Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing
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Like passing a turd that overstayed its welcome by a few days, that is what it felt like to see George W. Bush giving his last and final State of the Union Address (unless he declares martial law in an October surprise and calls off the 2008 election).
Bush’s speech was a total cognitive disconnect to the real problems of this country. He used the root word “terror” 23 times and never mentioned Katrina once. He complained about earmarks yet this Congress has greatly reduced the number of earmarks. Also he ignores the fact that he never vetoed a single bill from the Republican Congress – some of which were the most earmarked laden in history.
Wages are up? Bullshit. The economy is growing? Has anyone told him the stock market is tanking? It is tanking so bad that the Fed rushed out an emergency interest rate cut… and is considering another one. If his economy is growing then why is he signing tax rebate bill? The Treasury Department will need to get a loan from the Chinese to pay for it. You folks remember the last time Bush gave out rebate checks? We needed a $51 billion loan for that one too – and we haven’t paid that one off yet.. we are only paying the interest.
In Bush’s address, he tells us he will send Congress a bill that will cut 151 “wasteful” programs totaling $18 billion. That is it? That is all you have? How about this for a bill? Bring our troops home and save up towards a $100 billion for the next year? How about cutting back on our overly bloated military spending. You know, if you practiced diplomacy you wouldn’t need all those damn cannons.
And Bush calls out Congress for stifling scientific progress. This is the most anti-science administration in history. Typically, American Presidents have always pushed the frontiers of science and technology forward. This is the only President that has retarded scientific progress to the point where lobbyist and attorneys with no scientific background have edited scientific papers and studies.
The rest of his speech seemed to focus on war, war, more war with an extra helping of preemptive war. He goes off on Iran and “militants trained by Iran” but he doesn’t even mention Turkey bombing Iraq to kill Iraqis trained by the Iraqis (and probably by the US as an artifact of unintended consequences).
I have no idea what country Bush’s fantasy was talking about, but it wasn’t the United States.
These days, I am ready to hear about Camelot.