[Sabertooth]

First impression report card (haven't read transcript):

War on Terror -- A
(Glad he didn't mention "road map")

Tax Cuts -- A
(more more more)

Education -- C
(Good goals, too much federalization)

Marriage Amendment -- A+
(Surprise highlight of the speech)

"Not an Amnesty" Amnesty for Illegals -- F
(Unsurprising lowlight)

Health Care -- C
(Prescription drugs, bad ... MSAs and 100% deductibility for catastrophic coverage, good)

Relative brevity of speech -- B+

Relative absence of obnoxious laundry list -- B-

Absence of cameo intros -- A

Scowls from Ted Kennedy -- A

Overall -- B+
(Better Speech than last year)

[Ciexyz]

Interesting report card. But don't you think it was worth more than a B plus?

[Victoria Delsoul]

"Not an Amnesty" Amnesty for Illegals -- F

LOL! That's what I say sometimes when I read some of the amnesty articles… WTF!

GW said emphatically tonight…. read my lips (OK, my post)… No Amnesty.

[Torie]

Well we all see it through our own judgments about issues and ideoglogical prisms. I give Bush an "A" for standing up for his forthrightly. I like his moderate activist pro market mechanism conservatism (exemplified by the abstract details of his overall health care thrust), yes I do, and admit it. I want the feds to measure and involve themselves with failing schools and kids. I admit that too.

I know, and Bush knows, that his duty is to deflect into more productive and effective channels the demands of the citizenry for a more robust social safety net, in ways that enhance the discipline of the market place, and retard the dead hand of centralized command bureaucracy, and make more benign, that which in less capable and more strident hands, could turn malignant.

Yes, his anmesty proposal is a risky scheme, as is effectively doing nothing a risky scheme, which is the only real political alternative. We shall have to see how Bush reacts to the details of the pushing and shoving on this issue, since on this issue, details really do matter. But as you and I both agree, the proposal is not likely to get anywhere, certainly this year, and probably thereafter. The status quo will triumph, to effects that you think are far more sinister than I do. And so it goes.