I’ll say this for the man, he is a master rhetorician, and can hold forth on a speech like no other.   Of course, I do like the President.  I also admire his intellect, and consider him a critical thinker.  With all that said, I believe he hit it OUT of the park!  The man gave a hell of a speech.  My opinion.  You’re welcome to your own. 

He took the time to go over several points that I truly consider important, starting not with the economy, but with the state of our polity.  The climate of our politics is either in the throes of global warming, or in an ice age, depending on your perspective and penchant for imagination.  However, I don’t think anyone will deny that it simply does not work, and is getting worse.  The ideological divide is no longer a simple thing across which we can reach, hold hands, and come together.  No, now it’s a mawing chasm across which we fire metaphorical artillery seeking to annihilate each other.   This must stop!  We must elevate our politics.  

These words from the President’s speech indeed exemplify my personal pain and frustration at the current political climate, and the ideological power and profit driven forces that promote and propagate it.  However, personally I find greater fault with the people, and those of us that should be wise enough to know, that allow the people to wander, to go with the gut, to dispense perspective, call others sheeple, and proceed to immediately act like sheep. 

We should each consider the effects of policy on ourselves, then our families, and then our communities.  Many of us may then make the logical step to how a given policy will affect our state, and in the aggregate our nation.  However, it is those first few steps that far too many of us don’t take.  We listen to the rhetoric and internalize the words and thoughts of others, and we’re quick to accuse the so-called opposition of a lack of consideration, a lack of critical thinking skills.  In fact we readily jump on the bandwagon and call others evil, or just plain stupid.  We lack the critical perspective to understand that we’re being negatively critical of others, which is not a way to form a more perfect union.  There is no back road to achieving success for us all by being divisive, by calling an ideology a disease, by accusing people of associating with murderers and child killers, and laughing about it.  THIS IS NOT FUNNY!  

Actually, it’s quite sad and does not bode well for the majority of Americans.  There are those Americans who call others sheeple, but act like sheep, and happily support their espoused ideology, be it liberal or conservative, without regard for the impact either path has on their own lives.  They instead, without realizing it, lobby in the aggregate for the privileged.  They miss the fact that the privileged are often good rain or shine, expansion or recession, and in a depression, they have people on retainer to make it better.  You find this thought process in both Democrat and Republican.  It must stop.

The President is right.  We ordinary Americans do hope.  I hold myself and my fellow Americans responsible.  I also hold our elected officials responsible.  The Democrats are in power and though I have voted Republican, I am demanding that Republicans stop acting like children and start behaving like adults.  Every move they have made is designed to look somehow productive to the people as an effort to save America from destruction.  Actually, it is nothing more then obstructionists politics with a populists appeal aimed at regaining power.  TO WHAT END?  

The people seem to miss that if they vote Republican in November not only will they get more of the same from the Bush Administration, but they’ll get it with delay, and contradiction, and no forward movement in policy.  The Democrats will attempt to become obstructionist and we will be in the same place we are now.  Our government will stall right when it needs to be making progress.  I demand that we elevate our politics.  I will vote for the Republican that actually reads the bills, that actually sits with Democrats, that stops lying.   I will vote for the Democrat that best represents my interest and is willing to sit down with the Republicans in earnest and lean into discomfort, engaging in positive conflict in order to define a workable solution.  

The President did cut taxes.  If he were a Republican this would make sense to other Republicans.  However, because he’s a Democrat the Republican consensus is he didn’t go far enough.  They’re already lining up to say no to his new tax cut proposals because they say they’re not broad enough.  That’s not the truth.  The truth is he’s a Democrat and they are still working on removing him from power.  And the same plan would be in place if things were the other way around.  We, as the American electorate, must seek and push for the elevation of our politics!  We must eschew ideological rhetoric and hateful vitriol.  We must hold our officials accountable and seek to be knowledgeable enough to do so effectively.  And most importantly for us individuals, we must aspire to critical cognition, to think effectively, so that we don’t simply devour information and regurgitate it without careful consideration. 

This is part and parcel to the ideology of government as an evil monolithic thing that seeks to control every aspect of your life.  This isn’t even really ideology.  It’s a show piece, fluff at the core of a profit making agenda.  Evil resonates.  Attaching evil to an object resonates.  It gives people something to fight, to objectify, to rail against.  And why do this? Because it’s profitable.  Are we all getting it yet?

The truth is Government creates jobs.  Those of you who listen to the rhetoric, please take a moment to consider a differing perspective.  I want you first to define what a job is.  Go ahead.  Look up the definition of job.  Then, look at a department of the government be it local, state, or federal.  Okay, answer the question based solely on the definition.  Does government create jobs?  Go ahead … answer the question.  Both my parents worked at the Internal Revenue Service until they retired.  That was their job.  It doesn’t have anything to do with me hating taxes.  The fact is they had a job working for the IRS.  Their hard work at their job raised me, and put me through college.   It was a job.  A job created by the government of the United States of America.  I personally would have liked the President to toss this government does not create jobs garbage aside and speak truth to words, to power.  However, he’s walking a fine line.  I do understand.  He’s absolutely right that government can and should create an environment that fosters job growth for small businesses.  However, can we dispense with the asinine rhetoric as well?  Please?  

Spending continues, because it must.  There are those out there that actually advocate a broad scythe to the budget.  The Federal government needs to stop spending immediately.  The Federal government needs to concentrate on defense and eliminate its impact everywhere else.  This assertion … is frustrating.  If one considers it critically, it truly makes no sense.  Human beings, and the world we’ve crafted, are far too dynamic … and primitive.  I believe in the axiom that one day Human will not kill Human.  Sincerely this is a noble thing to aspire to.  However, as we are today we spend an inordinate amount of time killing each other.  We kill dreams.  We kill hope.  We kill the possibility of change.  We kill progress.  We do this to accumulate power, and in the act of seeking power, even as we break the backs of psyches and souls, we commit the ultimate act, and kill literally.  We traffic across the globe in murder as the end-product of acts of individual desire, passion, or hate, and we do the same in the aggregate, as policing actions, power politics that pierce souls and lays waste to minds, bodies, and hearts.  We, as human beings, are not evolved enough to stand apart, and persist in a minimalists government.   As we are now, as soon as we make the attempt, a few people will get together to assert …something, some kind of authority.  It’s human nature.  Hopefully it would be for the good, it could quite possibly be for ill.  Consider it. 

In terms of the national debt, I would posit that people truly stop listening to the mantra coming through the megaphone and truly take a look at what happens every time an official gets tax cutting happy.  There’s a reason Supply Side economics never works in practice.  It’s because every time it’s attempted the government keeps right on spending, and sometimes without regard to the impact.  One need only look back over the last eight years to see this.  

This is not an indictment of Supply Side Theory.  I’m no Keynesian.  As with so many things I believe the path to prosperity requires perspective, a healthy mix of both sides in our overall policy.  We must spur innovation and spend wisely, not haphazardly.  I, like most Americans, hate taxes on general principle.  However, I’m willing to foot my fair share as long as it’s being spent wisely, and the truth of that spending is readily available.  I’m thoroughly enjoying the many groups and information outlets that are dragging the lies into the light of day.  Officials have operated in the shadow for too long.  Our paradigm shift in information exposure has changed this.  WEB 2.0 makes it possible.  No side can hide, nor should they attempt to do so.  This is no indictment of Republicans in favor of Democrats.  They are BOTH CUPLABLE.  We must close the schism between factions.  Heal our wounds and come to compromise.  We must be serious about our political discourse. 

With regard to health care … it’s simple.  It’s a must.  The administration steps away from Health Care Reform at the risk of losing my vote.  I will be a thorn in the side of this administration if they step away from this critical debate.  It is just as important, if not more important, than any military engagement in Afghanistan. We are talking about the well being of OUR PEOPLE!  Health care is a must.

The Supreme Court’s ruling appears to hold true to the task of that august institution. However, what is at issue, in my opinion, is the crux of the problem between strict constructionists and loose constructionists; the highly charged debate between judicial activism and judicial restraint.  What most of us wanted in this instance is for the Court to consider the ramifications beyond the extent of the highest law of the land.  Even some who support judicial restraint call for this perspective with regard to this particular verdict.  It’s difficult to have it both ways.  We must all concede this.  I assert, as in all things involving human beings, there is no absolute.  The very nature of humanity prohibits it.  When we attempt to do so, we run the risk of disaster, the possibility of things going awry.  This is the critical perspective of the majority, with regard to the Court’s decision.  Now, the Legislative Branch of our government must act quickly to reverse the course the courts have set.  If not, I fear this year’s elections will be a corporate circus of spending and spin, marketing to the masses to push corporate agendas.  The same power that convinces you to by that hot new product will now be able to expend considerable sums of money in convincing you that the official who should govern is the man in this hot candy-colored commercial.  It will be MDC (Media-Driven ConsumerCelebreality) at its finest, determining the direction of government, even more than it does already.   

In the speech he mentioned more, much more.  Again, many will consider this President as taking on too much.  I completely disagree.  One must reach for the stars in order to attain the mountaintop.  The President once wrote a book about being audacious.  Americans are most certainly audacious.  Ours is a nation that is characterized by innovation, courage, hope, and a core ethic that believes in doing things not only because we must, but because we can.  It has been said, and I firmly believe, that such a personal mandate is what makes us Americans.   We can and must hold fast to the courage of our convictions, and continue to be AUDACIOUS!