Fox TV presented several post SOTU poll results which showed that
by roughly 2 : 1 margins the public approved of what Obama said.
Someone else may interpret the poll results differently but what those
numbers suggest to me are two things :
( 1 ) BHO still has high personal favorables, most people continue to
like him, but
( 2 ) they decided, because of their personal feelings for the man, that he
was saying close to the opposite of what he actually did say.
The analysis in the San Diego newspaper outlines something of this
argument,
or at least seems so to me. I STRONGLY object to the article's view that
homosexualization of the military is somehow a good thing, I am seething
about this, and am outraged, but otherwise the essay seems to me to "nail
it."
Billy
===========================================================
San Diego
(http://oas.uniontrib.com/RealMedia/ads/click_nx.ads/www.uniontrib.com/clickabil...@right)
Union-Tribune Editorial
A missed opportunity / Speech shows Obama in denial over fear of his agenda
Thursday, January 28, 2010 at 12:04 a.m.
In his legendary Gettysburg Address, President Abraham Lincoln turned out
to be quite wrong when he said “the world will little note, nor long
remember” his remarks. But in general, presidential speeches are far from
memorable.
We had hoped President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address last
night would be an exception. Millions of the Americans who voted for him in
2008 are recoiling from Washington’s massive deficit spending, its bailouts of
Wall Street, insurers and automakers and its attempts to radically remake
the U.S. health care system. These largely centrist, independent voters
were not seeking an administration whose members saw the nation’s economic
crisis as an “opportunity” to impose drastic change. But that is what they
got – and is what they are now rejecting.
We hoped Obama would use his speech to acknowledge his misjudgment of the
national mood. We hoped he would outline a new agenda, focused on economic
growth and a much more sober attitude about federal spending.
It didn’t happen.
In fairness, his decision to end the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on
gays in the military, if handled adroitly, could prove a coup. His push for
tax breaks for small businesses that hire new workers is overdue.
But his claim that “green jobs” are the path to economic nirvana is
fantasy. His attempt to tamp fears about out-of-control spending flopped.
Touting a spending cap on a limited part of the budget while hundreds of
billions
of dollars are still forecast to be added to the national credit card each
year isn’t reassuring. And his decision to blame his health care setbacks
on partisanship and poor marketing – instead of a lack of public support
for his proposal – was deeply disappointing.
It’s as though Scott Brown’s shocking win last week in the Massachusetts
Senate race never happened. It’s as if all the polls showing mass pubic
anxiety over ballooning national debt didn’t exist.
The president is right when he says the “deficit of trust” felt by
Americans preceded his election. But he only adds to that deficit when he
concludes that what the nation wants is a better-executed view of his extreme
initial agenda. Instead, the public wants a much more pragmatic, centrist
version of this agenda – and a laserlike focus on reviving the private-sector
economy.
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