Pundits seem to think Obama's speech was partially aimed at independents, i.e. the center. As someone who sort of fits that bill, here were my reactions.
- What if. I liked a lot of the proposals that I think were targeted at my political demographic, e.g. zero capital gains taxes, more nuclear power, small business credits, budget restraint, etc. However, I kept thinking why didn't all of these thing happen over the past year, when they arguably would have had a bigger impact on the economy.
Then I got to thinking they are somewhat bi-partisan proposals, at least in recessionary times, so what would have happened if Obama had led with these last year? Of course it is an unanswerable question, but you have to wonder if he had done it would he had started off on a better footing and then would have been more able to achieve a real bi-partisan, or at least more bi-partisan health care reform outcome.
- Too long. I realize most State of the Unions are super long, but it just seemed to drag on. I would love to see Obama or another president make a shorter, more themed speech as opposed to really ten different speeches on every major political topic. It seemed he was just trying to cover all the bases. The worst was at the end he threw in like three sentences on immigration with no proposals or anything. He might as well just said the word immigration, paused, and moved on.
- Liked the casual parts. I really appreciated the parts where Obama's personality shone through. That is, you could tell some of it was his own words. It bothers me how speech writers are so prevalent.
- Bi-partisan yet not at the same time. I thought the tone on partisanship was weird. He would call for bi-partisan effort and then 30 sec later attack people in a partisan way. And I thought some of his attacks were simplified to much in the same way he attacked the media for doing.
- Supreme court thing was strange. The moment where he called out the Supreme Court and all of Congress basically jeered at them while they just sat there was strange, and I thought inappropriate.
Follow my blog. I'd be eternally grateful.
