Hundreds of students across campus took a breather from daily collegiate life to witness what was arguably one of the most important moments in history: President Obama being sworn into office.
We now have our first non-white president.
It's kind of a big deal. Some students, faculty and staff members huddled around the television outside the Ball State University Bookstore while about another 50 students gathered around the televisions on the second floor of the Art and Journalism Building and another 50 were at the watch party in the L.A. Pittenger Student Center.
It's uncertain how many people total across campus watched the inauguration. Students in buildings without readily available television sets could have streamed the video online. Residence halls could have had it playing in their lounges.
Whether you watched the inauguration, or put forth great effort to avoid watching the inauguration, we need to start watching now.
The campaign is done.
The time for talk is over.
The first 100 days of Obama's presidency need to be a time of action.
We need to see if our new president is really everything we had hoped for or everything we feared.
Youth voters came out in droves for the first time in history and now we need to see the affects of our choice.
You cast your ballot to get certain issues addressed, now we have to see that they are addressed and respond accordingly if they are not.
It is our privilege and responsibility as Americans to keep an eye on our politicians. We elect them to serve the national will and once they are in office we are the ones who need to make sure they are performing up to our expectations.
Citizens should pay attention to how fiscal policy is handled in this global economic crisis and whether Obama holds true to his promise about Guantanamo Bay, the war in Iraq and anything else he has promised during his campaign.
You could even go so far as to make sure he really gets a dog for his children.
We took the first step in showing up at the polls, now we need to follow through on that action and hold our president accountable.
Obama ran on a platform of change: let's see if anything does.
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