The State of the Union

The president has had his turn to talk to us about the condition of the United States and her citizens. I would like to look at a few differences between what he said and what he has done. Bush asked us to "act in a spirit of good will and respect for one another" and pledged to do his part. He talked at length about the importance of Democracies because they bring liberty, respect the rights of citizens, the rule of law, and protect minorities. How much respect did he show the law or us when he began a program of illegal wiretaps on American citizens? More importantly how long will we allow him to continue claim powers beyond those given in the constitution? In his address to the nation the president said "So to prevent another attack – based on authority given to me by the Constitution and by statute – I have authorized a terrorist surveillance program to aggressively pursue the international communications of suspected al-Qaida operatives and affiliates to and from America. Previous presidents have used the same constitutional authority I have – and Federal courts have approved the use of that authority. Appropriate Members of Congress have been kept informed." This simply isn't true. He has lied to us. He has broken the law. To protect our democracy, our freedom, we must hold him accountable. If we do not protect freedom at home, the 2,400 Americans who died and the 10,000 who have been wounded in Iraq deserve as much vigilance from us as they have given their country.

On the economic front the President told us that we must make the tax cut permanent to protect the families. I am not sure how a budget deficit of over 400 billion a year is protecting the public. In the five years he has been in office he has run up a 2,300 billion dollar debt. He has cut funds to veterans, their families, and (in wartime) veterans’ hospitals. There are more than 260,000 veterans who cannot get into a VA hospital due to funding cuts. He has cut education funds, student loans, child health benefits, and child services funding desperately needed for America's young. Does he think we can remain competitive without a well-educated workforce? He has helped the elderly with Medicare cuts, cuts to housing and social services while giving huge cuts in the taxes of America's super wealthy and offering no-bid contracts to Halliburton. His cronyism, his cuts in funding to first responders, and the withdraw of engineering funds played a dramatic roll in the gulf coast debacle this year. Instead of coming to the forefront of rebuilding by offering the people on the gulf coast the first preference in jobs he allowed rich friends to bring in workers below minimum wage. It is no wonder that this president has resorted to bribing the media to report fake positive news written by government employees. The real news is that his presidency is as riddeled with failure and corruption as the rest of his career.