Madam Speaker, The President of the United States

January 27, 2010 marks President Barack Obama’s first State of the Union Address.  Although Obama gave an address to a joint session of Congress on Feb 24, 2009, there technically was no State of the Union Address in that year.  Then President George w Bush would normally have given the State of the Union in January shortly before leaving office, but like Reagan, HW Bush, and Clinton he chose not to give an address shortly before vacating the White House.

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2009 was certainly a unique year in the United States and certainly a rough first year for a former freshman senator turned President of the United States.  With the largest financial crisis since the great depression, two wars, an energy crisis, and of course the health care debate, there was no shortage of controversial issues for President Obama during his first year in office. After watching the SOTU, each Babeler was given a chance to comment on the address in private.  The answers are compiled below.

Madam Speaker, The Babelers

Greg Molyneux

What I liked:

• A demand for small business reform that would call for the elimination of the capital gains tax.
• Deficit of trust is a big win: I suspect many Americans like myself are very cynical with Washington and its sorry state of affairs.
• The President fairly and appropriately reminded (reprimanded?) the Democrats that they have not accomplished enough with the substantial majority they worked hard to win and are in the process of squandering.
• A very direct approach with humor, passion, and at times combative tones with Republicans, Democrats, and the Supreme Court.

What I didn’t like:

• Passing blame. While this is to be expected, is it an excuse, is it a reminder, is it revisionist history? There was plenty of veiled Bush bashing throughout the middle of the address.
• Leaning on and reaching for the “glory” years of the Bill Clinton era. The best part of that era was the Yankees’ Dynasty, I’m just sayin’.
• Very small mention of our honorable men and women and their castaway struggle abroad. This is what makes the comparison that this battle is our Vietnam so viable: our soldiers are treated as also-rans.

What I found hypocritical:

• With a freeze on discretionary spending (which I generally like overall), can we assume NASA will take a hit after some promising growth to the program in recent years? Obama mentions—positively—not wanting America to serve as number 2 to any country. Unfortunately losing the modern space race could have an enormous impact.
• When the President finally broached the subject of our two wars he stated that he was not being interested in reliving the past. It is hard for this statement to hold water when you spent time bashing the Republican led 2000s while praising the Democratically ran 1990s.

What surprised me:

• Surprised by casual and direct tone, doing a good job of speaking like a real person.
• Legitimately calling for the construction of new, clean, safe nuclear power plants.
• Blasting the Supreme Court—I wonder how they feel about being chastised? That was a page right out of Andrew Jackson’s book right there and there is no doubt this will not win President Obama any favors in those hallowed chambers.
• All troops out of Iraq by the end of August. Opinions on the justification of this war aside, Iraq will be a very troublesome place when we skip town.

What it means for the future:

This was a very centrist approach aimed at middle America in every way. The President targeted both the middle class and the moderate voter in what will no doubt lay the path for his bid for a second term. If recent voter reaction in Massachusetts, Virginia, and New Jersey can insinuate anything it is back-lash toward a more liberal agenda. With pleas for nuclear energy, elimination of the capital gains tax, and freezing of discretionary spending it is clear that the President is reaching across the aisle and this will put some level of pressure on the GOP to meet the President half-way.

What do I think overall:

I’m going with a B-minus performance. While it is difficult for me to articulate what my expectations were from the outset, I am left feeling unfulfilled. There was much I liked and plenty I did not, I suppose the final grade cannot be determined until we see whether or not any action will come from this.

Jack Gamble

The president’s address had bit of everything.

He included a token amount of die hard liberalism to appease the far left segment of his party when he made the bad call of repealing the Bush tax cuts. Repeat after me; do not raise taxes during a recession. He spent plenty of time talking about cutting spending, and then in typical fashion laid out dozens of new spending programs.  You can’t do both. He mentioned that the worst of the economic storm has passed, well then why not repeal the stimulus before hundreds of billions more is wasted on earmarks?

On the subject of earmarks, I thought he was kidding when he called for every single earmark to be displayed on a government website.  That will have to be one big website because tens of thousands of earmarks were signed into law by the president in his first year in office. I think he might have been serious about that, but I can’t imagine how.

The president also included plenty of pleas to his party in congress to not duck and cover in an election year. This is a clear reference to the New Jersey, Virginia, and Massachusetts elections which have scared the pants off of Democrats in conservative districts. The president is afraid that dozens of his supporters is congress will jump ship this year, which they will out of self-preservation.

He virtually ignored the clash of civilizations between secular, Christian, and Jewish civilization against radical Islam.  This is the defining struggle of our time and while he supplies tax payer funded attorney’s for the underwear bomber, we should be water boarding the jihad out of him and getting information that might save thousands of lives.

The most important part of the speech to me was energy. I loved his insinuation that he is willing to compromise on energy. Notice that he mentioned building a new generation of nuclear power plants (finally) and also making the hard choice of offshore drilling. Then he brought up energy and climate legislation. This shows that he is willing to compromise with Republican demands of nuclear and domestic drilling in order to get climate change legislation passed. I applaud him for this move to the center; he will take heat for it from his supporters.

Overall, I will give Obama’s first State of the Union a conditional C+ pending follow through on his energy statement.