Wednesday, January 21, 2015

SOTU

As I get older, I learn to just avoid things that will be painful.  Call it the wisdom of experience.  One thing I avoid is the State of the Union speech - and that's no matter who is in the White House.

Luckily, there are folks out there to watch it for me and give me the after-action report.  From John Hayward over at Big Government:
By the time we hit the lame-duck phase of any two-term presidency, SOTU will inevitably feel like an aging rock band that keeps giving encores nobody asked for, the audience groaning and returning to their seats as each new tune tumbles from the dusty speakers. This is an especially acute problem for Barack Obama, who has essentially been giving the same speech since 2008, with minor topical modifications.
He’s still generous to a fault with other people’s money. He still has a very high opinion of himself, coupled with very thin skin. He remains confident that his supporters can’t remember anything he’s actually done as President, or how any of it worked out. His speechwriters are still cherry-picking out-of-context statistics to make his presidency seem less disappointing. He still over-promises and under-delivers. He’s still the little boy who screams about everyone else’s cookie-eating habits when he gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Most importantly, President Obama has not lost faith in the magical power of his rhetoric. He thinks he can make problems including Yemen, Islamist terrorism, al-Qaeda, and his assorted scandals disappear by not talking about them. While he was busy trying to wish Vladimir Putin away to the cornfield, Russian and Ukrainian forces were exchanging fire. The regime Obama worked hard to install in Yemen is coming down in flames, to be replaced by some miserable combination of an Iranian satellite and an al-Qaeda fortress, but you’d never know it from Obama’s cheery blather about the glories of his “smart power.” By Obama standards, it’s a foreign-policy triumph that the evacuation of the last American from Sanaa wasn’t shown on a split-screen while he was patting himself on the back for his diplomatic skills.
Sounds like our Narcissist-in-Chief hasn't lost a step over the past six years.  It's still all about him and his view of how everything is wonderful thanks to The One.

This wouldn't be so bad if it was the 7th grade class president off on flights of delusion.  But this is the President of the United States of America.  Supposedly the most important man in the world.

From all reports, I saved myself pain and suffering by staying away from SOTU.  But I did enjoy Hayward's column.  You should read the whole thing yourself.


No comments: