Fort Worth Blogorrhea: Semi-Live Blog of the SOTU

I'm going to attempt a semi-live blog of the State of the Union. It's Tivo'd so I can FF thru clapping. So no timestamps with comments. Warning this is long and boring. Read at your own peril.

Sergeant at Arms does his bit and Bush starts glad-handing down the aisle.
Why did Chris Shays (R-Conn) kiss Bush on the cheek?
Obama is sitting with Teddy. I'm curious how much of a punch Teddy will give Obama. I'm thinking mebbe not so much.
Shot of the first family. Jenna either is injured or was never taught how to clap like a normal person.
Pelosi introduces Bush. Everyone hollers. Don't get that.
He's pleading for compromise and bipartisanship. Little late for that pards.
He just said he believes the appropriate guide for our country is the "collective wisdom of ordinary citizens." Good line, but I haven't seen much of that in seven years. Haven't we become more oligarchical (sp?) and relied more on the few? I believe we've turned our backs on this collective wisdom and moved closer to monarchy. If I truly believed that, why would he have claimed a mandate in either election with either no majority or a very small one? Both of his elections have been characterized by the alienation of half of the electorate after gulling most of the other half with fear-mongering. Collective wisdom, my ass.
"Trust in the ability of free people to make wise decisions." This shit infuriates me. I'm five minutes in and ready to turn this bullshitter off. There's about five people in his administration that make all the decisions and to hell with the "free people." None of these decisions have anything to do with "free people making wise decisions" or the "collective wisdom of ordinary citizens." What horseshit.
Stimulus Plan...borrow and spend...still don't get it. Congress' fault.
Tax Relief. Also Congress' fault.
Veto any tax increases. Just keep borrowing.
Government should balance the budget. No shit sherlock.
Seven years in, he's ready to take a hardline on spending.
I like the sound of this. No earmarks can be slipped in through the transom at the last minute. Somehow he's going to only allow earmarks that have had a vote. That sounds like a great idea that should have been done a long time ago. Congressional hypocrites all stand and cheer.
Mortgage relief, blah, blah.
Health care, blah, blah.
Education, blah, blah. Boys and girls with dreams, blah, blah. Reduce dropouts, blah, blah.
Trade, blah, blah.
He just said, "embolden the purveyors of false populism in our hemisphere." He said it really slowly, but he got through it. I think what he meant was that if we don't sign a free trade agreement with Columbia, look out for another fucking Hugo Chavez, but I wonder how many of his "ordinary citizens" caught that.
Euphemism alert: Trade Adjustment Assistance = what the Federal Government will do for you when you get outsourced.
Energy. Security, prosperity, environment require lessening our dependence on foreign oil. We've made some progress in seven years. No. 1 idea...clean coal. Cop out. He slipped in "renewable power" very quickly before he hit a big applause line with nucular power.
Now he wants an international agreement to slow, stop, and reverse the effects of what he euphemistically calls "greenhouse gases." Seems like we could have done that about seven years ago if we'd have really tried. Standing O. Cheney claps lacklusterly.
Says we need to trust our scientists and engineers to go forward and conquer. Now I'm waiting for the stem-cell shoe to drop... Double funding for the "physical sciences" he says as he sashays away from evangelical controversy with this clever code. Go kick some ass all you geologists, we'll get some out of work geneticists to help you.
Here we go. "Moral boundries." Shoe has dropped. Standing O from all bible-thumpers.
On to Justice. I just hit pause right after he said, "...trust in the wisdom of our founders." I can't imagine how much what he's about to say is going to piss me off. His AG has a picture of Orwell hanging in his office for chrissakes.
...pause again..."empower judges who understand that the constitution means what it says." Or are willing to interpret it with amazing creativity for everything having to do with war powers, justice, habeas corpus, unitary executive, etc. What a hypocrite.
Now to volunteerism. All about faith-based stuff.
Katrina and the "Armies of Compassion"??? Some meeting's gonna be held in New Orleans. Hopefully they'll have some breakout meetings in the ninth ward.
Entitlements, blah, blah. Didn't like my idea, you guys fuckin' fix it then.
Immigration. He just said that we need to create a lawful way for foreign workers to come here and support our economy. I thought we already had a lawful way? In fact I'm sure of it.
On to WarTalk. This year's policy: "We trust that people, when given a chance, will choose a future of freedom and peace." I would certainly choose it, but I'm not sure that I trust that everyone else would choose it. Sounds like he's choosing for them. Nothing new here.
Some stirring moments in the history of liberty in the last seven years: Georgia, Ukraine, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Iraq. I'm not so sure all of those have worked out so well buddy. How about what we've seen in Russia over the last seven years, or Venezuela? I'd agree those are stirring moments in the history of liberty.
"Deliver justice to our enemies" and Cheney springs up like a gymnast.
There's Jenna clapping like a four-year old again.
3200 Marines headed for Afghanistan. About time.
Here we go. SurgeTalk. I wonder how often he mentions the political benchmarks for which there has been little progress...the justification for the troop increases. Let's see... He just changed the whole justification for the surge...just like that. He said we gave the troops a new mission: protect Iraqi people, pursue the enemy in strongholds, and deny terrorists sanctuary. Of course, the surge didn't have anything to with political progress. And there's some conflation of "terrorists" and "the enemy" but that's old hat.
"The surge has achieved results none of us could have imagined just one year ago." One year ago, he said the Iraqi government was going to meet all of these benchmarks or we were going to bail. So, logically, he knew that there would be no political progress in a year? I'm very happy for the improved security of the Iraqi people and I'm gratified that our troops, along with the Anbar folks have enabled security improvements, but let's call a spade a spade. You said by doing x, z would happen. Y happened, which is nice, but it's not z.
He mentioned Osama almost as if he's part of the intelligence community. If Osama says it, it must be true.
Troops are coming home. Huge applause. But didn't they have to come home because their tours were up in March and we couldn't extend tours again?
Just hit the benchmark issue and claims that some progress is being made politically. Pretty much danced over there.
Quoting more Al Queda leaders as though they're part of our intelligence operation. I'm sure they're telling the truth.
More standard "we will prevail" saber rattling. Blah, blah.
Another call for two-state solution in Israel/Palestine.
More Iran axis of evil type stuff. Said nucular twice. Some tough talk to Iranian mullahs.
Here comes torture/domestic spying talk. More warrantless wiretapping fear-mongering. More protect AT&T from breaking the law talk.
Just called Sudan a genocide for the first time.
Good God this is getting tiresome.
Now we're going to stop famine by buying our crops from poor countries. Bet that'll go over good in Iowa.
Hey, spend some real money on AIDS. Like that.
Another great idea, pay for veterans benefits.
Sounds like this shit's about over. About time. He said the state of our union's strong. I wish he would say that it's not so hot right now.