A few legislators and Capitol Annex staffers gathered around a small, scratchy TV in the fifth-floor library to watch Barack Obama's inauguration as the next president of the United States. At one point, Idaho Statesman reporter Dan Popkey pointed and said, "There's Jim Risch!" Risch, Idaho's newest U.S. senator, was visible on the screen not far behind the new president. "Today I say to you that the challenges we have are real, they are serious and they are many," Obama said. "They will be met," he said to cheers. "We have chosen hope over fear ... unity of purpose over conflict and discord." He declared "a new era of responsibility."

One Democratic lawmaker, Sen. Nicole LeFavour, D-Boise, is absent from the Legislature today to attend the inauguration. Even the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee, which has Medicaid budget hearings running all morning today, scheduled its morning break for 10 a.m. Boise time, so people could see a bit of the inaugural on TV. Fifteen minutes later, however, the committee came back into session. Senate Finance Chairman Dean Cameron, R-Rupert, apologized. "Other places may be able to stop working but we don't get to," he said, and the panel delved back into the Medicaid budget.

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