Posted on 01/26/2011 5:39:15 AM PST by Hojczyk
As usual, Americans approve of a State of the Union speech.
But this speech will be remembered not for anything that was said but for where people sat, and for the fact that a new man sat behind the president for the first time, House Speaker John Boehner, who, if he leads well in the next year, could be in that camera shot long after President Obama has retired.
It would be puff talk to label the speech pedestrian. There was nothing new at all in the speech, and quite a lot recycled from old Team Obama rhetoric. In the run-up to the address, the gang at MSNBC were upset that the words "gun," "ammunition," "climate change" and "global warming" were not in the draft leaked before the president even entered the chamber, exclusions that signaled the president's decision to continue his symbolic march to the center.
But with the exception of an invitation for the Congress to send him tort reform legislation, there was nothing centrist about the speech. Its tired old talk of "investments" like high speed trains, the attack on oil companies, and the demands for tax hikes underscored that the president simply lacks the intellectual flexibility to deal with the changed circumstances that both he and the country faces.
President Obama is out of gas. His ideology is not capable of dealing with the economic realities of governing and his emotional commitment to the core beliefs of the left won't allow for the sort of innovation needed right now. He actually called for a government reorganization, the last gasp of a progressive with no chance of moving legislation. He is going to try and move the lines around on the federal flow chart and call it change.
Worst of all, in a speech in which he called for crucially necessary improvements in American education --and in speech made during School Choice Week-- he proposed none. Just a few days ago Detroit announced a move towards a policy of what is essentially warehousing of kids and abandonment of physical capital, and the president is still touting one school in Denver he has been holding up for a year. On the subject of education where he could lead, could pull a "Nixon-to-China," the president failed as badly as the math and science achievement levels he pointed to. President Obama urged parents to turn off television sets and encouraged young people to become teachers. That's it. The president talked innovation, but he is the enemy of innovation that challenges the monopolies that dominate public education in most of the school districts across the country, and by doing so condemns another generation of children to the second-rate (if that) education he condemned in his remarks.
Detroit isn't different, it is first. And given the president's obvious fealty to the teachers' unions, it is the first among many.
The spin may work for a day, but there was nothing in the speech that will be remembered beyond next month. It serves mostly as a signal that the president will be presiding for the next year, at least on matters domestic. It is up to the Republicans to tackle the very serious fiscal crisis, the solution to which has nothing to do with high speed trains and electric cars.
I don't really think Obama has ever given a memorable speech. I can't think of any quotes from his speeches. Sure, I remember that he gave "a big speech on race" and he gave "a big speech in Tucson" but do I remember what he said? Not at all.
I dislike JFK quite a bit, but everyone can quote parts of various JFK speeches. Obama? Quotable? His speeches are completely forgettable.
I noticed that the Republicans’ reaction to the speech was orchestrated by Boehner. If he just sat there, they just sat there. If he offered half-hearted applause, they did, too.
Which sure explains the Dems’ mindless applause in the last two years - little Nancy Pop-Up was the leader.
Detroit has a staff: pupil ratio of 1 to 5.
That’s INSANE, especially when you consider how lousy the results are.
The President ignored the disaster that is Detroit, and US education in general. He ignored the crushing Sovereign debt and the coming devaluation of the dollar.
Instead he boldly took the bull by the horns and talked about trains. This is a Hitler-in-the-bunker level of disconnect.
" And I especially want to thank you for bringing me all that
Oolong tea. Tea is very big around here since Nov 2010."
I could not stand to watch it last night. What’s this 5 pillars stuff I have been reading about? Did he really use the word pillars?? I thought for sure I would see a thread bashing him for that, meaning Islam has pillars too and it may even be 5. Help anyone??
That's because he ripped them off from Cicero.
...except for the one about his being a jelly doughnut.
"There is nothing to say that hasn't been said.
There is nothing to do that hasn't been done".
Liberalism as orchestrated in American politics is full of Big Things. The problem is, governing is about an endless string if interdependant small things. When you think Big Things and fail Big, you blame others for the failures. When you manage an endless string of small things, sound policy and leadership empower the fixing to delegated subordinates and even the American people themselves.
The 10 pillars of Islam.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillars_of_Islam
Yes, Islam has five pillars.
And there are 57 Islamic states. So, when Obama said that he had visited all 57 states, he was telling us something.
All those golf games and Hawaii vacations are just so exhausting.
Which by the way is an Islamic message. It’s his way of communicating that there is much more to be done and that he needs their help. There is a deliberate reason why he picked the number five.
OBAMA will be the ‘forgettable president’, provided we can find enough voters who realize the anarchists have bitch-slapped them with the ‘08 election of this pretender. His overthrow is necessary, but what is even more necessary is that he be filed away into the landfill with the other trash and this country and its’ patriots focus all energy and determination on defining and eradicating the forces that elected him in the first place. These forces need to be strung up on the light pole for everyone to see and a message sent to the world that we are forever embarrased by his election and will never tolerate this shame again - from a Soros, or anyone who panders to him.
Why would Barry be exhausted? He uses a golf cart when he golfs.
We are all Detroit. The only barrier between us and Detroit now is the tens of billions of Treasury bonds China buys each month.
Is it me or??? The misguided media whores don’t seem as excited as they used to be about the pretender, nobama, when he utters his banalities. Maybe they are having a collective case of nobama-dysfunction (ND). They just can’t get it up anymore.
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