Friday, August 29, 2008

Powerful Words

OK, I have to admit, the man can give a good speech.

Barrack Obama’s presentation last night was moving, as evidenced by the tears many of the 80,000-plus had in their eyes. In fact, I’d go so far as to say he’s got a bit of the preacherman in him.

But can he back it up?

In my opinion, and all the talking heads agreed with this morning (even those on a certain news channel), Obama hit all the high points and made his position known on all the big issues. Seriously, when was the last time we heard someone say they support abortion rights (and reducing unwanted pregnancies) and the 2nd Amendment (and keeping AK-47s off the street)?

Obama’s run to the middle faster than Bill Clinton chasing a short-skirted intern carrying a sack of White Castles while Hillary is out of the country. Not that that’s a bad thing (either one, in fact). The middle is a good place to start from since you’re already halfway to a solution on any issue.

He also paid the proper respect to John McCain’s service, both in the Navy and the Senate…and then proceeded to trash his political record. (“I'm not ready to take a ten percent chance on change.” Brilliant!)The last time anyone was that diplomatic to an adversary, Henry Kissinger was chatting with Lo Duc Tho in Paris. (One thought he was winning, the other knew he’d won.) Diplomacy, of course, is the art of telling someone to go fuck themselves in such a way as to make them look forward to the trip.

I was particularly impressed with his goal of a 10-year $150 billion investment in energy security. (That’s a big increase over the Department of Energy’s 2007 budget request of $1.5 billion for the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.) Not bad, now if we could get private industry to match that (on top of the money they’re already spending, which is impressive), we really could do what many of the Metro Buses say and tell OPEC to go fuck themselves. And not in a diplomatic way. (Anyone think someone’s been sharing a glass of Kool-Aid with Boone Pickens.)

The only thing I thought was missing was any statement on space exploration. The Mercury, Gemini, Apollo and space shuttle programs made America a world-wide scientific and engineering leader, it’s time for us to look to the sky again. Getting to the moon, again, by 2020 is not fast enough. It only took nine years the first time, why should it take 16 this go round?

Here’s me, looking forward to next week in Minneapolis. It’s gonna be fun.

4 comments:

Capitol Hill 20210 said...

Next week at the RNC is going to be interesting - I wish I was working it to be quite honest. Anarchists everywhere - they are suppose to be on the worst protestors in many many years.

still not voting for Obama though no matter how well he can he can move an audience.

[F]oxymoron said...

I agree... Obama's speech was brilliant. Especially the 10% jab!

Can't wait to watch the response

Kate said...

I enjoyed reading the text of the speech in the morning. Made more sense. When I hear him speak, I get a little sinking feeling he's the anti-christ or something and once he gets in office is going to order mass killings of us all, but his message is very powerful. Very.

FoggyDew said...

I'm pretty sure the Constitution doesn't grant the executive that power. Because, if it did, GW and friends would almost certianly have figured out a way to use it by now.