Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Boring Political Post Alert- disregard if you wish

I kept talking to myself and wishing my dad was here while watching the State of the Union, so I decided to take notes because I am a huge dork. I wasn’t able to watch the whole thing because my Tivo wouldn’t let me rewind all the way or pause but here is what I thought about what I heard.
Sustainable energy. Awesome. He talked about building clean nuclear power plants which I am a huge supporter of and increasing offshore drilling which I also support. He mentioned global warming but honestly I don’t even think of global warming when I think about clean, sustainable energy- I think about the fact that America is in a much better position when we are not relying on the Middle East for our energy. That just makes sense.
I don’t really understand what he was saying about exports. He “pledges” to increase our exports by 50% in a year, I think he said. That just sounds like a number he threw out there, to me. I don’t understand how we can be exporting more goods when other countries are producing goods so much cheaper. I’m not saying I agree with the way other countries run factories or pay workers, I think it’s horrible. But it’s a sad truth that the U.S. can’t compete in many areas because of these injustices.
Tuition stuff sounds great!!! He’s talking about giving families a $10,000 tax credit for a 4-year education and forgiveness of student loans after 10 or 20 years. He said no one should be in a financial strain because of the decision to go to college. That sounds so awesome but I’m still facing the problem of trust when it comes to this administration. It’s been a year since he’s been in office and I think, as a Republican, I really went into last year with an open mind, hoping for the best but also keeping my eyes and ears open. Up until this point I haven’t seen him accomplish much, except run us another trillion dollars into debt. A trillion, in a year people! The tuition part of the speech sounded a little like “I’ll make coke come out of the drinking fountain” in a Jr. high election. I’ve heard a bill has already passed to relieve public servants of student loans after 10 years but that it will never get funding. So apparently just passing those bills doesn’t do a whole lot if the money isn’t there- which it’s not.
Now he’s talking about the deficit. He’s talking about a 3 year spending freeze that will save us some odd billion dollars over the next ten years. How does it make sense to calculate the savings over 10 years when the freeze is for 3 years? Then he mentioned the freeze won’t take effect for another year. I heard some sarcastic chuckling in the audience over that one.
Tax cuts- says he will extend tax cuts to middle-class but Aaron says our taxes already went up. I guess we’re getting $16 less a month in our checks because of income taxes. Weird.
Sick of him talking about “the last 8 years” ugh. Just move on.
Talking about health care reform. What he talked about sounds more like health insurance reform which I am all for… but what isn’t he telling us? Why was this so debated? I think everything he talked about competitive options for health insurance, etc. is what we need. However, the last thing I want is government run hospitals. I hear people who have lived in other countries talk about the government hospitals and they are so scary and take so long to get into. Some of them have private hospitals but they’re way too expensive for the average person to afford. It’s stories like that that really scare me about this “health care reform.” He says if anyone has a “better idea” he’s ready to hear it. But I’ve heard lots of better ideas out there and he doesn’t seem to be listening.
Absolutely agree about lobbying money. Elections shouldn’t be paid for by lobbyists.
Also all for earmark reform.
National security. I’m actually surprised and glad that he’s taking national security so seriously and increasing troops in Afghanistan. From what I’ve seen that area is still very far from under control. It’s an interesting shift to see how he was going to yank all our troops before he got elected and how his tone has changed. Just goes to show that he now has intelligence as President that he didn’t have as a senator. Either that or he just wanted to win the election by saying he would end the war.
He says we’ll be out of Iraq by the end of the office. That’s another 3 years. We’ll see. The army generals aren’t applauding when he said that the war is ending and all the troops are coming home. Interesting. So glad he told America to support the troops when they come home. Now the generals are applauding. Largest increase for veterans in decades last year. I am all for supporting the vets. There are a lot of cuts I’d make to support the vets and military families.
Generals also didn’t clap for the allowing gays in the military thing.
Threat of nuclear weapons. Arms control treaty. Good.
Oh don’t you squash the pundants… He’s talking about the media and kind of insinuating that the media critics, aka people like Glenn Beck, Rush and all the other conservative talk show hosts are fostering negativity in the country. You know what, the media is the check and balance of the government and if we don’t have people speaking out against the government, that is when things get really scary. True, some are extreme, but cynicism is healthy at a time like this. How many people are going to take the time to do the research these talk show hosts do? Hardly anyone. I, myself, rely on them for the “other side of the story.” It scares me that he would even bring up the media because any government control of the media is downright terrifying.
Well that’s it. I know, I’m a dork. But now I’ll remember what my political views were in 2010, lol.

2 comments:

Bekki said...

Brooke, Love the blog and peek in on you once in a while. Thanks for the summary! I was at a YW activity last night and haven't gotten around to the dvr to watch it...now I'll know what to look for! Hope all is well in the frozen north.

jessica said...

Nice brooke...well said. We were excited about the loan forgiveness too. Public servants repayment just got funded 10 million. Who woulda thought? You can bet we'll be applying for that!