... was appearantly Tuesday night's SOTU speech. Did anyone see it (I had class)?
I read a couple commentaries, and I've skimmed the
transcript.
I'm impressed. Bush mentioned bin Laden by name (which I always give a thumbs up); legitimately talked about education; was truthful discussing his illegal wire-tapping saying, "Previous Presidents have used the same constitutional authority I have, and federal courts have approved the use of that authority. Appropriate members of Congress have been kept informed" (Note: he never claimed his acts were in fact legal, nor did he state he "briefed Congress"); told a decent joke about Bush Sr. and Clinton being great friends... but the best was the energy/oil/environment talk.
If you told me in 1991 that George H.W. Bush's oil-business-failure-son was going to be president (of the country) and you told me that during a State of the Union speech, he would say "America is addicted to oil" (in a bad way) and talk about reducing our oil dependency, I would not have believed you. It's been a interesting 15 years hasn't it?
I have this image of Bill Ford, CEO of Ford Motors, shaking in bed, watching Tuesday's SOTU speech, guzzling California Pinot Noir in his right hand, washing it down with Pepto-bismol in his left, whispering, "Not now, America can't really make cars now, we don't have the hybrid thing down yet, no corn oil engines, not now, not this decade, please..." (Note: I own Ford stock, hasn't been a banner 4 years.)
So Bush
got a bit over zealous with the numbers ('Most Awkward Opening Paragraph': 2006 nominee), but Kennedy did too in '62 with his pledge of going to the moon by '70 (something NASA wasn't prepared for). I'm going to give it up for G.W. this time. He's optimistic about a war he's going to win, but also about an energy policy.