• In the most high profile case of irony of all-time, President Barack Obama and Chief Justice John Roberts, two former Presidents of the Harvard Law Review, the highest honor in law school, managed to mutually bungle the legal process of the swearing-in.

There was, first of all, a false start from Mr. Obama, who started to respond before the chief justice had completed the first phrase. Mr. Obama ended up saying the first four words – “I, Barack Hussein Obama” – twice.

Then there was an awkward pause after Chief Justice Roberts prompted Mr. Obama with these words: “that I will execute the office of the president to the United States faithfully.” The chief justice seemed to say “to” rather than “of,” but that was not the main problem. The main problem was that the word “faithfully” had floated upstream in the constitutional text, which actually says this: “That I will faithfully execute the office of the president of the United States.”

Mr. Obama seemed to realize this, pausing quizzically after saying “that I will execute –”

The chief justice gave it another go, getting closer but still not quite right: “faithfully the office of president of the United States.” This time, he omitted the word “execute.”

Mr. Obama now repeated the chief justice’s initial error of putting “faithfully” at the end of the phrase. Starting where he had abruptly paused, he said: “the office of the president of the United States faithfully.”

• To the dismay of the Nightly News and some of the Inaugural’s critics, Obama did not deliver a signature line in the spirit of “There’s nothing to fear but fear itself,” or “ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.” Good. Obama has been speaking for two years about our sound bite obsessed media and his disdain for it. Hopefully the lack of a three second quote will force the media to quote full paragraphs. Here are two of my favorites:

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

• I can’t decide whether the poem was way over my head or just really bad. I’m leaning towards the latter.

• Leading up to the ceremony, much of the talk centered around the Reverend giving the Invocation, Rick Warren. In the end, his “God is everything, we are at his mercy” bullshit ended up sounding like any cookie-cutter prayer you see on TV Sunday morning. You know, the ones you roll your eyes at. His only interesting line came when he said, “[Help us, Oh God] when we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us.” Possibly, he was speaking to himself as much as he was to the crowd.

It is the name of the Reverend Joseph Lowery, though, who gave the Benediction, that history will remember. In 1957, Lowery co-founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with Martin Luther King. And today he was as touching, powerful, funny, and poetic as Warren was not.  But to just quote his words would be a disservice to his voice, so here is the video.

Simply put, he stole the show.