Not So Meaty, Beaty, Big or Bouncy

Et tu SOTU

Back in my halcyon college days at St. Olaf, I took an American rhetoric class from the Speech department to help pull together all the credits from my inter-disciplinary American Studies major. It was primary season in the spring of 1988, and one of the big assignments of the term was to write a speech to the for the winning candidate at the party's national convention--the twist being that the candidate you wrote for was the one you didn't support. Thus, I had to turn my back on Michael Dukakis and embrace (ugh) President George H.W. Bush.

Taking on the assignment from as dispassionate a stance as I could (remember, I was a passionate young college student at the time--hard to turn the spigot off), I cobbled together a wide assortment of material from Bush's stump speeches during that primary (contested largely by Bob Dole and Pat Robertson--my, how the times have changed) and came up with a pastiche of proposals that would move the country in the right direction (at least from the Bush perspective) and rousing bits of national pride--all pulled together with grandiloquent passages describing how great our nation was and how much greater it could be if we all pulled together and elected me... erm, President Bush. It actually sounded fairly realistic and I think I came away with a B+/A- (I was good at writing, but still needed work on my speaking skills).

I bring all this up in regards to last night's SOTU (State of the Union) address by President Bush, which sounded like yet another greatest hits collection from The Who (and they are many)--a wheezing, lifeless rehash of top-of-the-pops hits in a pristinely remastered package with one or two new songs (or remixes of old ones--something like Won't Get Fooled Again '05). Going into the speech, I was ready for some fiery oratory defending the President's positions in Iraq and on the warrantless wiretapping (erm... I mean "terrorist surveillance") program, but I was also looking forward to some new proposals on health care and energy independence--two threads that were being hyped by the pre-release of the speech by the White House press office (and with health care, in particular, grabbed onto by many, many major news sources as the lynchpin of the speech).

I say this kind of thing a lot, but based on my above noted college assignment, I really do believe I could have written last night's speech. As John Baer of the Philadelphia Daily News put it:

But mostly, almost entirely, this was a rehash of past ideas never realized, of meaningless nods to ethics scandals in Washington, of little comfort to those outside Washington who hate the war, fear the economy and worry about their health care.

From the NYTimes to the LATimes, analysis noted how muted President Bush's vision for the Union seemed. The WaPo's Dan Balz and Jim VandeHei also note this retreading , as well as some of the reasoning for it:

The president has never lacked for big ambitions, particularly in foreign policy, and he restated many of them last night. But his address lacked the rhetorical lift of some of his best efforts of the past, and the domestic policy agenda, although lengthy, included initiatives that have been around for some time.

In that sense, the speech was a reminder of how much the war in Iraq has drained the administration's energy and creativity, and how much it continues to define the Bush presidency. Before even turning to domestic issues, the president restated his determination to stay the course in Iraq, defended his controversial program of warrantless surveillance at home and issued another warning to Iran over its nuclear program.

Beyond Iraq, Bush's agenda is constrained by political and fiscal realities. Deep partisanship in Washington and the prospect of Democratic gains in the midterm elections lessen the likelihood of cooperation between the two parties on any issue of significance. Fiscally, the deep federal deficit and pressure from Republicans to cut spending restrain the president's ability to spend as significantly on domestic initiatives as he might like.

And Michael Scherer in Salon (subscription or viewing of annoying web ad required) sums up the Hooked on SOTU mash-up:

Bush appeared to be going through the paces, a lame duck coasting toward the midterm elections. He no longer boasted of vast political capital, piled high after his 2004 reelection. Instead of a Social Security privatization, the hallmark of last year's address, he proposed a bipartisan commission to study the problem.

Almost every line was an echo. In his 2005 State of the Union, Bush called for "expanded Health Savings Accounts." On Tuesday, he announced he would "strengthen Health Savings Accounts." In 2005, he promised to fund green projects, "from hydrogen-fueled cars, to clean coal, to renewable sources such as ethanol." On Tuesday, he pledged to invest in "zero-emission coal-fired power plants ... pollution-free cars that run on hydrogen ... cutting-edge methods of producing ethanol." In 2005, he promised to "ensure that human embryos are not created for experimentation." On Tuesday, he pledged to prohibit "creating or implanting embryos for experiments."

On immigration, Bush offered a "humane guest worker program that rejects amnesty," an echo of his 2004 declaration to "oppose amnesty" in favor of "my temporary worker program." He boldly asked Congress to reauthorize the Ryan White Act, an HIV/AIDS treatment program, repeating almost verbatim the same request from the 2005 State of the Union.

Even the few new proposals seemed simply to have been substituted for previous, ill-fated ideas. Where he once called for a ban on steroids in professional sports, he now called for lobbying and ethics reform. Where he once called for a gang prevention program, he now suggested math and science training for high school teachers. Rather than call for drilling in Alaska, he declared that America was addicted to oil -- but offered no hints that he would support stricter gas mileage regulations.

But aside from the rehash/retread meme of the speech, there was also a lot that the ever-rosy President Bush left out, and NPR had a great fact-checking of the address by pulled together by John Ydstie. First, President Bush on Iraq:

In less than three years, the nation has gone from dictatorship to liberation to sovereignty to a constitution to national elections. At the same time, our coalition has been relentless in shutting off terrorist infiltration, clearing out insurgent strongholds and turning over territory to Iraqi security forces.

And here's NPR's John Hendren (using my rusty transcription skills):

He did not talk about the rising casualty numbers over there. He did not talk about numbers for pull-out of American troops, no withdrawl date--although he did raise the prospect that there would be a gradual withdrawl of American troops as the Iraqi forces are trained. Really, what he talked about was broad themes of democracy expanding there and not really a lot else.

On the lofty subject of bringing liberty and democratic reform to the Middle East, Jackie Northam notes:

The result of elections, particularly in the Middle East, has been not actually what they were hoping for or expecting, and we point to something like Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood, which is a group the United States says is a terrorist organization, has started to make some very small inroads politically there. And then, of course, just recently in the Palestinian territories, we had Hamas that just won the elections absolutely hands down, undisputed. Of course Hamas is another organization that we deem as a terrorist group.

On the subject of warrantless wiretapping program (erm... I mean "terrorist surveillance" program), President Bush was unapologetic and continued the meme that had we had this "program" in place before 9/11/2001, the entire attack could have been avoided. (Note that even Ydstie refers to this program as, "what he [President Bush] calls his "terrorist surveillance program.")

We now know that two of the hijackers in the United States placed telephone calls to Al Qaeda operatives overseas. But we did not know about their plans until it was too late. 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 Qaeda operatives and affiliates to and from America.

Bruce Fein, an associate deputy attorney general in the Reagan administration, notes some of criticism of this warrantless wiretapping program, particularly in regards to FISA (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act), saying that the President does not have the authority to ignor congress's will as expressed in FISA:

No, he certainly does not. At first he refers to the fact that all previous presidents have asserted inherent constitutional authority. They did. But that was before FISA was enacted.

As an aside to this section on NPR's story, Daily Kos regular Bill in Portland Maine has a wonderfully snarky Cheers and Jeers today (a regular posting done most weekdays), summing up how easy it is to zap away pesky old laws:

What this country needs is a good scrubbing behind the ears. It's time to jettison any law that's not laser-etched on 21st Century titanium. If it's over 10 years old, toss it.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

"Abracadabra! The fourth amendment was written in 1789. We're having this discussion in 2006. It's a different world."

OK, back to NPR, where Larry Abramson notes there were many failure leading up to 9/11/2001, and, as Ydstie says as he introduces this section:

Ydstie: ...and it's unlikely the President's surveillance program would have caught the terrorists and foild the attacks.

Abramson: The problem was that the CIA knew that these guys were dangerous, that they had been at a terrorist meeting in Malaysia, and then they didn't put them on a terrorist watch list. So if they simply had done that, it's possible they would have been stopped at the border somewhere, they would have asked them questions, they would have linked them to the rest of the terrorists, and the whole plot would have been interrupted. The other problem is that the FBI didn't get its act together when they did find out about them and track them down as quickly as possible. So all of these agencies made many, many mistakes--there's no guarantee that the surveillance program would have helped them avoid those other mistakes.

On the economy, President Bush noted that it was vigorous, healthy and growing. As a counterpoint, Ydstie brings on Mark Zandy [sp?], chief economist for Moody's Economy.com, who notes that while job gains are being made and the economy is strengthening, the advances are not being distributed evenly:

Zandy: Business have fared very well. High income, high net-worth households have done very, very well, but lower/middle income households haven't done quite as well. So, the economy is doing fantastically, but the best of it [slightly unintelligable] has not gone down to everyone.

Ydstie: Zandy also says that Mr. Bush's statement that in every year of his presidency, he has reduced the growth of non-security discretionary spending was less than the full story. That designation leaves out things like the cost of Iraq, Hurricane Katrina and homeland security. Zandy says the country's finances have eroded sharply under President Bush.

Zandy: When he took office, the US government was running a record surplus of over $200 billion a year. At its worst, back in fiscal year '04, the deficit was over $400 billion; this past fiscal year '05, it was a little over $300 billion and according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, it will be well over $300 billion this year. So, by almost any measure, the nation's fiscal situation has sharply eroded in the past several years.

On the subject of our oil addiction:

Ydstie: To ease that addition, the President proposed an advanced energy initiative: a 22 percent increase in clean energy research at the department of energy, including work on zero emission coal plants, hydorgen fuel cells, batteries for hybrid cars, and ethanol. NPR's Scott Horsley says that the President's proposal ignores the area where the US has made the most progress in the past.

Horsley: The biggest success that the country had in terms of reducing its reliance on foreign oil came in the late 1970s and the early 1908s when we really did increase the efficiency of our vehicle fleet. About half the oil that we burn is to keep our cars and trucks on the road. In recent years, we haven't been doing a good job of improving the efficiency of that fleet.

Ydstie: President Bush set a goal of reducing US dependence on Middle Eastern oil by 70 percent over the next 20 years. What he didn't say was that the largest foreign sources of US petroleum are Canada, Mexico, Nigeria, and Venezuela. Petroleum imports from the Middle East make up less than a fifth of the total.

You can listen to this fact-checking story via Real Audio from this NPR page, as well as read more from the NPR reporters/commentators.

All in all, there's a lot to be proud of in America. But I have grave worries. I don't wanna be labeled a HAF (Hate America Firster) by proponents of this administration, especially after this section of last night's speech:

Yet there is a difference between responsible criticism that aims for success, and defeatism that refuses to acknowledge anything but failure. Hindsight alone is not wisdom. And second guessing is not a strategy.

I'm not trying to second guess just to be a curmudgeon. But I do want a full accounting of the facts, something that the BushCo administration simply will not provide.