State of the Union
Last night’s State of the Union address has to fall into the category of unadulterated hogwash. The President had so little to say that he barely bothered to cover up his re-use of tired old snippets from both his own and other people’s past speeeches. For those of you who really feel a need to read some of what he said, the New York Times has an transcript here: Annotated State of the Union Address
The overwhelming message in the speech is that Bush has learned nothing, will apologise for nothing, and will deliver nothing. His comment on energy is the lead item in this morning’s newspapers. Why? His plans are vaporous. They completely lack urgency or concreteness, and can hardly be genuine because his whole administration has been previously been all about helping the oil industry. Bush going ‘green’ even for security reasons is an obvious sham.
His call for a less harsh political landscape sounds so hollow that one can only laugh: this is from a person who revels in viscious hardball tactics against anyone who gets in the way.
His tax cutting appears to continue unabated, despite the bulging Federal deficit. The only concession he makes to fiscal rectitude is to cut yet more services to the poor: a paltry $15 billion at that. His is the most irresponsible administration in history, and he preaches fiscal restraint? My eyes and ears may be failing, but so mush as to fall for that one!
Then, of course, is his foreign policy. It lays in ruins and yet he meanders on about facing down evil and terror. Iraq is a mess. Iran … well the list goes on. Bush has done massive damage to the American ability to build effective international partnerships, and he’s the one to lecture us anbout isolation. His policies isolated us!
Absloutely nothing of substance will come from this speech. Bush, who only a year ago was boasting about his political capital, has been reduced to a scarcely relevant onlooker as the political parties continue the culture wars that the far right unleashed on us.
There’s a lesson here for all future presidents: being competent counts. Bush isn’t, so he doesn’t.
