The State of the Union

The State of the Union speech last night came with surprisingly little 'scathing response' from the usual outlets. this site included. I was probably LEAST disappointed by this one than with any Bush has given, and i guess that's really saying something.

The speech had 2 highlights for me. One was when he commented that the Social Security changes he pushed were left unfinished. He meant this as a scold to the congress, but the Democrats started clapping loudly to say "hell YEAH, we didn't pass that crap of yours!" i think they even gave that a standing ovation. that's a sort of thumb in the eye you probably NEVER see and will NEVER see again. usually the opposing party's disdain is summed up in comically exaggerated raised eyebrows or head shakes. All done, one suspects in the hopes that they'll be featured in a crowd/reaction shot for the cameras.

You know, for a speech that's usually considered an overblown, clap happy, dog and pony show, that was a pretty brazen act by the dems. I guarantee speechwriters will never again put something in that will allow that sort of phrasing again!

The Second part i liked, and this is short, was the President addressing our 'addiction' to Oil. The problem is that is the beginning and end of his 'addressing' the issue. It's also important to note his words. He didn't say 'addiction to oil' he said "Addiction to foreign oil". that's the key difference. It was said to make a nod to high fuel costs that the people are feeling, but the reality isn't about removing our need for large amounts of oil. its about less foreign oil. this is a nod to expanded drilling and sweetheart deals to oil companies.

You see, when those oil companies want to drill in national wildlife refuges like in Alaska, they aren't just wanting permission to go there. they want to extract the oil that, technically belong to the US government, they want to lease the space for pennies (or free if they can get it) and they want to give little to no royalties to the people for the taking of their oil. THIS is the full picture of why arctic drilling is a bad idea, not just the environmental woes. its a matter of taking the people's oil out of the ground for free so that they can sell it back to us for a mint. Of course, the amount of oil there to drill is profitable to the companies, but as a portion of the total oil market, it is not enough to increase supply enough to lower prices.

The current mix of skyrocketing oil company profits and skyrocketing consumer costs keeps bush from going too deep into this one, but that's the gist of it. We need to have less dependence on a fuel that is in finite supply and located primarily in volitile portions of the world. a refusal to deal with that fact is a refusal to deal with the current state of the world. Ask Ford Motors how that's going for them right now.