<![CDATA[Once more into the breach with my annual State of the Union commentary…. Will he enter in military uniform? No, this year I expect an ecumenical robe. So, reactions real-time….
We don't see the Chief Justice, only one Supreme at this little talk. Over in Personal Democracy Forum, liza writes "white smoke at the vatican and the supreme court?"
Here he is, Mr. President. Purple fingers raised by Congresspeople, and Bush raises his eyebrows. Wonder if he understood this symbolism, as he doesn't watch the news.
CNN's Wolf Blitzer suggests the Iraqi election will "spillover" on other issues Bush will discuss. He says "spillover" again and again. This is silly. A moment of triumphalism that will quickly evaporate. Alas, the Republican spinner with Blitzer is the only one to get in a word, obviously supporting this dumb idea.
"We've been placed in office by the people we serve" and follows with Afghanistan, Ukraine and Iraq. Purple fingers raised. This man's mandate is weaker than those in any of those elections. He then claims he renewed the nation's commitment to the ideal of freedom around the world, though he merely made that claim for himself. This is a sermon, the robes are coming out.
Advances in medicine? He's the force restraining medical advances we could really use. Not just stem cells, but real reform of the healthcare system and pharmaceutical development.
All future all the time, but only to preface the many crises he will raise up in the coming minutes.
2.3 million new jobs, roughly 600,000 fewer than needed to keep up with population growth. This is why unemployment hasn't budged.
"restrain the spending appetite of the federal government"? Oy! He's cutting the deficit in half by 2009, when it will still be 100 percent higher than it was when he took office.
"Taxpayer dollars must be spent wisely or not at all…." One wonders if the $80 billion in wasted spending in Iraq counts in the equation of wisdom we’re hearing about here.
I’m a small business owner and I worry less about junk law suits than I do about not having the power to sue someone who does damage to my business…. Frivolous asbestos law suits? By people who can’t breathe? Liability has to lie somewhere, so if we can’t pay it out of the wisely spent federal money, then let’s leave the courts as an avenue of last resort.
The chamber is a perfectly reflection of the country. Half are sitting unmoved while the other applaud platitudes.
Conservation? Eesh. Clear skies is a buzzword for polluting poorer communities. If we’re going to be less reliant on foreign energy, why are we fighting wars for oil that we were literally promised would be paid for by oil revenues.
Cheney smirks as Bush explains his plan to revamp the tax code. He’s thinking “I write off everything, the poor pay and fight the wars.”
A symbol of trust between two generations…. Honor its great purposes. So, gut the thing? It’s current path is bankruptcy? See Krugman, who summarizes this idiocy succinctly.
Over 55 and you are safe. No change at all. But all the rest of us get to ride the rusty rails of the markets. Interesting that if the system is left alone the worst economic potential comes true, but if it is changed the Bushies’ most optimistic economic forecasts are going to come true.
Nice to hear some booing. Finally, some backbone.
We share a responsibility to Mr. Bush’s base: Put more liquidity into the market for the rich! Bush rehearses many reasonable steps we might take, but none are what he is suggesting. They may be on the table, but these ideas are red herrings to get us to accept the idea that privatization is suitable.
He will listen to anyone with a good idea to offer? Could we have an example of Mr. Bush’s willingness to listen to alternative views? Just one? Wait, even Colin Powell is gone. No deviation from the Bush view tolerated.
This is a dictation, not a dialogue.
Cheney’s grinning like a demon.
A nest egg is a better deal because it is in the market, where folks like Cheney can gather it up. Risk is the nature of the marketplace. The government can never take it away, but the market can. See Enron for examples. How about MCI Worldcom? A conservative mix of bonds and stock funds? Well, if the dollar collapses because of the massive debt being run up by the Bushies, then there is no safe government bond….
Good lord, if people who love one another are allowed to marry it could hurt the kids. Here comes the abortion campaign… A culture of life. We could use a culture that valued the living.
We should all be able to agree on some clear standards? This in a room full of ideological divisions? It’s not partisan politics, just different views. No human life shouldn’t be sold, but it should be based on real choices about the use of cells, the freedom to reproduce or not.
We’ll give your nominees a vote, the Dems are saying. See them sitting down? They won’t let the scoundrels in.
A three-year initiative to end gang membership? Well, at least it’s not a war. Wait, it’s faith-based, so it’s a kind of war. I endorse fighting violence against women, and strong independent manhood, but I don’t see Laura Bush as a leader for that program. How about Colin Powell? How about anyone who has spoken on the issue forcefully.
In America we should make sure no person is every wrongly held or convicted of a crime they didn’t commit? Tell that to people charged under the Patriot Act, who can’t hear the charges but are imprisoned. He’s just introduced an Orwellian idea of testing everyone’s DNA preemptively. It’s the only way to say someone didn’t commit a crime, ending the right not to provide DNA when accused of something.
The war on terror at minute 35…. No real figures on success and some softening of insistence that we’re winning, but that masks a call for more of the same. Let’s see if Iran comes up in the next five minutes….
Wow, they sure have been good at building those coalitions that will defeat the dangers of our time. Even Tony Blair is challenging American to end its hypocritical approach to the War on Terror.
The force of human freedom apparently comes from the end of an American rifle…. There’s no right to extend our form of government? Haven’t we established that as a principal of foreign policy? That was the Bush Doctrine.
We’re witnessing landmark events in the history of democracy indeed. But we didn’t have anything to do with the Ukraine. It should be noted that we ignored the elected leaders of the Palestinians because we decided he wasn’t reasonable, even though he answered to his people. So, which is it? Democracy or cooperating with American standards?
We’re going to encourage a “higher standard of freedom” in the Middle East? He goes right on to say a royal family can deliver democracy…. Here comes the threat to Iran…. no, it’s Syria. Okay, Baathists are bad guys, we get that but, yes, Iran is the leading sponsor of terror.
Did he just ask to be invited into Iran a al the anti-Sandinista strategy. Send in the death squads with American weapons, that’s going to help win the hearts and minds in the Middle East.
Apparently a third of Congress voted in Iraq this week…. Symbolic of American-imposed government, I guess.
It was courageous to vote in Iraq. It will be a very different story when the troops leave. The point is that our troops are stuck there for as long as that democracy wants to exist….
Let’s remember that Saddam used American gas and weapons against his own people. Was it an American gun that killed this woman’s father? Was she vetted more carefully than Bernie Kerick?
He just turned the line about a small group of committed citizens being the only source of change on its head, trumping the notion of plurality. Democracy that is pro-American is a-okay, but not one that doesn’t like us. The risk of real democracy is that we may not be liked and we’d better get used to that if our goal is truly that we want to spread self-rule. If we are really concerned about this, we would be revising American foreign policy to be suppportive of dissent in all its forms and the ending of starvation and disease. That’s the way to spread an unhypoctical freedom.
I am proud of American soldiers, but I want all of them to come home after being used wisely. Bush says his orders put them at risk, but it has resisted paying for armor, kept death benefits below the poverty level and gutted on-based education. He uses but does not respect these brave people.
It’s just sickening that the parents of the dead are being applauded like this when the Bush Administration has hidden military funerals. It’s a wretched abuse and Bush is the one not applauding, but standing by despite having “ordered” these people’s boy to his death.
Wrong Roosevelt for this party. The speech is about undoing FDR’s system of government. More hypocrisy. Providence leads to freedom, but with risks in the market, so just trust us to manage your retirement funds and send your kids to fight our wars. Oh, and by the way, when we’re done with this country my base and I will be moving to the new American frontier: Iraq!
And what’s with the kissing Joe Lieberman?
CNN is always rhapsodizing the emotional moments. Calling parents who lose their child heroic bathes the tragedy of a life cut short in bathos, not glory.]]>
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SotU 2005
<![CDATA[Once more into the breach with my annual State of the Union commentary…. Will he enter in military uniform? No, this year I expect an ecumenical robe. So, reactions real-time…. We don't see the Chief Justice, only one Supreme at this little talk. Over in Personal Democracy Forum, liza writes "white smoke at the vatican […]