The President Speaks. Speak Back.

I listened to the President's speech and wondered if he were truly in touch with what is going on in this country. We should not have gone to Iraq and now we are mired in this mess. In the mean time, he is talking about a balanced budget, discussing expenditures for programs that we cannot afford and I wonder if he has thought about what happens when China calls in the notes for all the money that they have leant to this country. We are so far in debt that my grandchildren will be paying this off.. and he says that the budget can be balanced in 5 years???? Who is going to pay for the new programs... Is the fact that the cost of the Iraq war is NOT in the current budget how he can play this shadow game. It is not all done with mirrors... we have to pay the bills. Please explain to me how that will happen.

No, I don't think the speech was life changing. We need to deal with Iraq first, then the environment-energy crisis and then maybe, just maybe Mars.

I think that this President is, once again, blowing hot air.

Sending more troops to Iraq is not going to help, it's just going to get them killed.

The President's Health Insurance proposal is ludicrous, unless you own a business and no longer want to carry health insurance for your employees.

Reducing our use of oil is a great idea. The whole world has been pushing for it for well over a decade. It's nice that this President is finally joining the 1990's. What would be even better is to have a push for alternative energy sources, not just alternative fuel. Solar and Wind power are the 2 main ones that come to mind.

Social Security is going to have to be expanded very soon, in order to meet the demands of the baby boomers who will be retiring. That is reality. Pretending it will go away is not reality. So, our Government needs to get off their asses and increase the contribution percentage of employees and employers AND either take the cap off of the income contribution limit or raise dramatically. That is the only way that this is going to work.

There is another catch phrase Ned. Trust, But Verify.

From your column, Mr Bush said, "ambitious agenda, driven by bold and innovative concepts."

That means what? He is finally going to do his job and work for the American people? The quote above gives me the idea that Mr Bush is setting up the Republican run for the White House.

To answer your questions, Ned, "no," "no," and "no." I agree with you that most of the State of the Union speeches I've heard are immediately forgotten. But in this case in this year, the 900-pound gorilla in Congress is the war in Iraq. Until there is marked progress and significant improvement on that front, the domestic issues that the President has proposed will languish, all of them eclipsed by the war. And, as I said yesterday, his record has shown that he likes to propose ideas, but not follow-up on them, so I don't expect much from the "20 in 10" proposal.

The President did not give a memorable speech. Isn't it about time someone, somewhere, asked the obvious question: WHICH IS WORSE, TERRORISM ...OR OUR OVERBLOWN REACTION TO IT? We cannot force democracy on other countries at the point of a gun, nor can we neglect this country by spending trillions demolishing every tree because there might be a terrorist behind it. We need to judge this by porportion and we're not doing it. We cannot RID THE WORLD OF EVIL....and by attempting, we are adding to the Evil. Sick, sick, sick.

I'm still struck by the monumental hypocrisy of Bush's "War on Terror." We're in Iraq, spending 2 billion bucks a week on a ghastly error that we can't get out of, and he's throwing at us all these wondrous ideas. Unfortunately, he should have addressed all those ideas 5 years ago. The so-called war on terror is a farce, as is Homeland Security. Our borders and ports remain wide open to anyone with bomb or a vial of some bacterial agent. If he wants to fight terrorists, he needs to control the borders. That's the first thing he should have done after 9/11.

His plan for Social Security is a joke. The system is already hosed, and he wants to add illegal immigrants to the baby-boomers which will drain the fund in no time.

His health-care proposal is another little bit of madness. We need to impeach him and put him out of his misery.

This speech was mostly rhetoric. First, the health insurance proposal simply cannot work, as presented. The reduction in taxes would have to be made up with some hidden tax elsewhere. It couldn't be real.

The energy useage reduction is also not feasible, unless we reduce population growth, which this president opposes outright, with his stand on abortion. (The fact we are killing the planet at a greatly accelrated pace wiht over population, seems lost on him.)

His Iraq quagmire, while not his own making (in spite of the blame attributed by the public), cannot be overcome, as the problem is one of religious fanaticism (literally.....brainwashing), and there can never be a solution to the middle east problem, as long as this religion exists. His failure to recognize that fact, before entering into this fray, is something he should be held accountable for.

His "jobs creation" is a joke, as today we see millions more of our citizens under-employed, as more and more of the manufacturing jobs we need, go oversees. He talks a lot about education, but of what value is it, if you can't find employment, once you get the education? Graduating students, today, have little to look forward to, unless they are either in the medical field, or have "insider connections" to a good job, upon graduation.

Nope, nothing in his speech to cheer, or to even be optimistic about.