I'm ready to live-blog. Keep me company!
8:06 Central Time. The room looks shabby. Why is that? Here's the President. Wan applause. Kissy faces. Biden! He's looking lanky and elderly. Michelle is swathed in — what color purple would you say that is? Eggplant? Aubergine?
8:09. Nancy's in lilac. Purple is the color... if you want to appeal to all the reds and blues of America. Obama's got a red and white — peppermint — striped tie, so I take it he means to reach out to conservatives. But how? They say he's going to ask for the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell, but that can't please conservatives. It can't please the Democrats too much either, really — can it? — as they look toward the fall elections.
8:14. The economy sucks. But it could be worse. Obama reads the letters we write him. Letters from children. They want us to set aside partisanship. The people are resilient. And so, "I have never been more hopeful about America's future than I am tonight." First applause line.
8:19. If there's one thing that unites us, it's that we all hated the bank bailout. He talks about the bank fee, which he characterizes as a way of recovering the part of the bailout that has not yet been paid back. I've never understood that, and I don't understand it now. And it's hardly bipartisan, is it?
8:23. He's making big claims about having cut taxes and creating huge numbers of jobs. I don't believe it, but Obama is telling me that I should talk to some small business owner in Phoenix whose name I didn't quite catch. Didn't give the phone number though.
8:26. Small businesses are good. (Come on, talk to them.) Big business sucks though. We want to help small business grow... so it can become big business and then we can hate it.
8:29. China has better trains.
8:31. Biden was smiling a toothy grin but now he's all frowny-face and I'm afraid he's going to cry. Is it because other countries are better than we are? Did Obama call us losers?
8:33. It's time to get serious about solving problems. Like, before? We were clowning around.
8:35. Nuclear power plants! Off-shore oil-drilling! Yay! Really? It's mixed in with a lot of "clean energy" and "climate" talk.
8:38. Let's export more stuff.
8:41. Hey, kids! Do your homework!
8:42. $10,000 in tax credits for college (for the whole 4 years?). And you'll only have to pay 10% of your income, at the most, to pay back your college loans. After 20 years of that, any remaining debt is forgiven.
8:44. Why the hell did I get bogged down in health care reform!?
8:45. Michelle. Oh, my! What does that expression on her face mean? I get a chill and imagine she hates him. I'll go back and get a photograph of this later.
8:47. Obama takes his "share" of the blame.
8:49. We're "in a fiscal hole." Here's the part about freezing spending.
8:55. Were they laughing at him?
8:56. "Let's try common sense. A novel concept." A laugh line that is a confession of past incompetence.
8:57. He's bitching about the Supreme Court — about the Citizens United case — while the Justices are sitting right in front of him. They all look pretty poker-faced, except Samuel Alito who mouths some words. I'll have to go back and try to lip read that. [ADDED: People are reading it as "not true" and comparing that to last year's "You lie."]
9:00. Obama doesn't like the way politicians are always being politicians. "I will not give up on trying to change the tone of our politics... We still need to govern." And "we" — meaning, divisively, the Democrats — have the majority and people expect us to get things done. So the Republicans shouldn't be obstructing. Get it? Be bipartisan. Let's show everybody that "we" — and this time he means the nice, docile Republicans — are able to get things done.
9:04. He doesn't want to "relitigate" the past. What litigation was there in the past? He's referring to the old arguments about who's tougher on national security. He doesn't want us to talk about that anymore. Just accept that we all care about America. Hear that, Republicans? Don't use your strongest issue in this election year.
9:06.
9:14. We're gonna repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell. And give women equal pay for equal work. And fix immigration.
9:15. "It's our ideals — our values — that built America."
9:17. "No wonder there's so much cynicism out there. No wonder there's so much disappointment." Meade says: "Uh oh. Malaise."
9:19. He didn't say that hope and change would be easy. Yeah. He just said hope and change. And we bought it.
9:21. He's started talking about particular kids, so the end must be near. Oh, yikes, now, clearly, the end is nigh because he's yelling. I mean... getting all inspirational. "A new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don't quit. I don't quit." Yeah, him quitting would have been really weird! "Let's seize this moment. To start anew. To carry the dream forward. And to strengthen our union once more."
9:31. I check Site Meter to see what SOTU-related searches are bringing people to this blog. It's basically all about why everyone is wearing purple. Ha ha.
9:34. Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell gives the Republican response in the Virginia State House, which looks great. We're told it was designed by Thomas Jefferson. A nice backdrop.
9:37. The federal government is simply trying to do too much. We need to "reconsider and restore the proper limited role of government at every level."
9:40. We're blessed with natural resources "and we must use them all."
9:44. "Top-down one-size fits all decision making should not replace the personal choices of free people in a free market, nor undermine the proper role of state and local governments in our system of federalism. As our Founders clearly stated, and we Governors understand, government closest to the people governs best."
9:46: About Haiti, McDonnell directly thanks Americans: "Thank you for your ongoing compassion."
9:48:
January 27, 2010
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416 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 401 – 416 of 416I wonder if he ever realized they were not laughing with him. They were laughing at him.
Joe Biden is an embarrassment to the human race.
Official I-ME-MY SOTU count:
http://templeofmut.wordpress.com/2010/01/28/the-i-me-my-count-of-sotu/
About Haiti, McDonnell directly thanks Americans
Well, you're very welcome, Governor. But I didn't do anything for you. I see what you're doing there, planting a little flag.
Obama told a big bold lie in the SOTU.
Obama said - Well I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities."
The Court held that 2 U.S.C. Section 441a, which prohibits all corporate political spending, is unconstitutional. Foreign nationals, specifically defined to include foreign corporations, are prohibiting from making "a contribution or donation of money or ather thing of value, or to make an express or implied promise to make a contribution or donation, in connection with a Federal, State or local election" under 2 U.S.C. Section 441e, which was not at issue in the case. Foreign corporations are also prohibited, under 2 U.S.C. 441e, from making any contribution or donation to any committee of any political party, and they prohibited from making any "expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement for an electioneering communication... ."
90% of Republicans Who Did Not See Obama's Speech Disagree With It.
Ritmo: count me in the 90% -- no need for me to watch, I read enough to know that it would've been excruciating.
I appreciate the efforts of Ann and all the other bloggers who watched so I wouldn't have to. Thank you all very much!
It's the Virginia Capitol, not State House, because it's a Commonwealth, not a State. Unfortunately, it's surrounded by tall buildings.
I've ridden a train in China, and I've ridden a train in the United States. Let me assure you, if I never step foot on a Chinese train again, it will still not erase the horror of the hours spent on the Chinese train.
All told, jury awards, settlements and administrative costs — which, by definition, are similar to the combined cost of insurance — add up to less than $10 billion a year. This equals less than one-half of a percentage point of medical spending.
Love how the NYT intentionally deceives us here. They mention that there is a lot of defensive medicine going on, but don't tie that to the need for malpractice reform. Instead, the statistic is trotted out about how little actual malpractice costs as a percentage of the total health care bill.
They, of course, laugh at the silly doctors for doing so much defensive medicine, and think that they are so much smarter than all those guys and gals who each spent up to a decade learning their craft. One guy who probably couldn't have gotten into medical school, so went to J school instead, versus hundreds of thousands of doctors who did go. And he thinks they are the silly ones.
If the plaintiffs tort attorneys hadn't contributed so much to the Democrats, we could see if malpractice reform actually saves money by reducing defensive medicine or not. It seems to, looking at rates in different states. But that type of reform was never even considered for the possibility of being on the table.
Barak Obama=Jimmy Carter
Bye Bye!!!!!!
"8:45. Michelle. Oh, my! What does that expression on her face mean? I get a chill and imagine she hates him. I'll go back and get a photograph of this later."
Is this what you were thinking?
OMG, Michelle is sitting right next to Frau Bissina.
(Okay, she's probably a really nice lady, but the resemblance is striking.)
Republicans are disingenuous hypocrites. What programs would they cut? *crickets*
@Beth, that was pretty rude. To me it was nice that someone thought to thank the American people for their (make that "our") willingness to reach into our pockets, roll up our sleeves, and be available to help out whenever and wherever there's a problem.
You lefties take the rest of us for granted sometimes.
Well I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities."
Has Bradley Smith not heard of Sony Pictures? Today's multinational corporations mean many time American interests and foreign entities are one and the same. Even years ago, growing up in the Midwest, we shopped at a British-owned department store, ate British-owned fast food, and even popped British-owned dinner rolls into the oven on the most American of holidays, Thanksgiving. Further, Brits and Dutch owned two gas station chains.
As a college senior, I applied for work at local subsidiaries of a Swedish aerospace company and an Italian heavy equipment manufacturer. Is Smith asserting all these companies are still muzzled by Federal law?
Mike, thanks for all you've done for Haiti. I really appreciate it, despite not being Haitian nor knowing any Haitians personally. I would never want to take you for granted.
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