grumble grumble

I realize I'm six days late, but I have some thoughts on the State of the Union speech last week:

1. The President's vision of taking care of the environment was breathtaking!  One of the best policy initiatives I have ever heard!  He should be re-elected solely on this issue alone...wait a sec, I just woke up.  Apparently I was dreaming when I heard him address ANY environmental issues.  No matter your political affiliation, can we all please agree now that this president doesn't give a damn about environmental issues if money for energy companies is not involved?  Please?

2. I am sure the leaders of France, Germany and Russia regret their decisions not to be part of the "coalition of the willing" when the President ran off that impressive list of countries that have joined and contributed.  I think Mr. Bush should have shown a bit more emotion, like Howard Dean in Iowa.  That would have had Chirac, Schroeder and Putin looking out their windows longing for a prom date with the likes of Tonga and El Salvador.

3. Was this the first SOTU where the President says the words "sexually transmitted disease"?  I realize he had to sprinkle some ultra conservative salt into the speech, but how is teen abstinence an issue?  Think about it: what parent doesn't want their teen to abstain?  Why do you need to spend a billion dollars emphasizing it?  One of the things that drive me NUTS about politicians is when they forget what it was like to be an adolescent, because I'm sure ALL politcos that preach abstinence as the only acceptable sex education for teens were virigns until they married.

4. Anyone remember the animated skit on "The Electric Company" where a man in a coffee shop orders a cup of coffee and a sweet roll, only to hear the waitress say that they are out of sweet rolls?  He changes his order to orange juice and a sweet roll, the waitress again tells him that they are out of sweet rolls, and so on it goes until he says "OK, I'll just have a sweet roll."  That's the feeling I got listening to the President demand that Congress make his tax cuts permanent and then segue into a lot more spending .  I get that the President wants us all to have a sweet roll, but you better eat yours now because they aren't going to be any around in a few years.

5. No matter your feeling on gay marriage, you cannot refute this: statistics say that the amount of the US population that is homsexual is around ten percent, which means that there are around 3.5 million gay people living in this country.  I find it puzzling that the President of the country that treasures freedom and liberty above all else would use this speech to tell 3.5 million people that they aren't worthy.

So the President believes marriage needs to be saved from becoming unsacred.  Great!  Can't wait to hear his ideas on getting the divorce rate among "sacred" couples below 50%...

6. Someone please give Ted Kennedy a bogus date for next year's speech.  He really, really does not need to appear on television anymore.