Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Forest Lady's State of the Union Speech

I watched the State of the Union address last night. I think it's amazing how a person can talk that long and say nothing. I am reminded of a Rotary meeting I once attended, where a local politician gave a speech. Afterwards he asked for questions.

One lady stood up and said she is a retired teacher, and what did he intend to do to help the educational situation. He then talked about how important he feels education is, how he has his own children and realizes its value, how he plans to make it a number one priority, yada yada yada. After his long windy answer, he asks if anyone else has a question. This same lady stands back up. She said well you didn't answer my question. I want to know what you are going to DO and how you are going to DO it.

This sent him on another long diatribe of meaningless chatter, and again she stood up. She said she was sick of politicians who talk around issues because they don't want to admit they have no plan to actually DO anything. He quickly switched subjects and ended his question segment. I have to admit the woman had balls. And she was right.

I could have given the State of the Union speech for Bush.

"You may or may not have Social Security. Don't count on it. If we handle that program the way we handle all the other government programs, there's a good chance you'll just pay into it all your life and get nothing. As for education, I'm going to talk a lot and try not to have you realize that if we want quality education for our children, we go back to teacher's pay and offer something to them to attract quality teachers to this profession. Quality teachers equals quality education. You get what you pay for. The dumb-ing down of America is a reality. When people get to that crossroads of deciding whether to get a regular math degree or a educational math degree, and they look at the salary comparisons, which way do you think the good ones go?
If you want healthcare, you'll pay through the teeth for it, have none you can afford if you change jobs, and it's a crap shoot whether you'll get a doctor who knows what he's doing. If you have no insurance, you'll get what you can pay for, nothing.
We could pull out of Iraq, but then I'd look like a big idiot for getting us into this to begin with, so I think we better just stay until I get out of office and let someone else deal with this mess. And since the terrorists use fear, I will too, and remind you often of 9/11 and how it could happen again if you don't listen to me.
The truth is I can stand up here and promise all this stuff that WE are going to do, but since our congress is so divided, and are more concerned about being different than having anything in common, they're not going to come together to actually get anything done. Good luck folks"

End of Speech

1 comment:

Forest Lady said...

Exactly! And did you see the scowl on Hillary Clinton's face? I expected her and Bush to start sticking their tongues out at each other any minute.