I forced myself to suffer through the anointed one's state of the union speech last night and have come to the conclusion that Obama is even more arrogant than Bill Clinton. First of all, is there ANY need to drone on for an hour and ten minutes on anything? Second of all, while Obama was "feeling our pain", which he incidentally helped to create in large part, he also exuded a smug and arrogant demeanor in parts of his speech. Overall, he did not come across as very presidential and rather seemed to be back on the campaign trail once again. That being said, below are my thoughts on the good, bad, and the ugly from this mess of a speech.
The Good (as Obama stated; whether he is being honest and actually intends to carry out these things is a completely other matter.)
1. Will grant small business tax credits
2. Will eliminate capital gains tax for small businesses that reinvest
3. Call for more nuclear power plants
4. Call for more offshore gas and oil development (I don't believe this for a second!)
5. Call for more clean coal technology (Yeah, I doubt this too.)
6. Call for doubling exports in the next five years. (Good suggestion but no specifics given.)
7. Enforce trade agreements. (Well, duh!)
8. Starting in 2011, freeze all discretionary government spending for the next 3 years (good start but needs a hell of a lot more cuts than this to even make a tiny dent in the deficit.)
9. Restore pay as you go law (ABSOLUTELY!)
10. Earmark reform - all earmark requests listed on a single website before a vote. (Great idea!)
The Bad/Ugly
1. Bank bailouts - "not popular but necessary" (Not when you reward Goldman Sachs especially)
2. TARP
3. Call for placing fees on biggest banks (This will only decrease lending and increase our costs)
4. "Taxes not raised by a single dime" (His policies, whether called a tax or not, have drastically now and certainly in the future taken more money from our wallets)
5. Tax-payer subsidizing of high speed railroads etc. (Let private industry fund this, if viable)
6. Clean energy products (Again, if this is viable, private industry will lead the way)
7. Call for passing an energy and climate bill (This is one of two biggest job and economy killing ideas he has proposed, let alone the fact that a climate bill is not needed!)
8. Obama's arrogance and smirk after proclaiming the "overwhelming scientific evidence" shows that climate change is occurring. (Thanks Al Gore Jr., but this is NOT so and you know it!)
9. Cookie cutter federally mandated education reform. (Let this be done by local or state jurisdictions)
10. Call for $10K college tax credits and Pell grants where debt is forgiven for student loans in 20 years (10 for those in public service). (This only encourages the government to pick up the tab for loans that are already the highest defaulted by type.)
11. Health insurance reform (Yes, but not anything like what Obama or the Democrats want. He asked for suggestions. Go to the GOP website for REAL suggestion that will work!)
12. Iran and North Korea are more isolated (No they are not. Both are still belligerent, antagonistic and dangerous. Obama has done nothing to lessen this!)
13. Call for the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" policy for the armed forces. (This is hugely disruptive and provides for a large issue in discipline and morale of troops if enacted.)
14. Scolding of the Supreme Court on recent decision regarding corporate freedom of speech. (Whether this is something agreed upon or not, a state of the union speech is not the place to scold a co-equal branch of the federal government!)
President Obama near the end of his speech said, "America must always stand on the side of freedom and human dignity." It is too bad that these lofty words are often betrayed by the actions of Obama and the Democrats with their dependency-creating policies and their lack of support for the affirmation of life and American values. Unfortunately, the state of the union, regardless of our president's speech last night is not good right now. Hopefully, it will begin to get better come November though.
2 comments:
I wonder Paine, do you question the scientific consensus on gravity?
Dave, by the leaked internal emails from some of the "leading" scientists in the field, their own admissions were such that they had to falsify data in order to justify their theories.
Climate changes. Always has and always will. Man-caused climate change is nothing more than an attempt at curbing individual freedoms and redistribution of wealth to poorer nations. It is Marxism on a grand scale. And, there is a huge body of research and a growing number of scientists brave enough to step up against this evil agenda and state that this global warming tripe is a thinly-documented theory at the very best.
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