President Barack Obama walks from the Oval Office to the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Friday, Oct. 9, 2009, to make remarks about being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. (AP)

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Barack Obama’s presidential scorecard is getting one tough going-over these days.

The Nobel Peace Prize committee may see his message alone as a winner. Critics on the left and right do not. When they’re not charging socialism, conservatives crow he is all talk. Progressives complain he hasn’t delivered when it comes to change.

A massive healthcare reform could shift the tone — and right now it’s moving on Capitol Hill. But the audience has grown tough. Even on Saturday Night Live.

This hour, On Point: Arianna Huffington, Byron York, and Jack Beatty, on the Obama scorecard now.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Arianna Huffington, co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post.

Byron York, chief political correspondent for The Washington Examiner.

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

Watch Saturday Night Live’s Oct. 3 skit on President Obama’s scorecard (and see what the fact-checking site Politifact had to say about the SNL checklist):

President Barack Obama speaks at a rally for Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds in McLean, Va., on Thursday, Aug. 6, 2009. (AP)

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Barack Obama became president in the teeth of an economic super-crisis — and carrying the expectations of a history-making candidate promising an era of change.

Now he’s six months and counting into his first year. Washington’s August recess feels like halftime.

The economy may be pulling back from the brink. A healthcare reform debate is fully ablaze. And we’ve seen a lot of this president in action. How’s he doing? We asked at 100 days. With stakes so high, we’re asking again.

This hour, On Point: President Barack Obama and his agenda at halftime, year one.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from New York is Jeff Greenfield, senior political correspondent for CBS News.

From Dallas, Texas, we’re joined by Bill McKenzie, editorial columnist for the Dallas Morning News.

And joining us from Yellow Springs, Ohio, is Ellen Belcher, editor of the Dayton Daily News opinion pages.

A detail of President Barack Obama's birth certificate, from The Annenberg Political Fact Check (FactCheck.org), a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.

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President Barack Obama turns 48 next week. August 4th.

But for a highly agitated fringe of unhappy Americans, the important thing is not when the president was born, but where.

They call themselves “birthers.” And despite the evidence of birth certificate, birth announcements, the records of the state of Hawaii, the affirmation of Hawaii’s Republican governor — the “birthers” do not believe, or want to believe, that Barack Obama is the legitimately American-born and elected president of the United States.

This hour, On Point: They can’t accept him. Against all evidence, what’s driving the “birthers”?

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Ben Smith, senior political writer for Politico. He first reported on the Birthers movement back in March.

Orly Taitz, a lawyer and activist demanding that President Obama prove his eligibility for the Office of President of the United States.

Heidi Beirich, co-director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project, which tracks extremist groups across the country.

Michael Medved, host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show The Michael Medved Show.

More links:

See “Born in the USA: The truth about Obama’s birth certificate” at FactCheck.org.

MediaMatters.org has tracked the treatment of this subject by CNN’s Lou Dobbs and by G. Gordon Liddy on MSNBC’s Hardball.

From the LA Times’ Show Tracker blog on Friday: “CNN President Jon Klein declares Obama birther story ‘dead.’”

On Saturday, The New York Times’ Brian Stelter reported on the recent flurry of media attention.

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Since Barack Obama’s inauguration, we know of only one work of fiction that’s made it to the presidential nightstand.

After the briefing books and security reports, President Obama has made it known, he’s been reading last year’s widely-praised “Netherland” by Joseph O’Neill.

It’s a maximally multi-cultural tale of New York life after 9/11. Of a new century’s immigrants making their way. The president has called it wonderful.

This hour, On Point: “Netherland” author Joseph O’Neill — and James McBride, bestselling author of “The Color of Water” — on President Obama’s first read in the White House.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joseph O’Neill joins us in our studio. His novel “Netherland,” now out in paperback, was a New York Times bestseller and winner of the PEN/Faulkner award.  His other books include “This is the Life,” “The Breezes,” and “Blood-Dark Truck.”

You can read an excerpt from “Netherland” at RandomHouse.com.

And joining us from New York is James McBride. A writer and musician, his memoir “The Color of Water” was a national bestseller. His new book is “Song Yet Sung.” You can hear his On Point interview from last year.

U.S. President Barack Obama speaks at Cairo University in Cairo, Thursday, June 4, 2009. In his speech,President Obama called for a "new beginning between the United States and Muslims", declaring that "this cycle of suspicion and discord must end." (AP)

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Candidate Barack Obama promised that if elected he would speak to the Muslim world from a major Islamic capitol, to try to mend the breach between the United States and many Muslims.

Today in Cairo, President Obama delivered on that promise. He spoke at length to the Muslim world. He greeted the crowd in Cairo with the goodwill of the American people, he said, and a greeting of peace in Arabic — assalaamu alaykum.

In the hall in Egypt, he got a standing ovation. What about outside?

This hour, On Point: President Obama’s Cairo speech, and reaction from the Muslim world.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Cairo is Margaret Talev, White House correspondent for McClatchy newspapers.

Also with us from Cairo is Ibrahim El-Houdaiby, an Islamic activist and advisor for the English-language website of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Joining us from Baghdad is Anthony Shadid, Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent for The Washington Post and author of “Night Draws Near: Iraq’s People in the Shadow of America’s War” (2005). He wrote this week about how much President Obama has to overcome as he addresses Muslims in his Cairo speech.

From Dubai, we’re joined by Dawood Al-Shirian, editor-in-chief of alarabiya.net, the website for the Arabic-language global satellite channel Al Arabiya, and columnist for Al-Hayat, a major international Arabic paper.

And from Washington, we’re joined by Hisham Melhem, Washington Bureau Chief for the Dubai-based Al Arabiya News Channel. He conducted the first formal interview with President Obama, on January 26, 2009, a week after his inauguration.

More links:

NPR.org offers the complete transcript and audio of President Obama’s speech. The BBC has the complete video.

President Barack Obama speaking at the National Archives in Washington and former Vice President Dick Cheney speaking at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington on Thursday, May 21, 2009. (AP)

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A very unusual showdown this week. The duly elected president of the United States, months after his election, grappling center stage over fundamental national security questions with an ex-vice president who hasn’t faced voters in almost five years.

Obama versus Cheney, again, on American values and American security.

We‘ve got new emission controls on the way, greens battling greens over cap-and-trade, new rules on credit cards and a green light for loaded guns in the National Parks.

This hour, On Point: Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Chrystia Freeland, U.S. managing editor of The Financial Times. She leads the paper’s U.S. edition and U.S. news on FT.com.

Gebe Martinez, political columnist and contributor to Politico.

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

President Barack Obama is hooded as he receives an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Laws during commencement ceremonies at the University of Notre Dame on Sunday, May 17, 2009. At left is University Registrar Harold Pace and on the right is Chairman of the Board of Trustrees Richard C. Notebaert. (AP)

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For weeks there was fury over Notre Dame’s decision to invite President Barack Obama to address its 2009 graduation, and to give the famously pro-choice president an honorary degree.

One bishop called that “truly obscene.” Scores formally objected.

Yesterday, before the gathered thousands of graduates and family in South Bend, the president sought to calm the waters on abortion. Some heckled with shouts of “baby killer.” More cheered with Obama’s cry of “Yes, we can.” The president called for open hearts, open minds.

This hour, On Point: Catholics, abortion, and Obama at Notre Dame.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from South Bend, Indiana, is Scott Appleby, professor of history and director of the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame. He attended the commencement ceremony yesterday. 

Read the transcript of President Obama’s speech at Notre Dame.

From Washington we’re joined by E.J. Dionne, columnist at The Washington Post and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. His latest book is “Souled Out: Reclaiming Faith and Politics after the Religious Right.”  In his Post column today, Dionne calls President Obama’s Notre Dame address “both the most radical and the most conservative speech of his presidency.”

Also from Washington, we’re joined by Helen Alvare, professor of law at George Mason University and nationally-recognized speaker on pro-life issues. She is a member of Pope Benedict XVI’s Pontifical Council for the Laity, former attorney for the National Council of Catholic Bishops, and a senior fellow at the Culture of Life Foundation.

President Barack Obama walks down the Cross Hall to hold his first news conference, Monday, Feb. 9, 2009, in the East Room of the White House in Washington. (AP)

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You can call 100 days arbitrary. You can call it a gimmick, when it comes to sizing up a new administration. But you can’t deny that by the hundred-day mark — particularly in wild times like these — we learn a lot about a new president.

Today marks 100 days in office for President Barack Obama. It’s been a cool frenzy of high-wire moves in an economic meltdown. If polls are right, Americans certainly feel better under Obama. Now, where are we going exactly?

An economy in crisis. Big plans on healthcare, education, environment. Huge spending, and a new face abroad. The president has reached out to old foes, and drawn blood of Somali pirates. One hundred days is not much. But we’ve seen a lot.

This hour, On Point: Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin and conservative Pat Buchanan on what we’ve learned about this new president, and where he will lead.

You can join the conversation. What’s your take on President Obama’s first 100 days? Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

In our studio we’re joined by Doris Kearns Goodwin, historian and author of “No Ordinary Time,” her Pulitzer Prize-winning history of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. Her 2005 book, “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln,” was a New York Times #1 bestseller. She’s also written acclaimed histories of LBJ and JFK.

With us from Washington is Pat Buchanan, political analyst, syndicated columnist, author, three-time presidential candidate, and leading conservative voice. He served as senior advisor to Presidents Nixon, Ford, and Reagan, and ran himself in 1992, 1996, and 2000. His most recent book is “Churchill, Hitler, and ‘The Unnecessary War’: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World.”

More links:

Behind-the-Scenes: 100 Photos for 100 Days — Amid all the Hundred Days coverage, this special Time magazine photo gallery stands out.

Clockwise from top left: Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage.

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American politics and political discourse have never been pattycake. In the years of George W. Bush, opponents railed against the president.

But the language lately on air has grown particularly fierce and apocalyptic: President Obama called a dictator and sympathizer with terrorists. His policies called socialist, Marxist, Bolshevik, dangerous. Americans called to rise up in revolt. All this while the economy tanks and gun sales surge.

Is this just the hurly-burly of American politics, or something else?

This hour, On Point: Hot airwaves, fear and anger in the age of Obama and economic bust.

You can join the conversation. Have you heard the talk-show calls to rise up and take back the country? What do you think when you hear President Obama called fascist, Manchurian candidate, terrorist sympathizer? Is this just democracy in action — free speech and political protest? Is it different from the kind of attacks leveled at George W. Bush?

Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Montgomery, Ala., is Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project, which tracks extremist groups across the country.

Joining us from Washington, D.C., is Allan Lichtman, professor of history at American University and author of “White Protestant Nation: The Rise of the American Conservative Movement.”

And joining us from Princeton, N.J., is Mickey Edwards, Republican Congressman from Oklahoma from 1977 to 1993 and a member of the House Republican Leadership in those years. He’s now a lecturer in public and international affairs at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School. His new book is “Reclaiming Conservatism: How a Great American Political Movement Got Lost–And How It Can Find Its Way Back.”

More links:

A big thanks today to Media Matters, which tracks, catalogues and fact-checks political rhetoric.

You can link to some of the media personalities whose sound bites were played on today’s show: Rush Limbaugh; Glenn Beck; Sean Hannity; and Michael Savage.

People are seen in front of the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Turkey, on Saturday, April 4, 2009. President Obama visited the mosque on Tuesday. (AP)

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There was the president of the United States, introduced as Barack Hussein Obama, standing before the Turkish parliament, reaching out to the Muslim world. The president, in Istanbul, in the midst of a town hall meeting with largely young Muslims, taking their questions one by one. The president, shoes off, walking solemnly through the great Blue Mosque.

The facts on the ground in trouble spots across the Muslim world are hard to change. But President Obama is trying hard right now, for starters at least, to change the music, the message, the tone of the United States toward the world’s Muslim populations — and mend a rocky relationship that has plagued and cost the United States, and much of the Muslim world, dearly.

Can he do it? Can put it on a new path? This hour, On Point: Obama’s message and the Muslim world.

You can join the conversation. What do you make of President Obama’s outreach? Is it the right message? Can it change the context? Tilt it toward a better day?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Robin Wright, longtime diplomatic correspondent for The Washington Post, currently a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. She’s the author of five books, most recently “Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East,” now out in paperback.

From London, we’re joined by Ali Allawi, Iraqi Minister of Defense and Minister of Trade from 2003 to 2004, following the U.S. invasion, and Minister of Finance in the Iraqi Transitional Government from 2005 to 2006. He’s the author of “The Crisis of Islamic Civilization” and “The Occupation of Iraq: Winning the War, Losing the Peace.”

From Washington, we’re joined by Bulent Aliriza, director of the Turkey Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and host of “Beyond the Atlantic,” a current affairs show on Turkish Radio and Television. He is also co-director of the CSIS Caspian Sea Energy Project.

And from Chicago, we’re joined by Rami Khouri. Based in Lebanon and currently traveling in the U.S., he is director of the Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at American University of Beirut and editor-at-large for the Lebanese English-language paper The Daily Star.

Marines listen as President Barack Obama speaks about combat troop reductions in Iraq as he addresses military personnel at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, N.C., Friday, Feb. 27, 2009. (AP)

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Last week when President Barack Obama laid out his plans for troop withdrawals from Iraq, his former campaign rival, Republican John McCain, of all people, was quick to voice support.

But antiwar activists and leaders who have protested the war for years were not so sure. A stretched-out exit. Maybe 50,000 troops still in Iraq for years. And a new surge in Afghanistan.

Barack Obama promised an end to the Iraq war. Many activists worked hard to support him. So, what do they think now?

This hour, On Point: Antiwar voices on Obama’s war plans.

You can join the conversation. Did you vote for Barack Obama because of his promise to end the Iraq war? Is President Obama delivering? Coming close enough for now? Or not?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Rep. Dennis Kucinich, Democratic congressman from Ohio. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004 and 2008. In 2007 he sponsored a bill  that would immediately end the Iraq war.

Also from Washington, we’re joined by Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the feminist antiwar group CODEPINK.

And with us from Washington is Tom Andrews, national director of the Win Without War coalition. He was a Democratic congressman from Maine from 1991 to 1995.

Joining us in our studio is Barry Posen, professor of political science at MIT and director of MIT’s Security Studies Program.

The very words “liberal” and “liberalism” have been out of fashion for decades. Even now, you don’t hear President Obama use that language.

But the budget put before the country last week by the Obama administration, and the principles articulated by the president almost every time he takes the stage, are clearly liberal.

Political scientist Alan Wolfe says it’s about time — that the country is overdue for a straight-up dose of liberalism. And he wants to remind the nation what, in his view, that means.

This hour, On Point: Back to the future. Saying hello, again, to liberalism.

You can join the conversation. Are you ready for a dose of liberalism? Do you hear it in President Obama? And what does it mean to you, today?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Alan Wolfe joins us in our studio. Professor of political science and director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College, his new book is “The Future of Liberalism.” You can read an excerpt here.

And with us from Washington is Byron York, longtime writer for National Review and now chief political correspondent for the Washington Examiner. He’s the author of “The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy.”

President Barack Obama addresses a joint session of Congress in the House Chamber of the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2009. (AP)

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So there was the new president, Barack Obama, in his first big speech before Congress — and oh, what a difference since last year’s State of the Union.

No George Bush, no scowling Dick Cheney, but smiling Joe Biden on the dais, and, at the podium, a young president with the highest public approval ratings since Ronald Reagan in his first month of office.

Obama was sober, he was hopeful, he laid out an agenda of startling ambition. But he still has to work it through America’s rugged politics. Rebuilding is going to take many hands, on both sides of the aisle, and that’s not easy.

This hour, On Point: we’ll get Republican and Democratic perspectives on the Obama agenda, and ask if it’s time for a bipartisan push to do the rebuilding — or if that is a pipe dream.

You can join the conversation. What did you hear in the President’s speech last night? Did you hear enough specifics? Enough hope? An answer to the crisis we’re in? And what about Governor Bobby Jindal’s Republican response?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

John Harwood, political writer for The New York Times and chief Washington correspondent for CNBC. See his New York Times piece on President Obama’s early “fiscal pivot.”

Rep. Donna Edwards, Democratic Congresswoman from Maryland. She represents Maryland’s 4th District, which includes parts of Montgomery and St. George’s Counties, around the Beltway. She’s a lawyer and champion of progressive causes — a hero to her “netroots” backers. She’s in her first term in Congress, and she’s the first African-American woman to represent Maryland in Congress.

Rep. Michael Burgess, Republican Congressman representing Texas’s 26th District, in the northern part of the state, including Fort Worth and most of Denton Country and parts of Tarrant, Cooke, and Dallas counties. A medical doctor (obstetrician), he joined Congress in 2003. He’s a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and a strong opponent of the stimulus package.

Abraham Lincoln, 1863.

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Two hundred years ago today, Abraham Lincoln was born — yes, in a log cabin, in Kentucky.

We can’t help wondering if he could have imagined an African-American president in the White House on this anniversary. Let alone an African-American president who so embraced him, Lincoln, as a model and hero.

Barack Obama has again and again held up Lincoln as an inspiration. But Lincoln was also a down-in-the-details, do-what-it-takes leader – and a canny politician — who presided over the most trying years in all of American history.

So, how might the man who fought the Civil War have faced Obama’s plate of problems? This hour, On Point: Lincoln’s leadership style in the White House.

You can join the conversation. Do you think of Lincoln as a distant marble statue, or a real and relevant leader now? What should Obama learn from Lincoln?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Dallas, Texas, we’re joined by James M. McPherson. One of America’s leading historians of the Civil War, he’s professor emeritus of history at Princeton University. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for his Civil War history “Battle Cry of Freedom.” He’s the author of two new works on Lincoln: the short biography “Abraham Lincoln” and “Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief,” which, just today, won the Lincoln Prize for outstanding Civil War scholarship.

Read an excerpt from “Tried by War.”

Joining us from Hanover, N.H., is Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic.

President Barack Obama makes opening remarks during his first-prime televised news conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, Feb. 9, 2009. (AP)

Just three weeks into his new presidency, the heat is fully on Barack Obama: heat to win and launch an economic stimulus package; heat to save the American banking system; heat to explain and sell the speed and scale of government intervention to the American public.

Last night, President Obama stood before reporters on national television for his first full-dress press conference — and gravely warned of worse to come in the economy if a stimulus isn’t passed soon: “Even greater job loss, even greater loss of income, and even greater loss of confidence. Those are deficits that could turn a crisis into a catastrophe, and I refuse to let that happen.”

Catastrophe. Not a word presidents use lightly. And today there’s more, on the American financial system, as Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner rolls out his new bank bailout.

It’s an all-hands-on-deck moment. This hour, On Point: Obama in the crucible, and the big push, from stimulus to bank bailout.

You can join the conversation. Is the president making his case? Does the country have a choice but to step in and try to stop the slide? Tell us what you think.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Washington, we’re joined by Gerald Seib, executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal, where he writes the Capital Journal column. He’s co-author with John Harwood of “Pennsylvania Avenue: Profiles in Backroom Power.”

Joining us from Chicago is Raghuram Rajan, professor of finance at University of Chicago Booth School of Business and former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. The Wall Street Journal profiled him as a prescient commentator on the economic crisis.

And from New York we’re joined by Diane Brady, senior editor at BusinessWeek magazine.

In this Dec. 1, 2008 file photo, President-elect Barack Obama, left, stands with Secretary of State-designate Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., center, and National Security Adviser-designate Ret. Marine Gen. James Jones, right, at a news conference in Chicago. (AP)

It was a glorious day. Americans laughed, they cried. They saw history. At the balls, they danced all night.

And now, reality waits. Barack Obama was as plain as he could be on Inauguration Day that the challenges are vast and urgent. “Nation in crisis” was right there in the morning-after headlines. And he’s called for action.

So, how do we get started? On war, energy, health care and – most urgently of all – the economy? They say there’s a plan for the first hundred days. So, what’s in it? This hour, On Point: Emergency, and Obama’s agenda, right out of the gate.

You can join the conversation. What do you expect first, in the first hundred days, from this president, President Obama? What’s most urgent for you?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Jonathan Alter, senior editor and columinst for Newsweek.  His 2006 book “The Defining Moment: FDR’s Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope” was a national bestseller.  His latest piece in Newsweek examines the keys to success for President Obama’s early agenda.

Ken Walsh, chief White House correspondent for U.S. News & World Report and author of the “The President” blog at the magazine’s Web site.  He looks at President Obama’s inaugural address and the direction he indicated for his administration.

Ezra Klein, associate editor and blogger, The American Prospect magazine.  He looked at President Obama’s Inauguration speech in his blog.

Further reading:

The Wall Street Journal and New York Times look at the tough economic challenges ahead for President Obama.

President Barack Obama delivers his inaugural address at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2009. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Special  Broadcast at 7pm today.

It’s done. Barack Obama is President of the United States.

His speech was tough. Tough love. The crowd was vast, stretching to the horizon of Washington’s great Mall and beyond. Aretha Franklin sang. Ted Kennedy collapsed.

There were few dry eyes, and many shouts of joy as President Obama and now First Lady Michelle Obama got out of their car and walked on Pennsylvania Avenue. And now, the balls begin. It has been a day for America’s history books. This Hour, On Point: a live wrap-up of President Barack Obama’s Inauguration Day.

You can join the conversation. What will you take away from this day? From President Obama’s inaugural?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Edna Greene Medford, professor of history at Howard University and expert in 19th-century African-American history. She’s co-author of “The Emancipation Proclamation: Three Views.” She joined us on January 2 for an hour on the memory of emancipation today.

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst.

Howard Fineman, senior Washington correspondent and columnist at Newsweek and author of “The Thirteen American Arguments: Enduring Debates That Define and Inspire Our Country.”

James Pryde, a member of the Tuskeegee Airmen, the elite group of all-black aviators in World War II. Their bravery during the war helped persuade then President Harry Truman to desegregate the military in 1948. The surviving members were invited to attend today’s inauguration.

Fred Barnes, executive editor of The Weekly Standard and co-host of “The Beltway Boys” on Fox News.

Anne Schroeder Mullins, gossip columnist for Politico, where she writes the Shenanigans blog.  She’s covering the inaugural balls.

Huge crowds gather on the National Mall in Washington for the swearing-in ceremony of President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2009. (AP)

On Inauguration Day, January 20th, 2009.

At noon today, Barack Obama lays his hand on the inaugural Bible Abraham Lincoln used, to take the oath as president of the United States. Red velvet cover. Gold trim. History under that hand. And in Obama’s oath today.

An African-American president swearing to “preserve, protect and defend” the US Constitution on the steps of a capitol built by black slaves. The great Mall in Washington is filling up. The nation and the world turn to hear. This hour, On Point: we’re opening Inauguration Day for Barack Hussein Obama.

You can join the conversation. What are your thoughts, your emotions, on this day? Did you think you would ever live to see it?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Gerald Seib, executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal, where he writes the Capital Journal column, and co-author with John Harwood of “Pennsylvania Avenue: Profiles in Backroom Power.”

Ronald Brownstein, political director for Atlantic Media publishers and author of “The Second Civil War: How Extreme Partisanship has Paralyzed Washington and Polarized America.”

Nell Irvin Painter, historian and author of “Creating Black Americans: African American History and Its Meanings, 1619 to the Present.”

Monica Brady-Myerov, reporter for WBUR, on the Mall in Washington.

Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst.

President-elect Barack Obama comments on his economic plans on Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2009, at a press conference at his transition office in Washington, DC. (AP)

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He’s been pounding the drum all week, and again this morning. Barack Obama, in what his aides bill as a major speech on the economy, is warning loud and clear that it’s bad, and that without quick action — without a huge stimulus package — could get a lot worse.

Unemployment into double digits. Family incomes dropping. A “generation” of American promise and potential, he warns, at risk.

OK, we’re scared. So what’s in the package?

This hour, On Point: The shape and size and politics of Obama’s super-stimulus package. And the super-sized question, Will it work?

You can join the conversation. The challenge looks huge. So do the deficits. Do we have a choice here? Does the federal government have to spend big-time, right now, to save the economy? And spend on what?

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

From Washington, we’re joined by Greg Ip, U.S. economics editor at The Economist.

Also joining us from Washington is Christian Weller, economist and senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a think tank with close ties to the incoming Obama administration. He’s also a professor of public policy at the University of Massachusetts, Boston.

And from Palo Alto, California, is John Taylor, professor of economics at Stanford University and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. He was Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005 and served on the President’s Council of Economic Advisors during the Ford and George H.W. Bush administrations. He was an economic advisor to John McCain during the presidential campaign.

More links:

Time’s Mark Halperin has excerpts from the prepared text of Obama’s speech.  Politico and The Wall Street Journal preview the speech.

Kaamilah Furqah, 13, views the Emancipation Proclamation on Sept. 22, 2007 at the William J. Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Ark. (AP)

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On January 1st, 1863, Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation — the historic document that freed America’s slaves, sort of.

In the midst of civil war and politics and military challenge, Lincoln’s act was narrowly aimed at slaves under Confederate control. Their bondage remained unbroken — and once broken, gave way to many decades of Jim Crow oppression.

But the Emancipation Proclamation stands as a national watershed. Now, with Barack Obama headed for the White House, its history speaks again. On January 20, Obama will lay his hand on Lincoln’s Bible to take his oath as President of the United States. It’s a good moment to look back on history.

This hour, On Point: The Emancipation Proclamation and its resonance today.

You can join the conversation. Barack Obama reveres “the Great Emancipator,” Abraham Lincoln. Do you? And how do Lincoln’s acts echo this year in Washington? Tell us what you think.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Joining us from Washington is Edna Greene Medford, associate professor of history at Howard University. She specializes in 19th-century African-American history and is co-author of “The Emancipation Proclamation: Three Views,” with Harold Holzer and Frank Williams.

And from Hanover, N.H., is Jack Beatty, On Point news analyst and senior editor at The Atlantic. He’s written about 19th-century American history himself, most recently in his book “Age of Betrayal: The Triumph of Money in America, 1865-1900.”

More links:

The National Archives website features a digital reproduction of the original Emancipation Proclamation, as well as the text version; the “preliminary” proclamation of September 22, 1862; and a background essay by historian John Hope Franklin.

In the November 1862 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, Ralph Waldo Emerson reacted to Lincoln’s Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation in an essay, and the national mythology was born before the proclamation had even been signed:

It is not a measure that admits of being taken back. Done, it cannot be undone by a new Administration…. This act makes that the lives of our heroes have not been sacrificed in vain….

With this blot removed from our national honor, this heavy load lifted off the national heart, we shall not fear henceforward to show our faces among mankind. We shall cease to be hypocrites and pretenders, but what we have styled our free institutions will be such.

In December 1866, also in The Atlantic, Frederick Douglass appealed to the United States Congress to live up to the promise of Lincoln’s proclamation:

Whether the tremendous war so heroically fought and so victoriously ended shall pass into history a miserable failure, barren of permanent results, — a scandalous and shocking waste of blood and treasure … or whether, on the other hand, we shall, as the rightful reward of victory over treason have a solid nation, entirely delivered from all contradictions and social antagonisms, based upon loyalty, liberty, and equality, must be determined one way or the other by the present session of Congress.

As we know, it would be a century, and more, before liberty and equality began to be realized for African Americans.