosityandthecat]

dale mcgowan mentioned something about obama and religion that i found interesting.  he noted that after the election (about a month ago) obama stopped attending church regularly.

[Whitney]

It would be great if after he is done with his 8 years and is viewed as a successful president do the the great job he (hopefully) did; he came out as a non-believer.  That would be a great way to show that it doesn't take faith in anything to do good for America.  I don't think anyone could say he lied either because he never claimed to believe that jesus christ is his personal savior and had stated he became a christian essentially because it seemed like the thing to do; he has mentioned "god" but so did many of the agnostic/deist/atheist founding fathers.

btw, If he was reading our comments about his being non-religious he'd probably tell us to shut up before we blow his cover and ruin it for everyone.  

[AnnaM]

who cares?  it's all smoke and mirrors, an irrelevant puppet show.  obama is more of the same.