Bush’s SOTU Sales Pitch. A Brief Analysis.

January 24, 2007 by mugsy.

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Last night, President Bush delivered his 6th State of the Union address, but his first before a Democratically controlled Congress, and the lowest approval rating of any President since Nixon gave his 1974 speech at the height of Watergate. Once again, he made a point of reminding us how much safer he HASN’T made us since becoming president; pointed out the increase in corruption and abuses of power that flourished under the Republican controlled Congress; and his SIXTH warning about energy independence and the need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil (instead, under Bush, our dependence on foreign oil has GROWN from 58% in 2000 to 70% today).

Here was President Bush’s first comment to catch my attention:

“Finally, to keep this economy strong we must take on the challenge of entitlements. Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid are commitments of conscience — and so it is our duty to keep them permanently sound. Yet we are failing in that duty — and this failure will one day leave our children with three bad options: huge tax increases, huge deficits, or huge and immediate cuts in benefits. Everyone in this Chamber knows this to be true — yet somehow we have not found it in ourselves to act.”

“Somehow“? Up until now, Republicans controlled both houses of Congress. If President Bush had put forth a plan that 51% of both Houses supported, his plan would of passed. But even the recent Republican Congress wasn’t fool enough to vote for President Bush’s absurd service-crippling scheme to privatize Social Security. President Bush hit the “campaign trail” in 2005 to push his unpopular plan, and the more he explained it, the more unpopular it became. And “somehow” his scheme hasn’t passed yet. Can’t imagine why. And if he’s expecting better results under a Democratic Congress, he’s sorely mistaken.

“In 2005 alone, the number of earmarks grew to over 13,000 and totaled nearly $18 billion. Even worse, over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate — they are dropped into Committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You did not vote them into law. I did not sign them into law. Yet they are treated as if they have the force of law. The time has come to end this practice.”

Once again, President Bush remarks on the rampant abuse of power and fiscal irresponsibility of his own Party. And now he is suggesting it is the job of the Democratically controlled Congress to stop this unparalleled waste and abuse of power. Of course, the new Democratic Congress has already taken on this issue, enacting legislation that eliminates the anonymity of those who insert earmarks into legislation. You insert some enormous piece of pork into a bill, your name goes in with it.

“Yet even with all these steps, we cannot fully secure the border unless we take pressure off the border — and that requires a temporary worker program. We should establish a legal and orderly path for foreign workers to enter our country to work on a temporary basis. As a result, they won’t have to try to sneak in — and that will leave border agents free to chase down drug smugglers, and criminals, and terrorists.”

I spoke of finding ways to decriminalize illegal immigration last year. It is nice to hear President Bush address the issue, though I doubt anything will come of it, or that he will propose a solution I agree with.

‘…we must increase the supply of alternative fuels,”

If you’re keeping count at home, this is the sixth time in six speeches that President Bush has spoken of the need to promote “alternative energy”. As mentioned above, our dependence on foreign oil has only grown, with tax-cuts on gas-guzzling SUV’s as much as $100,000 encouraging automakers to produce and rely heavily on the sales of vehicles that fewer and fewer Americans want in the face of rising gas prices (a direct result of the Bush Administrations foreign policy), leaving the worlds largest automaker, GM, teetering on the brink of bankruptcy while fuel-efficient economy-car maker Toyota is poised to usurp GM’s throne sometime this year. ALL THREE major American automakers are headed for some form of financial restructuring this year, and all three have resorted to major layoffs and plant closing to cut costs. Once again, the rhetoric President Bush espouses in his SotU is not followed up by any serious action.

“We stopped an al-Qaida plot to fly a hijacked airplane into the tallest building on the West Coast. We broke up a Southeast Asian terrorist cell grooming operatives for attacks inside the United States. We uncovered an al-Qaida cell developing anthrax to be used in attacks against America. And just last August, British authorities uncovered a plot to blow up passenger planes bound for America over the Atlantic Ocean.”

Here, President Bush refers to four “thwarted” terrorist plots that weren’t. The plot to “fly a hijacked airplane into the tallest building on the West Coast” refers to a plot that was revealed more than a year ago… October of 2005… which occurred before his LAST State of the Union speech. However, the plot he speaks of was thwarted in 2002 and discovered by an unnamed Southeast Asian country (probably the Philippines). The “Southeast Asian terrorist cell” described in the next sentence refers to the EXACT SAME GROUP in the previous sentence.

I am unable to accurately deduce the source of President Bush’s “al-Qaida cell developing anthrax” reference, but a cursory Google search suggests every story regarding anthrax and terrorism all refer to the efforts of “Khalid Sheik Mohammad”, who has been in US custody since March of 2003. (While the source of the anthrax sent to members of Congress… including Sen Minority Leader Tom Daschel… was never found.)

And of course, the British bomb plot was uncovered and foiled by the British police and British intelligence, with minimal U.S. involvement… once again proving Kerry’s point that fighting terrorism is a law enforcement problem, not a military one.

“In the sixth year since our nation was attacked, I wish I could report to you that the dangers have ended. They have not.”

For the second year in a row, President Bush reminds us that his War on Terror has been a COMPLETE AND TOTAL FAILURE.

“In Iraq, al-Qaida and other Sunni extremists blew up one of the most sacred places in Shia Islam — the Golden Mosque of Samarra. This atrocity, directed at a Muslim house of prayer, was designed to provoke retaliation from Iraqi Shia — and it succeeded. Radical Shia elements, some of whom receive support from Iran, formed death squads. The result was a tragic escalation of sectarian rage and reprisal that continues to this day.”

This has become a popular theme from the Bush Administration as of late: re-writing history to convince us that everything in Iraq was on the right track and getting better until al-Qaeda blew up the “Golden Mosque” last February in order to start a civil war. Certainly, the referred to attack didn’t make things in Iraq any better, but of course, Iraq was NOT improving before that point. It was November of 2005 when former hawk Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) called for Redeployment of American troops out of Iraq in the face of what he had finally concluded was “Civil War”. Any suggestion that the current level of violence is a “recent” event that can be nipped in the bud if we react quickly by sending more troops, is pure fantasy.

“If American forces step back before Baghdad is secure, the Iraqi government would be overrun by extremists on all sides. We could expect an epic battle between Shia extremists backed by Iran, and Sunni extremists aided by al-Qaida and supporters of the old regime. A contagion of violence could spill out across the country — and in time the entire region could be drawn into the conflict.

For America, this is a nightmare scenario.”

Does it seem to anyone else that this is the kind of thing that should of been considered BEFORE we invaded Iraq nearly four years ago? “Nightmare scenario”? I can think of several.

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