samboct
Posts: 1817
Joined: 1/17/2007
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Hi Marini
Good to see you back! I'm playing hooky for a few- so I'll throw my $0.03 (inflation) in. I didn't watch the speech- I listened to it as I was busy reformatting references.
Overall- shy on specifics and funding. Not much there to be taken all that seriously I'm afraid. Yes, he's saying he's pushing education and clean tech. Show me the money- although there was a tweak in educational loans which are a disaster these days. In clean tech- calling for 1 million electric cars on the road by 2015- not much of a goal. Had he said we're going to be converting the federal mail truck fleet over-that would have been noteworthy- and a good idea if there were $$$ behind it. The difference between the Apollo program and clean tech is that Apollo had money- and clean tech doesn't. Serious clean tech proposals begin with a T in terms of dollars.
High speed rail- sorry- it's a sick joke. We don't have the population density of Europe or Japan where this can make sense. Who needs to go to Iowa in a hurry anyway? Given the population flocking to the coasts and leaving the Midwest empty, it's silly to build rail lines to nowhere- Japan found that out in a hurry.
The war time stuff- no biggie. We're still winning- but who knows when we're victorious? Repeal of DADT- popular with everybody but the brass.
Illegal immigration- nothing specific, but he's also pointing out the idiocy of deporting kids once they graduate college. He ignored the strong racist tinge to the immigration issue.
Normal nonsense around eliminating unnecessary regulation (the problem is that the biggest driver of silly regulations is Cali- but they also come up with some good ones.), cleaning up the tax code, reducing corporate taxes....Nothing I took seriously.
One thing on the table that might actually move though- the issue around medical malpractice. The Republicans have been calling for reform on medical malpractice and the Democrats have balked to satisfy the trial lawyers. Well, it's a disaster and I haven't seen a study that accurately accounts for the costs of medical malpractice- they're all deeply methodologically flawed- on par with clean air and water is free. This would be a big step in actual health care reform compared to the recent bill mislabeled health care, but really insurance industry reform.
There was a lot of commentary about the seating arrangements. I'm wondering if this is one of those seemingly small changes that can actually have a big effect.
Overall- what he did was make sure that if the Republicans do decide to govern- they're not going to have an entrenched battle on their hands. If they could work in a bipartisan fashion- they wouldn't have egg on their faces from anything the Pres. said. So perhaps the most important thing he did was to not slam the door in the freshman congressional faces. The problem is that he's widely perceived as being too pandering to the Republicans, and the campaign mantra of change has been jettisoned in favor of bipartisanship.
Ways to tell if the speech was effective....If the idea of ditching "Obamacare" is dropped- if the Republicans decide that they had years to propose substantial changes in health care and did nothing- and that the current insurance system is in fact, a Republican plan given the alternative was a single payer system and they decide that "Obamacare" isn't too, too dreadful and with some changes, might be workable- well- it's been a success. But if the Republicans insist on trying to repeal the health care act- then a far more partisan speech where he slams the Republicans for their distortions, their role in getting us into two unwinnable wars, driving up the deficit fantastically, deregulating the financial industry to the point of global calamity etc- was the way to go.
Given the Republican talking imbecile after the speech I saw on MSNBC blathering on about how the deficit was both parties responsibility (I gave up after that.) maybe the gross distortions of the Republican owned media are getting hard for a lot of people to swallow.
Obama's approval ratings are climbing- given the Republican crazies alternative- Obama may start looking pretty good to the center. Maybe he can pull out a second term.
Sam
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RE: State of the Union - 
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