Pots & Pans
I started this yesterday, but didn’t come back to it to finish before the State of the Union… Oh well…
So there is a group of protesters that intends to drown out the President’s State of the Union speech tonight by banging on pots and pans [ read it here ]. How intelligent!
Unfortunately, if you play Monday morning quarterback with the speech tomorrow at work, I would guess that most people you talk to won’t be able to tell you what was said, not because of the extra background noise of clanging pots, but because they didn’t watch it. And there are two reasons (excuses) for this:
- They don’t like the President
- They don’t care
Unfortunately, both of these are pretty sad. First off, how can you be an informed citizen and, more importantly, voter, if you don’t pay attention to what is going on. To not like the President is fine. No one says you have to. But you had better pay attention to what he says in his speech tonight. These are the key issues, and they will be discussed ad nauseum until the mid-term elections in November.
So now that the State of the Union has been delivered, I’ll add to this.
I listened to the full speech last night. I think that every American should. Some people don’t for the reasons I mentioned earlier and that is sad. How can you make an informed decision on our leadership when you don’t listen to what the issues are.
Whether you like him or not, you should be aware of what the current Administration is saying. Don’t rely on the news to give you the condensed version. That could be biased one way or the other. Do your own homework - something I’ve preached before.
So if you missed it, or you need a recap, here is the transcript: http://www.whitehouse.gov/stateoftheunion/2006/
I liked the speech. I felt there could have been more focus on tax reform and energy policy. There was a clear call for bipartisan plans on key issues. There was very little call for new programs and initiatives. Now I can’t recall the last time I got that from a State of the Union speech, and that was refreshing.
The Democratic Response, compared to last year’s reponse by Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, was designed to appeal to the moderates and the so-called swing voters. Wise strategy. Virginia Governor Kaine is reported to be a moderate Democrat of a “Red State,” so the choice makes good sense. However, as I listened to the content, it may as well have been Harry Reid giving the speech.
Kaine kept telling us “There’s a better way” over and over, until it became a mantra of the response. That is all well and good, my ears are open, you have my attention Mr. Kaine. But he never got to that “better way”. We were left hanging. This is typical of the current Democratic Party, it has become a party of pessimism and negativity with no plan for real solutions.
Oh, we are told there are solutions, but we are never told what exactly they are. Their web site at dnc.org seeths with rancid negativity. If you look under “Agenda” you will see no solid meat, no plans. Just complaints and whining about the current administration. But I digress.
Kaine had a wonderful opportunity to outline the Democrats “Better Way”, if it indeed exists, and he fumbled. To me, it was the equivalent of the response to Bush’s speech last fall on the Iraq War. Bush outlined in his speech his plan for success and mentioned that the document could be downloaded from whitehouse.gov. Reid’s response to the press about the speech was that Bush still has not given us a strategy for success in Iraq.
Huh? Does that make any sense to you? Me neither. The only people that fall for that are the people that don’t listen to key political speeches and rely on what is spoon fed to them. Unfortunately, that is a massive percentage of our population.
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