[kenberg]

I have no great expectations of tonight's address. This is not a partisan statement, I could easily repeat it every year. But where are we?

Afghanistan: Have we done any good at all? A response to 2001 events was needed, but that was 12+ years ago. How should we evaluate the events of the last several years?

Health Care: Everyone has numbers proving, or so they say, something. Where are we really?

The economy: We survived the crash. Who gets the credit for dodging that bullet? Bernanke? But although survival is very good, we perhaps can hope for better?

Education: Is it just not possible to adequately educate a broad portion of our population?


I confess to being uncertain about all of these questions. It seems to me that before we can move forward, there has to be a credible assessment of where we are. I don't really believe that "credible" and "State of the Union speech" can, regardless of who is at bat, fit together comfortably in a sentence but I raise the question anyway.

[Winstonm]

I think the U.S. is in a state of flux as the old way grudgingly yields to a growing population dynamic - old white America has lost its position of dominance and old white America doesn't much like it.

[blackshoe]

I don't know why Mr. Obama needs two hours to say one word, or rather acronym: FUBAR.

[cherdano]

So is it strong?

[kenberg]

Not weak, but perhaps precarious. I take it that "it" means the union.

The speech was crap.

[mycroft]

I haven't understood why it takes 2 hours for presidents back to oh, I don't know, Truman? to say the one word it always has been: SNAFU.

[Winstonm]

At least I don't live in Texas.

[billw55]

Winstonm, on 2014-January-29, 12:09, said:

At least I don't live in Texas.

At least unemployment isn't bad there. Below national average since before Obama took office.

I lived in Wichita Falls for a couple years, and honestly Oklahoma didn't seem very different from Texas.

[kenberg]

Either way it's ok you wake up with yourself. --- Billy Joel.


My older daughter went to grad school at UT Austin and, after a period of adjustment, came to like it. But we all know that Minnesota is the Land of Sky Blue Waters. I was very disappointed when I found that not all cities have lakes.

[y66]

I thoroughly enjoyed hearing Obama say "Wherever and whenever I can take steps without legislation to expand opportunity for more American families, that’s what I’m going to do". His long running fantasy about the possibility of bipartisan cooperation in Washington, even when the economy is at stake, turned out to be a joke and a total waste of energy.

David Remnick published a thoughtful "on the road" story in the New Yorker this week titled Going The Distance which included this part near the end:

Quote

Obama has every right to claim a long list of victories since he took office: ending two wars; an economic rescue, no matter how imperfect; strong Supreme Court nominations; a lack of major scandal; essential support for an epochal advance in the civil rights of gays and lesbians; more progressive executive orders on climate change, gun control, and the end of torture; and, yes, health-care reform. But, no matter what one’s politics, and however one weighs the arguments of his critics, both partisan and principled, one has to wonder about any President’s capacity to make these decisions amid a thousand uncertainties, so many of which are matters of life and death, survival and extinction.

“I have strengths and I have weaknesses, like every President, like every person,” Obama said. “I do think one of my strengths is temperament. I am comfortable with complexity, and I think I’m pretty good at keeping my moral compass while recognizing that I am a product of original sin. And every morning and every night I’m taking measure of my actions against the options and possibilities available to me, understanding that there are going to be mistakes that I make and my team makes and that America makes; understanding that there are going to be limits to the good we can do and the bad that we can prevent, and that there’s going to be tragedy out there and, by occupying this office, I am part of that tragedy occasionally, but that if I am doing my very best and basing my decisions on the core values and ideals that I was brought up with and that I think are pretty consistent with those of most Americans, that at the end of the day things will be better rather than worse.”

Lobowolf would have loved that title.

[PassedOut]

y66, on 2014-February-01, 12:55, said:

David Remnick published a thoughtful "on the road" story in the New Yorker this week titled Going The Distance...

Good article. Thanks for the link.