Here are my quick takes on the State of the Union speech today:
1. OMG, Obama gets a budget too? After all the build up and hub bub on the spending orgy called the Economic Recovery Act ($787B), I completely forgot about the normal annual appropriation bill! Chaulk up another $410B for 2009. He talks about how hard it was to put the ERA and the budget together...come on...how hard is it to spend at will. It's like giving someone $100,000 and tell them to spend it at the mall. There are sooooo many stores...where do you go, where do you start, what do you buy? Give me a break.
2. Energy. Ok, quickly what is zero times two? Hmmm. I get zero. So we are going to double our output from renewable energy in 3 years at a cost of how much? Double zero and you get zero. NO ONE in Washington understands economics. We are sitting on over 200 years of coal and hundreds of billions gallons of oil and we are going to double zero to avoid importing oil. My head hurts with all this stupidity.
3. Healthcare. Need reform? No doubt, but do we really need the Government to run this? Remember anything "free" -- which is what most people hear when politicians say healthcare reform -- must be rationed. There is never unlimited resources to continue to provide "free" things for infinity. How do you ration? Government will make decisions on what health services you will receive and when you will receive them. It is that simple. We know how it works by watching Canada and UK. How many of you truly enjoyed your experience at the division of motor vehicles so much that you want to reward government with running healthcare?
Do three things and you have a different, more responsive, and reformed healthcare system: (1) tort reform, (2) take health insurance out of company benefits, and (3) foster competition.
4. Education. Ok, so Obama was so successful with improving Chicago public schools that it is now time to do the same for the rest of the US. Not. Look into Chicago public schools and the millions Obama and others wasted. Education from birth to 18. That is another OMG moment. Public schools are so great in the cities that we will now bring in kids immediately after birth. Also, what happened to the era of responsibility? Parents won't have to worry about being responsible for those pesky kids anymore...hmm....yea we need more of that....not.
I do like his support of charter schools. There, I can say something nice.
5. He says, "we are not going to pass on debt that they [our kids] can't pay"!!!! I feel like I'm in a twilight zone episode. I love how he says what we want to hear but take actions that are exactly opposite. And we are not done spending yet. We have coming to a congressional committee near you....Auto Bailout 2, Save the Mortgages Bailout, Bank Bailout 3 (call it TARP 2 if you wish), and Econimic Stimulus 2 & 3 double header when the current stimulus doesn't work. We have added debt for our kids, their kids, and probably their kids. Because if there is one thing that is certain, government NEVER reduces. Every dollar we spend in the name of stimulus and stability will continue to be spent in the out years, subject to inflation increases of course, because we simply can't cut from the needy...
Oh, and lastly...what a snoozer from Gov Bobby Jindal. That was a horrible Republican response. There, I said something not so nice about a Republican.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
I wonder what made it sound like Bobby Jindal's speech was a snoozer? Was it the fact that he alluded to the fact that the Republicans have spent so much in the past 8 years and it was a mistake? Or was it the fact that Bobby is trying to compare himself to Obama ("Like the president's father, my own parents came to this country from a distant land") and therefore try to give himself a platform to 2012? Or was it that Bobby is not as good an orator as Obama is?
I think it is the latter combined with a first nation wide audience. He is very articulate and clear in interviews so I know he has the capacity. His content, in my opinion, was good. I liked the text of the speech...he just didn't deliver it to his capacity.
Obama is a master presenter so you can't compare. But I'm not down on Jindal. I like his story and his approach quite a lot. Let's see if he turns around Louisiana for some real evidence of his rhetoric.
Post a Comment