January 24, 2007
Why does he actually have to state the State of the Union?
Last night was the annual party known as The State of the Union Address and Our Fine President seemed a bit more reserved and less braggadocios than in previous years as he repeated past talking points, glossed over failures and while not everything he said was off base with the mood of the country, he managed to annoy me in the beginning, the end and of course in the middle.
His first real line was “This rite of custom brings us together…” and this got us off on the wrong foot. A rite is a custom, and he really could have shortened things up by dropping his unneeded synonym. It could have been his choice, we could have been brought together for one or the other whichever he preferred, but both was a redundant start. I guess that was a bit of a theme.
At the end he got on my nerves by stating, as he always does in this speech, “The state of our union is strong…” The way I see it, his speech should expound upon the state in which our union sits and where he’d like to take this country in his remaining two years. Some of his talking did that, but plenty of it was rehashing of old ideas and empty rhetoric like the above statement. He’s not going to put it this way, but the divisive political of the era he’s led have split this nation’s opinions to polar extremes and little he’s done appears aimed at healing that rift.
Through the middle of his speech he laid out all manner of plans and always talked about the future. That’s a place where his and my ideals seem to diverge. He never really speaks about the present and how people are getting along right now. Maybe making sure people are able to live promising lives now will go a long way to insuring the progress we hope to see in the future.
Our Fine President talked a good bit about fiscal responsibility and fixing Medicare and Social Security, but he’s never presented a plan to Congress with an honest financial estimate or offered any compromise in his concept of ending government entitlement programs via a slow privatization process.
He continued on about the need for a sound immigration policy that permits guest workers but discourages illegal entry. He recognized the major dilemma over the plight of people currently here illegally and said, “We need to resolve the status of the illegal immigrants who are already in our country - without animosity and without amnesty” I’m not quite sure what his plan is then, will we be charging them a fee to stay, kicking them out in the nicest way possible, (candygram maybe?) or maybe telling them to enlist in the army and then they can become citizens.
His big push was on energy, the need for new sources and the way freeing our nation’s dependence on foreign oil hurt our security. All his ideas for saving energy were built on sci-fi notions that technology is just on the cusp of a revolution and if we just keep doing what we’re doing, that breakthrough will fix everything. He made his point about how important this is saying, “This dependence leaves us more vulnerable to hostile regimes, and to terrorists - who could cause huge disruptions of oil shipments … raise the price of oil …. and do great harm to our economy.”
Way to give the terrorists an idea there. If that wasn’t part of their plans before it is now.
He continued by rolling out a tax break disguised as a health care measure because his only two plans seem to be “keep on keepin on” and “cut them taxes.” Then of course he got to the war in Iraq and the fight against terrorism. He extolled his use of every lawful means to fight the terrorist without acknowledging the fact that he’s also been using a number of illegal means too. And then came one of my favorites:
“Free people are not drawn to violent and malignant ideologies - and most will choose a better way when they are given a chance. “
Where does this come from? Is there some evidence he or anyone can point me to that correlates free societies with peaceful coexistence? The way history looks when I glace at it is societies of all types have violence and violent individuals. Our Fine President shows amazing ignorant to the tragic irony of his waging war in the name of peace.
He continued with his speech trying to bolster prospects for his new Iraq strategy via shear force of will. He talks like he truly believes that if everyone just believes in his plans hard enough, they’ll work out great. The words were a little different this time around as stay the course and other catch phrases have long since worn off on the public, but the meaning was the same.
He’s Our Fine President for another two years and like it or not (and plenty of us don’t) he’s going to lead his way. I guess no one told him that if you walk off in a direction by yourself and no one follows you, you’re just out for a stroll. Someone has to be following for a leader to be any more than a wanderer or a passerby.