We woke up, got ready, ate breakfast, and headed towards the train to go to the Newseum. If you haven't guessed it, the Newseum is a museum dedicated to the news. In front of the museum, there were front pages from each state the the day before, the Inauguration. In another section of the museum, there were Inauguration front pages from all over the world. It was interesting to see how news in the US is front page news in so many other places, but I guess Barack Obama is a big deal everywhere.
We first watched a movie about the news and the museum. I might have fallen asleep during it or I may have closed my eyes, but it basically just told about all the different events that make news- war, peace, etc. Then we headed up to the top floor, where all the world newspapers were located. Next, on the 5th floor was the 9/11 gallery. They had the antenna from one of the WTC towers and the front pages of many different newspapers from across the US and world from that day and the one after.
We also saw an exhibit which had newspapers from forever ago to the present. I looked at the Chicago Fire newspaper, Kennedy's assassination, and a bunch of other historical ones that I can't really remember. They also had some videos of fake news like SNL skits and a video about women in the news business.
My favorite exhibit was one that had a bunch of different (maybe all?) Pullitzer Prize winning photos and the stories behind them. They were all really good photos and the stories behind them were interesting. One was a photo of a child obviously dying of starvation curled in a ball with a vulture behind her looking ready to eat her. The photographer took the photo and then cried. He was told not to touch any of the people because they might be diseased. He then received much criticism for not picking up the child. He eventually killed himself, I think because he couldn't live with the guilt of not helping the child.
Anyways, we didn't get to see all of the museum, but what we saw was very good. We had to leave because next we had a tour of the Capitol! We walked over there and stood in the security line with hopes of seeing Hillary Clinton roaming the halls.
We were early for our tour, so I got a chocolate covered rice krispie treat in the Capitol cafeteria. There was a sculpture of Sacajawea, so we took my picture next to it. Then i got lectured for touching it by an old security lady. Then it was time for the tour.
It started with a movie, which I fell asleep during, so I can't tell you what it was about. Then we toured the Capitol. We saw the rotunda which is where people lie in state and lie in honor. There were sculptures and paintings that were explained. We went into a room which is where the house of representatives (I think) once sat, and they had marked where some famous people had sat. There was also part of the room that if you stood and talked there you could here it on the other side of the room because of the way the ceiling was shaped.
We also saw the walkway that Obama walked down and then onto the platform the day before. We saw another room that was supposed to be where George and Martha Washington were to be buried, but it wasn't finished when they died and then their family decided not to move them.
Our tour guide mentioned that we could get passes to the Senate floor viewing gallery simply by heading across the street to our Senator's office and asking for them. Knowing that the Senate was going to attempt to again confirm Hillary as Secretary of State that day, we Immediately headed over to Dick Durbin's office when our tour ended. We easily obtained passes...so easily that we also went to Hillary's senate office in order to get some passes with her name on them (because she would only be a Senator for a couple more hours).
We headed back to the Capitol and then waited in line to get on the Senate floor. We got yelled at by another old security lady to not sit on the floor for some weird reasons that she appeared to make up. When no one listened to her, she went and got a police officer to tell everyone to stand up. I don't know what got stuck up her ass that morning, but apparently it was very far up there.
Anyways, we didn't wait as long as they had told us before we got to go inside. We had to check our phones and cameras (which I had neither of) and then go through security again. We finally made it into the gallery in time to watch some of Hillary's confirmation hearing. The distinguished Senator from Maryland spoke, and then there was time before the vote was to be taken so John Kerry rambled on, basically to himself, for about half an hour.
John Kerry is hilarious! He was talking about the environment and said such things as..."this scientist told me" and "those 5 or 6 states...I don't exactly remember all of them right now." Anyways, there were funnier ones, but I don't remember them. It went on and on and on, and I dozed off at some points. And it didn't really appear to have much to do with Hillary Clinton.
Then, it was finally time for the vote. Ninety-six senators voted. I got to see Dick Durbin, Roland Burris, John McCain, Diane Feinstein, and everyone else. Ted Kennedy, Hillary, Al Franken, and one other person were not there. Anyways, the vote came out 94-2, and because it was a role call vote, Hillary was confirmed. Everyone applauded, which they weren't supposed to do.
After Hillary's confirmation, they began to talk a little bit about the Ledbetter case. We stayed for a couple minutes then we left. We had probably been at the Capitol for 5 hours that day and we needed to eat.
We walked over to a tavern closer to our train station and we were pretty sure we saw Rahm Emmanuel driving a Cadillac on our way there (Sarah disagrees).
Anyways, we ate. I ate a cheeseburger. Then we went souvenir shopping. I bought five t-shirts (two with Obama and MLK, one with Obama and doves, one with him dressed as a sheriff, and one that said "Obama in the house!") and a stack of Barack Obama $9 bills.
We took the train back to the hotel. I basically passed out as soon as we got back and couldn't manage to wake myself up until the next morning.
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