State of the Union 2007

9:02: If your lawyer is sleeping, better give ‘im a nudge, everybody look alive ’cause here come the judge(s)!

9:03: Condy Rice looks nice. Hey, you know what this needs? Joan and Melissa Rivers offering fashion commentary on the carpet.

9:06: Red is a power color. Interesting, the women dressed in bright red outfits. They pop out at you in the group shots.

9:07: I think when Bush enters, he should be proceeded by a guy playing “Hail the Chief” on a kazoo. That would entertain me. And when he gets up to the podium, he should just toss aside the prepared text, step forward and shout, “You wanna piece of me?! C’mon!”

9:09: He’s wearing a blue tie. Blue=Democrats. Conciliatory?

9:10: It’d be cool if he kept shaking hands and then kept right on going out the far door, leaving everyone standing there going, “Wait? Huh?”

9:11; Still clapping. I wonder how long the ovation would be if his approval rating weren’t in the low 30s.

9:13: Nice touch, acknowledging “Madame Speaker.”

9:16: “Each of us is guided by his own convictions.” Including the criminal convictionst that plagued the GOP.

9:16: Oh, NOW he wants cross-aisle governing.

9:17: Yes, wages are rising…thanks to the Democrats raising minimum wage. 41 straight months of job increase? Can anyone back that up?

9:19: Yeah. Earmarks. That’s certainly something that presents a major concern to Americans.

9:22: Oh, geez, here we go with school vouchers again.

9:23: The quality of education, and the fiasco that has been “No child left behind,” isn’t exactly something I’d boast about.

9:24 Stony silence for the health care plan.

9:25: Ooooooo, that was embarrassing. Lots of people sitting on their hands for the health tax break plan. Could it be that they perceive it as, ultimately, a means of getting big business off the hook for health benefits while not at all guaranteeing that everyone can get health insurance?

9:26: Okay, good point about malpractice junk law suits. That’s just out of control.

9:29: Yes, we are too dependent on foreign oil. But “clean safe nuclear power” is a bit of an oxymoron.

9:31: And we’re going to reduce gasoline usage in the US how, exactly?

9:32: If we want to decrease gas usage, keeping the price of gas DOWN is the wrong way to go. You want to keep it high so that people will be motivated to use less gas.

9:35: Yes, by taking the war to the enemy, we can win the war on terror, just as we’ve won the war on crime and poverty and drugs and…

9:34: Okay, who had 9:34 in the 9/11 pool?

9:38: Terror terror terror terror

9:39: Who had 9:39 in the Iran pool?

9:40: in the six years since we were attacked? I thought it was five years?

9:41: If a fraction of the money spent on the war had been spent on education, the country would be in a lot better shape.

9:41: Terror terror terror terror terror terror terror

9:42: Was McCain asleep or taking notes?

9:43: Terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror terror

9:44: Of course, we wouldn’t even have to be thinking about breaking promises and leaveing friends if he hadn’t gotten us into the war in the first place.

9:45: Does he realize there’s a whole bunch of country outside of Baghdad?

9:47: Baghdad is NEVER going to be secure. He msut know that. It almost sounds as if he’s setting up framework for going into Iran.

9:50: No, they didn’t vote for failure, they voted for a military incursion that was intended to findd WMDs, based upon falsified information fed them by Bush.

9:54: Finally moved away from terror.

9:55: interesting that the SC justices don’t stand, not even for combating Malaria.

9:57: Plug a basketball player success story. There’s a slam dunk.

9:58: I think it would be funny if there was an orchestra who played him off if he went on too long.

9:59: The annual parade of people continues.

9:59: Yeah, okay, the subway car guy. That was one dámņëd heroic thing he did.

10:01: The depressing thing is that if this decorated Sergeant were a democrat running for President, there would be a GOP disinformation campaign organized to assert that he didn’t actually earn his medals.

10:02: Jon Stewart called it. He said the country would be blessed by God, and that Bush would say the country was “strong.”

Overall a very low key, sedate, even borderline somnambulant presentation.

114 comments on “State of the Union 2007

  1. The 25th amendment was primarily intended for cases in which the president was unable assume his duties due to health reasons, such as when Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke late in his term.

    In order to invoke it, Cheney and the cabinet would have to say that Bush is physically or mentally unable to serve and they will not do that since it would mean admitting he isn’t perfect. Even if Bush had shown up for the SOTU three sheets to the wind or started talking about hearing voices, they would still deny that there was a problem. Nothing short of Bush falling into a coma would cause them to invoke the 25th amendment.

  2. Den said, “In order to invoke it, Cheney and the cabinet would have to say that Bush is physically or mentally unable to serve and they will not do that since it would mean admitting he isn’t perfect.”

    Like I said, Cheney would never go along with it.

    Rick

  3. Assuming the “6 years” remark was “since 9/11”, it’s at least semi-justifiable.

    2007 – 2001 = 6

    Yes, in reality it’s closer to 5 years than six. Then again, realize that we Christians manage to work with saying that Friday afternoon to early Sunday morning (not even 48 hours) is three days.

    RD Francis

  4. “Then again, realize that we Christians manage to work with saying that Friday afternoon to early Sunday morning (not even 48 hours) is three days.”

    Uh, Sunday? Don’t you mean Monday? Most people I know with office jobs don’t work on Sunday. or Saturday.

  5. “…we Christians manage to work with saying that Friday afternoon to early Sunday morning (not even 48 hours) is three days.”

    ?????????

    I used to work office jobs and I have lots of friends who still do. The only time I ever hear the weekend called three days is when there is a holiday on a Monday or a Friday. Even the national press makes a point of calling weekends holiday, three-day or long when a day has been added to point out the dif between them and the average two day weekend.

  6. “Then again, realize that we Christians manage to work with saying that Friday afternoon to early Sunday morning (not even 48 hours) is three days.”

    Uh, Sunday? Don’t you mean Monday? Most people I know with office jobs don’t work on Sunday. or Saturday.”

    I think he is refering to the crucifiction and resurrection of Christ.

  7. Captain Naraht/Raymond Will —

    Sorry, I caught neither the State of the Union address nor the Democratic response. Wasn’t feeling well that evening and I went to bed early.

    I’ll probably read the transcripts of both, but by the time I do this thread will probably no longer be fresh.

  8. Hi all,

    I am a long time lurker and fan of PAD. In the interest of full disclosure, I am a lawyer, however, not in the medical malpractice/personal injury field. The so called “explosion of frivolous suits” is nothing but a myth. Over the years there has not been an explosion of the number of med mal suits nor has there been a sgnificant increase in jury awards. There has been a concentrated effort from insurance companies and others to create that perception though. That is not to say that there are not high jury awards given and frivolous lawsuits filed, believe me I know there are. However, most extreme jury awards are never paid as they are reduced on appeal and frivolous lawsuits are dismissed before they ever see a courtroom.

    Insurance complanies have raised rates in large amounts that do not add up to what they have had to pay out in med mal suits. This started after the stock market bottoming in the 90s as many insurance companies took premiums and profits and used the great return of the stock market at the time to maximize profits. When the stock market dropped they had to make it up somehow else. The answer was increasing rates and creating the hype we now see and using that as justification.

    You can take many lawsuits and mention SOME of the facts involved and make it seem frivolous, and you can take certain examples of cases that are frivolous and use those as proof that the entire system is like that, however, that doesn’t match up with the statistics. Sure there are bad lawyers who do sleazy things. There are also bad doctors who hurt people, bad cops, bad accountants, etc. There is already a method of sorting out frivolous lawsuits. It’s called the court system and the burden of proof.

    Chad

  9. “41 straight months of job increase? Can anyone back that up?”
    —–
    In many of those months, the number of jobs created did not exceed the number of new workers entering the work force. But as to the “41 straight’ I don’t know.

  10. Craig J. Ries posted:
    “I just finished watching the video of Webb’s response. He did a good job, and *gasp* he gave a plan for what we should do in Iraq.

    Unfortunately, barely anybody is going to see this as Bush’s own blabbing dominates the headlines.”
    —–
    Thus providing a good example of the ‘bully pulpit’.

  11. HMOs don’t work. It has been proven. The only time HMOs consistently make a profit is when they insure only the healthy people of a given population. They aren’t supposed to do that.

    The same will be found to be true of the voucher program. Even if poor people are given vouchers, how will they get their children to the charter schools? Only the wealthy and the (shrinking) middle class will have students in the better schools.

    A recent report said that NO STATE was going to pass the No Child Left Behind plan. I don’t know if that came true, but it certainly is scary. Is the Federal government going to take over ALL the schools in the US?

    The key factor to a better country is a better educated populace. That is one of the reasons that education is required for children. To selectively only educate some of the people hurts all of the people.
    .
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