President Obama takes second oath of office at inauguration

A self-assured President Obama on Monday used his second inaugural address to lay out a bold liberal vision of the American future, drawing direct links between the origins of the republic and some of the most vexing political issues of the day.

The usual inauguration choreography of prayers and poems and crowds became a powerful demonstration of history’s arc: The first African American president was taking his second oath of office on a day named for the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on the Mall where King thundered almost 50 years ago


about the United States’ unfulfilled promise.

On a day when the president was at times confident and wistful, solemn and jubilant, he called on the American people to join him in creating a new nation grounded in the old ideas of equality and opportunity.

“What makes us exceptional, what makes us America, is our allegiance to an idea articulated in a declaration made more than two centuries ago,” Obama said. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” He linked the struggle for civil rights and women’s suffrage to the debate over same-sex marriage, and promised to reform immigration legislation and fight climate change.

“We the people still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity,” he said.

Obama spoke to a throng bundled against the cold weather in scarves and hats. Attendees had come by plane, by car and crowed Metro to see his second inauguration.

Myrlie Evers-Williams, widow of slain civil rights activist Medgar Evers, spoke of “a great cloud of witnesses — unseen by the naked eye, but all around us — thankful that their living was not in vain.”

The 18¹/
₂-minute address showed a president who had shaken off the personal caution and political gridlock that had hemmed in his ambitions before. His speech did not soar as much as it hurried: bouncing from goal to goal, building an agenda that could define his party — and his legacy.

“We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate. We must act, knowing that our work will be imperfect,” Obama said, in an address that quoted the Declaration of Independence, and repeated the opening words of the Constitution’s preamble: “We the people.”

“We must act, knowing that today’s victories will be only partial,” Obama said. “And that it will be up to those who stand here in four years — and 40 years, and 400 years hence — to advance the timeless spirit once conferred to us in a spare Philadelphia hall.”

Obama was the first president to use the word “gay” in his inaugural address. He had made outreach to gay voters and gay donors a key part of his reelection strategy. On Monday, he cast the battle for gay rights as part of a longer, broader struggle to make good on the declaration’s promise that “all of us are created equal.”

Obama listed three turning points: There was Seneca Falls, the town in New York where a convention in 1848 helped launch the women’s rights movement. There was Selma, referring to a civil rights march in Alabama in 1965.

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DPM Teo urges Punggol East voters to do comparisons

SINGAPORE: Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean has urged voters of Punggol East to compare what the People's Action Party's (PAP's) candidate has to offer against what the other candidates in the by-election have for the ward.

Mr Teo said PAP's Dr Koh Poh Koon will work hard for residents and deliver the plans he has in mind to make Punggol East a better place.

Mr Teo, who was speaking to reporters after meeting parents and children at a kindergarten in Block 124, Rivervale, on Tuesday morning, was also asked for his views on how the campaign is shaping up.

He described it as a keenly-contested campaign, which Dr Koh and the PAP are taking very seriously.

Mr Teo said the party will reach out to every voter and wants to ensure that it serves residents well.

- CNA/al

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Tasar spins new work for tribals

PATNA: From soil to silk, tribals engaged in tasar sericulture now tread the full spectrum towards building sustainable livelihoods in Bihar's Banka and Jamui districts, hotbeds of naxal activity. The Central Silk Board (CSB) has been working with marginalized communities in these regions to draw women and young people into silk production, helping them make a better life for themselves.

Non-profit Pradhan was the agency that rolled out the programme, Swaranajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY). CSB, set up in 1948, promotes tasar silk and works through micro-entrepreneurial models. Tasar silk is produced in Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Andhra and Maharashtra, and supports 2.5 lakh families in rural and semi-urban areas.

CSB's idea was to increase tribals' income, improve their lives and thereby help check migration to urban areas. CSB mooted the use of private wastelands to raise the plants that host silkworms. The project covered all stages of making silk: pre-cocoon, seed and post-cocoon. Kisan nurseries were set up to raise the host plants. Then block plantations of host plants were raised on 987 ha of private wastelands.

Rearer groups within Tasar Vikas Samitis then formed district-level cooperatives. Women reeler-spinners were grouped into Masuta Producers Company, an all-women tasar-yarn producers' collective. In the process, 3,526 people formed 57 activity groups, 24 producer organizations, one cooperative with 2,000 stakeholders and a producer company. Today, CSB's project has supported 11,000 beneficiaries since it began in 2003-04.

CSB also pitched in with technology to boost production. Traditionally, women used earthen pots (matka yarn) and wooden charkha to spin cocoons, a tedious process. Motored reeling-cum-twisting and spinning machines were distributed. But there was a problem. The CSB's machine ran on a 75-watt motor and most of the villages in Bihar's Banka district are power-starved. So, a 'modified' charkha was used to spin the tasar yarn and solar-powered reeling machines were developed.

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Attack at Algeria Gas Plant Heralds New Risks for Energy Development

The siege by Islamic militants at a remote Sahara desert natural gas plant in Algeria this week signaled heightened dangers in the region for international oil companies, at a time when they have been expanding operations in Africa as one of the world's last energy frontiers. (See related story: "Pictures: Four New Offshore Drilling Frontiers.")

As BP, Norway's Statoil, Italy's Eni, and other companies evacuated personnel from Algeria, it was not immediately clear how widely the peril would spread in the wake of the hostage-taking at the sprawling In Amenas gas complex near the Libyan border.

Map by National Geographic

Algeria, the fourth-largest crude oil producer on the continent and a major exporter of natural gas and refined fuels, may not have been viewed as the most hospitable climate for foreign energy companies, but that was due to unfavorable financial terms, bureaucracy, and corruption. The energy facilities themselves appeared to be safe, with multiple layers of security provided both by the companies and by government forces, several experts said. (See related photos: "Oil States: Are They Stable? Why It Matters.")

"It is particularly striking not only because it hasn't happened before, but because it happened in Algeria, one of the stronger states in the region," says Hanan Amin-Salem, a senior manager at the industry consulting firm PFC Energy, who specializes in country risk. She noted that in the long civil war that gripped the country throughout the 1990s, there had never been an attack on Algeria's energy complex. But now, hazard has spread from weak surrounding states, as the assault on In Amenas was carried out in an apparent retaliation for a move by French forces against the Islamists who had taken over Timbuktu and other towns in neighboring Mali. (See related story: "Timbuktu Falls.")

"What you're really seeing is an intensification of the fundamental problem of weak states, and empowerment of heavily armed groups that are really well motivated and want to pursue a set of aims," said Amin-Salem. In PFC Energy's view, she says, risk has increased in Mauritania, Chad, and Niger—indeed, throughout Sahel, the belt that bisects North Africa, separating the Sahara in the north from the tropical forests further south.

On Thursday, the London-based corporate consulting firm Exclusive Analysis, which was recently acquired by the global consultancy IHS, sent an alert to clients warning that oil and gas facilities near the Libyan and Mauritanian borders and in Mauritania's Hodh Ech Chargui province were at "high risk" of attack by jihadis.

"A Hot Place to Drill"

The attack at In Amenas comes at a time of unprecedented growth for the oil industry in Africa. (See related gallery: "Pictures: The Year's Most Overlooked Energy Stories.") Forecasters expect that oil output throughout Africa will double by 2025, says Amy Myers Jaffe, executive director of the energy and sustainability program at the University of California, Davis, who has counted 20 rounds of bidding for new exploration at sites in Africa's six largest oil-producing states.

Oil and natural gas are a large part of the Algerian economy, accounting for 60 percent of government budget revenues, more than a third of GDP and more than 97 percent of its export earnings. But the nation's resources are seen as largely undeveloped, and Algeria has tried to attract new investment. Over the past year, the government has sought to reform the law to boost foreign companies' interests in their investments, although those efforts have foundered.

Technology has been one of the factors driving the opening up of Africa to deeper energy exploration. Offshore and deepwater drilling success in the Gulf of Mexico and Brazil led to prospecting now under way offshore in Ghana, Mozambique, and elsewhere. (See related story: "New Oil—And a Huge Challenge—for Ghana.") Jaffe says the Houston-based company Anadarko Petroleum has sought to transfer its success in "subsalt seismic" exploration technology, surveying reserves hidden beneath the hard salt layer at the bottom of the sea, to the equally challenging seismic exploration beneath the sands of the Sahara in Algeria, where it now has three oil and gas operations.

Africa also is seen as one of the few remaining oil-rich regions of the world where foreign oil companies can obtain production-sharing agreements with governments, contracts that allow them a share of the revenue from the barrels they produce, instead of more limited service contracts for work performed.

"You now have the technology to tap the resources more effectively, and the fiscal terms are going to be more attractive than elsewhere—you put these things together and it's been a hot place to drill," says Jaffe, who doesn't see the energy industry's interest in Africa waning, despite the increased terrorism risk. "What I think will happen in some of these countries is that the companies are going to reveal new securities systems and procedures they have to keep workers safe," she says. "I don't think they will abandon these countries."

This story is part of a special series that explores energy issues. For more, visit The Great Energy Challenge.

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Obama's 2nd Term: Whose Time Is 'Our Time'?

Jan 21, 2013 12:50pm

Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images

ANALYSIS By RICK KLEIN

President Obama used a brief pause in the partisan warfare that’s scarred his time in office to return to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, with his own declaration of urgency and a call to action that reflects shared sacrifice and responsibility.

This was no centrist conciliator. It was the speech of a committed, unapologetic progressive, an Obama doctrine for domestic policy that included concrete commitments in areas he made little progress on over his first four years. Above all, he was speaking to a changing America – the nation that propelled him to a second term, and whose voices he will need to channel to be effective over the next four years.

“My fellow Americans, we are made for this moment, and we will seize it – so long as we seize it together,” the president declared.

That word “together” appeared seven times in the president’s speech. He used the phrase, “we, the people” five times. Notably, the president said “our time” five times. It was a clear signal that Obama is not satisfied with the frustrations that marked his first term, and that he is cognizant of his opportunity at this moment.

And he sees those opportunities mainly to his left. Obama made a firm commitment to pursue climate-change legislation, in addition to immigration reform and gun control. In an era of budget-cutting, he delivered a rousing endorsement of the social safety net, including Medicare and Social Security.

Obama cited the civil-rights movement and listed Stonewall – the 1960s demonstrations over a police raid of a New York City gay bar that galvanized the gay-rights movement – alongside Seneca Falls and Selma. He also promised equality for “our gay brothers and sisters,” apparently becoming the first president to use the word “gay” in an inaugural address.

Obama’s defining challenge as president has been to deliver on the hope and promise he rode into office on in 2008. He may never hope to fulfill the expectations that surrounded his elevation. But speaking to the largest crowd he’s likely to ever appear before again, the president sounded both more optimistic and more committed to progress on his priorities than anything in our current political system would suggest is warranted.

“Progress does not compel us to settle centuries-long debates about the role of government for all time, but it does require us to act in our time,” the president said.

For a president whose very inauguration speaks to the promise of America, but whose first term ended with so much frustration, it was a return to his roots. President Obama is cognizant of his role in history, though clearly not content with leaving it at that.

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Employers challenging health law contraceptive provision

Enjoy the festivities, President Obama, and while you’re on the grand stage Monday, it might be wise to make nice with the assembled Supreme Court justices.

The next legal challenge to the Affordable Care Act is moving quickly to the high court, and bringing potent questions about religious freedom, gender equality and corporate “personhood.”

The issue is the health-care law’s requirement that employers without a specific exemption must provide workers with insurance plans that cover a full range of birth-control measures and contraceptive drugs.

Inclusion of the no-cost contraceptive coverage for female workers has always been a controversial part of the legislation. It has now sparked more than 40 lawsuits around the nation involving more than 110 individuals, colleges, hospitals, church-affiliated nonprofits and private companies.

The cases involving those with religious affiliations are in limbo, as the Obama administration works on regulations that might provide a compromise. In a case involving two such institutions — Wheaton College in Illinois and Belmont Abbey College in North Carolina — a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is requiring administration officials to report by mid-February about the new rule, which is to be issued by spring.

At the same time, “the business cases are moving quickly,” said Kyle Duncan, general counsel of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, one of the groups coordinating the challenges to the law. Duncan said he believes the cases will be decided in lower courts in plenty of time for the Supreme Court to decide whether to review the issue in its term that begins in October.

By Duncan’s count, there are 14 cases filed by business owners who say the law forces them to choose between running their companies and following their religious beliefs. In nine of those cases, courts have issued injunctions until the conflicts can be decided on their merits.

The cases differ by what the business owners say they are willing to provide — some say all contraceptives would violate their religious beliefs, others object only to abortifacients such as the “morning-after pill” and intrauterine devices. But all rely on protections in the First Amendment regarding free exercise of religion and in the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).

The 1993 act prohibits the federal government from imposing a “substantial burden” on a person’s exercise of religion unless there is a “compelling governmental interest” and the measure is the least-restrictive method of achieving the interest.

No court of appeals has reached the merits of the challenges, but two — the 7th and 8th circuits in Chicago and St. Louis respectively — have granted business owners injunctions, and two — the 6th in Cincinnati and the 10th in Denver — have denied them.

And along the way, those decisions give a pretty clear indication of the fight ahead.

The most promising for the challengers is a ruling by a three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit. Cyril and Jane Korte, owners of K & L Contractors, said the new law offends their Roman Catholic beliefs. They wanted to replace the insurance program they offered their workers, which they found provided contraceptive services, with one that did not.

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SDA's Lim to launch online rally at 6pm

SINGAPORE: The Singapore Democratic Alliance's (SDA's) candidate for Punggol East, Mr Desmond Lim, will start his online rally at 6pm on Monday.

Mr Lim told reporters after meeting residents at Kangkar LRT Station in the morning that he will start with two video clips.

Each clip will be between seven and 10 minutes long.

Mr Lim said he will produce at least 10 clips during his by-election campaign.

The videos will be available on his Facebook page and can be downloaded to smartphones.

Mr Lim said his volunteers will approach residents during the walkabouts and ask them if they would like use Bluetooth to transfer the clips to their phones.

- CNA/al

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Murder-accused MLA sent in judicial custody

PANCHKULA: A local court on Sunday refused cops' request to extend the police remand of Himachal Pradesh Congress MLA Ram Kumar Chaudhary and sent him in judicial remand to Ambala Central Jail.

The court also directed Panchkula police to file a reply on the request made by Chaudhary during the previous hearing, seeking permission to take oath as MLA on January 22.

During the hearing, representatives of Panchkula police failed to convince the court why they needed Chaudhary's police remand for two more days.

ACP Virender Singh, the probe officer, informed the court that four cellphones, including the victim's, were yet to be recovered and that two cellphones were thrown into a river by the accused.

Chaudhary, a first-time MLA from Doon assembly constituency of Solan district, is one of the four accused in the murder of Jyoti, whose body was found in Sector 21 of Panchkula on November 22.

Plea for 'B category' facilities

Chaudhary has moved an application through his lawyer for special 'B category' facilities in Ambala jail on grounds that he is a post-graduate. His application stated that he has passed MA in public administration from Shimla university in Himachal. Chaudhary's counsel Sukeja told TOI, "Being MA-pass, he is entitled to special facilities in the jail." These facilities include access to newspapers, books, TV and a separate place from other undertrails.

Visited religious while on the run

Police officials said that Chaudhary had visited religious places in different states -- Rajasthan, Himachal and Punjab - travelling by transport buses during the one and a half months of his flight from the police. ACP Virender Singh said that interrogation of Chaudhary revealed that he visited a number of gurdwaras in Punjab and Salasar Balaji temple in Rajasthan.

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Attack at Algeria Gas Plant Heralds New Risks for Energy Development

The siege by Islamic militants at a remote Sahara desert natural gas plant in Algeria this week signaled heightened dangers in the region for international oil companies, at a time when they have been expanding operations in Africa as one of the world's last energy frontiers. (See related story: "Pictures: Four New Offshore Drilling Frontiers.")

As BP, Norway's Statoil, Italy's Eni, and other companies evacuated personnel from Algeria, it was not immediately clear how widely the peril would spread in the wake of the hostage-taking at the sprawling In Amenas gas complex near the Libyan border.

Map by National Geographic

Algeria, the fourth-largest crude oil producer on the continent and a major exporter of natural gas and refined fuels, may not have been viewed as the most hospitable climate for foreign energy companies, but that was due to unfavorable financial terms, bureaucracy, and corruption. The energy facilities themselves appeared to be safe, with multiple layers of security provided both by the companies and by government forces, several experts said. (See related photos: "Oil States: Are They Stable? Why It Matters.")

"It is particularly striking not only because it hasn't happened before, but because it happened in Algeria, one of the stronger states in the region," says Hanan Amin-Salem, a senior manager at the industry consulting firm PFC Energy, who specializes in country risk. She noted that in the long civil war that gripped the country throughout the 1990s, there had never been an attack on Algeria's energy complex. But now, hazard has spread from weak surrounding states, as the assault on In Amenas was carried out in an apparent retaliation for a move by French forces against the Islamists who had taken over Timbuktu and other towns in neighboring Mali. (See related story: "Timbuktu Falls.")

"What you're really seeing is an intensification of the fundamental problem of weak states, and empowerment of heavily armed groups that are really well motivated and want to pursue a set of aims," said Amin-Salem. In PFC Energy's view, she says, risk has increased in Mauritania, Chad, and Niger—indeed, throughout Sahel, the belt that bisects North Africa, separating the Sahara in the north from the tropical forests further south.

On Thursday, the London-based corporate consulting firm Exclusive Analysis, which was recently acquired by the global consultancy IHS, sent an alert to clients warning that oil and gas facilities near the Libyan and Mauritanian borders and in Mauritania's Hodh Ech Chargui province were at "high risk" of attack by jihadis.

"A Hot Place to Drill"

The attack at In Amenas comes at a time of unprecedented growth for the oil industry in Africa. (See related gallery: "Pictures: The Year's Most Overlooked Energy Stories.") Forecasters expect that oil output throughout Africa will double by 2025, says Amy Myers Jaffe, executive director of the energy and sustainability program at the University of California, Davis, who has counted 20 rounds of bidding for new exploration at sites in Africa's six largest oil-producing states.

Oil and natural gas are a large part of the Algerian economy, accounting for 60 percent of government budget revenues, more than a third of GDP and more than 97 percent of its export earnings. But the nation's resources are seen as largely undeveloped, and Algeria has tried to attract new investment. Over the past year, the government has sought to reform the law to boost foreign companies' interests in their investments, although those efforts have foundered.

Technology has been one of the factors driving the opening up of Africa to deeper energy exploration. Offshore and deepwater drilling success in the Gulf of Mexico and Brazil led to prospecting now under way offshore in Ghana, Mozambique, and elsewhere. (See related story: "New Oil—And a Huge Challenge—for Ghana.") Jaffe says the Houston-based company Anadarko Petroleum has sought to transfer its success in "subsalt seismic" exploration technology, surveying reserves hidden beneath the hard salt layer at the bottom of the sea, to the equally challenging seismic exploration beneath the sands of the Sahara in Algeria, where it now has three oil and gas operations.

Africa also is seen as one of the few remaining oil-rich regions of the world where foreign oil companies can obtain production-sharing agreements with governments, contracts that allow them a share of the revenue from the barrels they produce, instead of more limited service contracts for work performed.

"You now have the technology to tap the resources more effectively, and the fiscal terms are going to be more attractive than elsewhere—you put these things together and it's been a hot place to drill," says Jaffe, who doesn't see the energy industry's interest in Africa waning, despite the increased terrorism risk. "What I think will happen in some of these countries is that the companies are going to reveal new securities systems and procedures they have to keep workers safe," she says. "I don't think they will abandon these countries."

This story is part of a special series that explores energy issues. For more, visit The Great Energy Challenge.

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Sasha's View: 'Good Job, Daddy. You Didn't Mess Up'

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden today officially embarked on their second term, taking the Constitutionally mandated oath of office in two separate private ceremonies inside their homes.

Shortly before noon in the Blue Room of the White House, Obama raised his right hand, with his left on a family Bible, reciting the oath administrated by Chief Justice John Roberts. He was surrounded by immediate family members, including first lady Michelle Obama and daughters, Malia and Sasha.

As he hugged his wife and daughters, Sasha said, "Good job, Daddy."

"I did it," he said.

"You didn't mess up," she answered.

Biden was sworn in earlier today by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic to administer a presidential oath, in a ceremony at his official residence at the U.S. Naval Observatory. He was joined by more than 120 guests, including cabinet members, extended family and his wife, Dr. Jill Biden.

Because Jan. 20 -- the official date for a new presidential term -- falls on a Sunday this year, organizers delayed by one day the traditional public inauguration ceremony and parade down Pennsylvania Avenue.

Vice President Joe Biden Sworn in for 2nd Term Watch Video

Obama Sworn In for Second Term, Kicks off Inaugural Festivities Watch Video

Obama and Biden will each repeat the oath on Monday on the west front of the Capitol, surrounded by hundreds of dignitaries and members of Congress. An estimated 800,000 people are expected to gather on the National Mall to witness the moment and inaugural parade to follow.

The dual ceremonies in 2013 means Obama will become the second president in U.S. history to take the presidential oath four times. He was sworn in twice in 2008 out of an abundance of caution after Roberts flubbed the oath of office during the public administration. This year Roberts read from a script.

Franklin Roosevelt was also sworn in four times but, unlike Obama, he was elected four times.

This year will mark the seventh time a president has taken the oath on a Sunday and then again on Monday for ceremonial purposes. Reagan last took the oath on a Sunday in 1985.

Both Obama and Biden took the oath using a special family Bible. Obama used a text that belonged to Michelle Obama's grandmother LaVaughn Delores Robinson. Biden placed his hand on a 120-year-old book with a Celtic cross on the cover that has been passed down through Biden clan.

The official inaugural activities today also included moments of prayer and remembrance that marked the solemnity of the day.

Obama and Biden met at Arlington National Cemetery for a brief morning ceremony to place a wreath on the Tomb of the Unknowns, honoring military service members who served and sacrificed. The men stood shoulder to shoulder, bowing their heads as a bugler played "Taps."

Biden, who is Catholic, began the day with a private family mass at his residence. The president and first family attended church services at Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church, a historically black church and site of two pre-inaugural prayer services for former President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore and their families.

The Obamas and Bidens plan to participate in a church service on Monday morning at St. John's Episcopal, across Lafayette Park from the White House. They will also attend a National Prayer Service on Tuesday at the National Cathedral.

Later on Sunday evening, the newly-inaugurated leaders will attend a candlelight reception at the National Building Museum. The president and vice president are expected to deliver brief remarks to their supporters.

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