State of the Union Comment

This is a comment I made on a washingtonpost.com board. The end addresses the other commenters. Ironically, it was too long, so it wasn't actually posted...

The State of the Union was an eloquent speech full of strength and idealism, two qualities that have been absent from Washington for a very long time. Obama was careful to point out that he's not naive (he knows just how entrenched those in Congress are with special interests). I was impressed with the boldness of his points, and I almost expected him to call them out, as in "I know each and every one of you are thinking about your biggest campaign contributor and how mad they're getting right now. Let them go. Stand on your own platform!" It was incredibly disingenuous of the Democrats to applaud him when he called out the special interest influence, and he even tried to stop their applauding at one point. They didn't get that he was talking to them, too.

Which seems to be the problem with a lot of the comments here. I firmly believe that Obama is operating on a four year cycle; he's not running for reelection yet. He believes that, if he just does what is right for transparent and logical reasons, the American people will appreciate it. And, if they don't - oh well. America needs saving right now; we have needed it for the past twenty years. If Obama only gets to be president until 2012, but he manages to make a lasting impact to improve our infrastructure, our economy, our standing in the world, our defense, then I'm pretty sure that's fine with him. We need it, and he wants to give it to us. We need him.

For those of you who call him a liar, or make comments about how high speed trains don't put food on the table, I ask you to explain yourselves. Please. I don't want to be naive in my opinions, and i like to know all sides of an argument. So please present a side to the argument. So much of what happens on these boards is based on assumptions that no one actually agrees on in the first place. I think high speed rail will put food on the table by invigorating the economy through cheaper and faster transportation of goods and workers. If the VRE was a high speed rail that could be relied on, I might consider living farther from my place of work. This would help invigorate the economy in the poorer parts of the state in the same way that highways invigorated economies when they were built. It would be great if private companies would build and maintain these railways, but they aren't doing that, so the government needs to.

Obama's whole premise is that, since the free market has failed us, since the government was run into the ground by the previous administration, since other countries are leapfrogging us in areas that will be vital to the 21st century, we have to do something. Do you disagree with that premise? Why?

Obama's plan is to put money into education and emerging technology markets, while at the same time creating a market more conducive to responsible and fair lending. Do you think we shouldn't do that? Why? What do you suggest instead? Why is that different from what's happened the past ten years, and why will it work?

Think. Then post.

Massholes

So, Ted Kennedy's seat goes to the Republicans. Republicans interpret this in the only way they know how ("EVERYONE has an irrational hatred of Democrats!"), and columnists call it a referendum on Obama. I'm inclined to agree with them, if only indirectly. This election is a referendum on the leadership in Congress. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi had the entire government on a silver platter, and couldn't manage to do anything with it. They allowed special interests and morons to dominate the health care debate over the summer when they should have had something concrete worked up. They allowed irrational fear-mongers scream about bureaucratic health care and death panels while they did nothing to extol the virtues of what they were trying to do. They failed to pass clean energy legislation. They failed to reign in corporate payouts. They failed to do anything about education, labor, trade, or immigration. In short, they did not strike while the iron was hot, and now they look like asses.

So what does Obama have to do with this? Very little. And that's the problem. He stepped back to allow these jackasses to take the lead. Maybe he was scared of repeating Clinton's mistakes, and being rebuffed if he handed them a cut and dried agenda. Maybe he was starry eyed because of the seniority of Reid. Who knows. The fact is, Americans didn't want Reid or Pelosi to shape the agenda - they were put in leadership positions by Washington politicians. Americans want Obama to shape the agenda, and I hope this election serves as a wakeup call to the White House that they need to get off their asses and start putting people's nuts in a vice.