This historic day began for me with the incredible sight of thousands of people marching on Washington in the pre-dawn darkness. They were walking from the Lincoln Memorial, where Dr. view history King spoke 45 years ago, to the Capitol Building, where President Obama would speak today.

“It reminds me of the day the Berlin Wall fell,” said a cable pundit.

Freedom is an extraordinary force, I said to myself.

In his Inaugural Address, President Obama sought to set the tone for the four years ahead.

He began by speaking of the politics he hopes to leave behind, noting “our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.”

After recalling George Washington’s words during that desolate December at Valley Forge, he concluded by saying:

“In this winter of our hardship, let it be said by our children’s children that we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.”

Now the work – those hard choices, begins.