As speeches go, it was one of the best. As cheerleading and bully pulpiting go, it was magnificent. But I still hate State of the Union addresses. Obama was as subtly partisan as they come while blaming George W. Bush for all of our debt problems of the last decade or so, and his claim that we need to be more bipartisan was clearly aimed at Republicans. And he lied about not having any lobbyists on his payroll.
Barack Obama is so much more pleasant to listen to than the nasally, twangy George W. Bush. He's clearly a very intelligent man. Which makes it all the more embarrassing that he jumped to the juvenile level of haranguing supposedly know-nothing Republicans and Supreme Court Justices. Presidents ought to be above that.
Is Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg qualified to sit on the High Court? She appeared, from a lengthy video shot during Obama's address, to be at death's door. Do her clerks write her opinions and then have her sign them?
How many lies did Obama tell? At least one. He said he doesn't have any lobbyists in policy-making positions. Admittedly his lie is nothing compared to the lies George W. Bush told about Iraq and Iran on a regular basis during his State of the Union addresses.
How can President Obama, with a straight face, call for bipartisanship, and then continually but subtly cite examples that accuse only the Republican party of not being bi-partisan?
At 28 minutes into the speech, Obama claimed that we need to double exports over the next 5 years, which will lead to 2 million new jobs. Which hat did he pull THAT rabbit out of?
I disagreed with the recent Supreme Court decision about corporate campaign funding, as did Obama, but don't you think he should apologize for his brazen and arrogant behavior toward the court in his speech?
President Obama has been President for a year now. Can he please pull himself out from behind the shadow of George W. Bush, and quit complaining that everything that has gone wrong is Bush's fault?
Obama's intent to use $30 billion in loans to small businesses is like a chivalrous man offering to a charming woman a deck chair on the sinking Titanic. Keynesianism sucks. It has never worked. It never will. And we have tens of trillions of dollars of debt to show for it.
For just a moment I thought that Obama was going to admit that bailing out Wall Street had been a big mistake. He almost said as much, but then, in deference to his puppet masters, he turned and ran the other way. "We can agree," he said. "We all hated the bank bailout. It was as popular as a root canal. But we couldn't have allowed the meltdown of the financial system." I'm sure our President has a better understanding than that of how bankruptcy law works.
How many times did the President mention the Federal Reserve's role in the economic debacle of the last couple of years? How about the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? If you said, "Not once," you are correct.
Will
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please
explain
the
economic
crisis
to
me?
Frank, blaming Bush's Great Recession on President Bush is entirely appropriate. Bush also doubled the National Debt and busted the budget. President Obama was simply reciting the facts, while politely avoiding mentioning Bush by name.
ReplyDelete"By the time I took office, we had a one year deficit of over $1 trillion and projected deficits of $8 trillion over the next decade. Most of this was the result of not paying for two wars, two tax cuts, and an expensive prescription drug program. On top of that, the effects of the recession put a $3 trillion hole in our budget. All this was before I walked in the door."
He could have added: "And that, folks, was the state of the nation a year ago."
The Supreme Court made a bad decision. The president, with due deference, called them on it.
As for partisanship, the day after President Obama challenged them to support deficit reduction and everything else that Republicans claim they stand for, in the Senate the Party of NO voted unanimously against PAYGO. Which they used to be FOR.
The man has already proven to be a master orator, but I'm not sure he's much more than that. The SotU was just another example of that. Many places where he stretched the truth, plenty of bully pulpit partisanship.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with you regarding his remarks about the SCotUS. They deserved to be publicly called out to their faces on their wrong decision. (and yes, you're right about how Bader-Ginsberg looked. That doesn't mean that her mind isn't as keen as ever, but she did look like she was on death's door).
I personally don't really see why everyone makes such a big deal of the SotU address. I watched it because my wife was eager, but I just don't think we should focus so much on speeches. I'm more concerned with concrete action.
This is a good speak if speak loudly in the square.
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