It’s true that kids are dropping out–of high school, let alone college. A lot of deadbeat 20 year olds in my town.

What comes of this moment is not by whether we can sit together tonight, but whether we can work together tomorrow. Good point!

He spoke about undocumented workers; Sorry, guys, but some of those undocumented workers are living in my town’s jails.

Is it true about the internet? He seems to know his speech better. I don’t understand why he’s criticized so much for not memorizing his speeches. I could never remember that speech. I’d have to have notes.

Is he talking about something like FDR new deal? I’m for that. I’m opposed to tax the rich.

Senator Hatch looks pained.

Korea, our town is a sister city to Korea, maybe we
ll get a factory

Are they booing him over health care?

Anything can be improved–I love that. I got that desire to work with others from his book.

Deficit spending didn’t begin with George W. Bush. Give me a break.

What does it mean to freeze domestic spending?

Cutting defense pending? Can they do without bullets? How does the health care reform save us money?

Tax cuts for the wealthy? (Forget tax cuts, we should ask millionaires to spend less on weddings and homes and help build homes for the poor. Ask, not force)

website about taxes? Where is it? lobbyists online?

Veto earmarks. He doesn’t always do what he says. close Guantamon, ets. Will he be forced to sign instead of vetoing?

In my opinion Afganistan is a righteous war.

Making government more efficient, reorganization. 12 different agencies that deal with exports, etc. favorite example, salmon, commerce & interior
–sounds good to me.
What information did the white house put online?

I do not believe him when he says “we will defeat you.” I don’t think he means it. I think he prefers compromise and doesn’t feel them to be the threat I personally believe they are.

Hey! John Kerry is sitting by John McCain.

Good obserfvation about gays in military.

“Argue about everything”…..He makes that kind of point in his book, he talks about differences and seems to shrug them off. Almost humorous tone about that kind of stuff in his book.

Kid from scranton–Biden (hey, he’s from the town the Office is in!)sweeping floor of Dad’s bar–speaker, When he talks like that, I love him.

I’ve probably never watched a speech so closely, only because of last week. I taped it. Usually, it’s a lot like conference, I leave it on, so I feel righteous, but only half pay attention.

We’ll see.

How did you like the Bachman response?

anne, re: the question in comment 3, the reference was vague, but I’m guessing he was talking about this from last March:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/us/politics/31obama.html

Thanks, Bill, I’ll check it out. And ESO, what did you think of his speech? Do you think he’s a strong president?

Obama has never shaken hands with a Republican speaker before because there has never been a Republican speaker of the house before during his term as president. The speaker has always been a democrat before this.

I think he blames Bush for the deficit because, supposedly, Clinton left office with a budget surplus. So there was no budget deficit at the time Bush came into office, but obviously there is now.

Part of that, however, is just dumb luck. When the economy is up, you have good tax revenue and less demand for government services. You also have less government spending when you’re not at war. Clinton got the benefit of leaving office before the war on terror and during a good economy. You can give him some credit for that if you want, but it’s mostly luck.

Bush had to spend a lot of money on the war on terror after 9/11 (though you can argue that he didn’t have to go into Iraq) and there were a lot of government costs associated with 9/11 itself and increasing the security at airports and elsewhere. Then, the economy tanked while we were still egaged in wars in two contries. That’s not a situation where you can avoid a budget deficit, as Obama well knows.

DKL – I would agree that the State of the Union was pretty average – like most of W’s. They tend to be Santa Clause addresses – something for everyone. Clinton and Reagan – now they did have some good State of the Unions… Oh the glory days of yore…

Bush shouldn’t have had to spend a lot of money going into Iraq. Big mistake. Big. Not admitting mistake: bigger mistake.

Truthfully, I don’t see any real purpose behind these speeches on either side.

ESO, I guess he’s not tough. It’s an impression of weakness. In my opinion. I think he’s too conciliatory; too quick to see the other side’s point of view, which can make a person indecisive. I think he’d make a great minister or college professor, but we need a president with backbone. That being said, he did get health care past. Although I’m not so thrilled about that. He might be stronger than I think.

I guess we never really know what a person will do in crisis until it happens.

As I have said, I think that ability to compromise is one of his strengths. What is the purpose of standing on principle and never getting anything done? While imperfect, Obama got quite a bit done in the past few years. I much prefer my government working for their pay than standing around giving principled speeches and never agreeing on anything.

GWBush was very decisive and didn’t seem the least bit interested in what the other side thought and I thought he was a nightmare of a president.

What is the purpose of standing on principle and never getting anything done?

I like it when Presidents don’t get anything done. There’s less screwing up. The best President is the most inefficient President.

Imagine if FDR had never gotten anything done – we probably would have been out of the depression years sooner.

If GWB had never gotten anything done, we wouldn’t have to pay for Iraq.

I think I would have liked Andrew Jackson :)