Are You a Middle Class voter?

If so, then Obama was talking to you, in his State of the Union speech tonight. Lets see - stop offshoring jobs! A plea to get those nicely paid manufacturing jobs back. Tuition is too high! Responsible homeowners should be rewarded! $3000 for each of them! Drill baby drill, off our coastal shores!

And do you know why he had to raise the debt limit by $1.2 Trillion just last week? It was to pay for those tax breaks for the uber-rich, like Warren Buffet. Wait, are you sure that money didn't go to pay for the interest on the national debt? Or a B-1 bomber? Or maybe 99 weeks + 2 more months of unemployment insurance for millions?

What is an investment, and what is a payoff to supporters, and what is money down a black hole?

And how exactly are those promises going to be kept? I would like nothing more than manufacturing jobs to return.. but saying it does not make it so. Please, tooth fairy, I know I didn't lose any teeth lately, but I truly believe, and maybe that 50cents I got when I was 6 years old should continue to be compensated now, due to inflation you know.

Bottom line, there is no "there" there, no substance in this speech. But, it does precede his annual budget proposal in February, which will also have no bipartisan support. For now, it is promises to voters, who he hopes will remain on his side through November 6 at least (at most). Its the promise of "hope" and "change". Well how well did that work out last time ?

On the Eve Of..

.. Reading about Iran's second nuclear installation, and their threats to close shipping lanes makes me think of that song "On the Eve of Destruction". You know, the 60's garage sounding band.

I have packed my fears of living minutes away from nuclear war war away with my leg warmers and political cartoons of Ronald Reagan.

For those of you who did not experience the 80's up close and personal, the overriding fear of the era was nuclear annihilation. Now that was something to occupy a public square over.

Today there are terrorists in the world. Somali pirates. Iran's nuclear weapon ambitions. And the homegrown mentally unstable college student detached from reality, armed and loaded with easily obtainable military class weaponry.

The threat is so far out there, like those billions of galaxies the Hubble telescope is finding. The threat is next door to us. The threat is already on the public square, ahead of us.

What is the response? Is it the Patriot Act on steroids, surveilling our every move and every anticipated move, minority report style? I'm so glad the airport scanner can detect tissues in my pocket (perhaps a cover for baked on cocaine smuggling!) and I have to de-belt and re-belt in a public airport terminal (as you get older kiddos, its really no big deal). But I doubt any of this catches any clever terrorists. Though it probably does create more jobs, for TSA screeners.

Gun control, economic opportunity, community.

Unchecked freedom lends to chaos. Don't give guns to people on the edge. Pool resources or forge a sister country relationship with Somalia to allow people other avenues besides looting ships.

Are we on the eve? The eve of what? Today, thinking about being on the eve of community.