The State of our Union...

I know this might sound shocking to some, but I actually sat through the entire State of the Union address last night. Yes, it's true. I listened to a whole 60 minutes of crap interesting remarks from the President of the United States. I can't remember the entire thing because truthfully, I was too busy laughing at members of Congress with my roommate (has anyone else ever noticed how much John Kerry resembles Guy Smiley?). But I digress. The speech (or at least what I got out of it) went something like this:

Our nation is great but we are failing. All these other amazing countries (China and South Korea were each mentioned more than once) are passing us up and we need to work harder. But never fear! The President has a plan! He wants all our youth to become teachers because we need better teachers! I don't know what his exact plan is to sustain (aka: pay) all these new teachers or where all of them are even going to find jobs, but it probably doesn't matter because they will all be working to help our children!

He also has a plan to "invest" a bunch of money in a bunch of different places to help our country succeed. And we, the taxpayers, don't have to worry about it because it will all be "privately funded". He didn't mention who would be privately funding all of this, but my guess is one of these other amazing countries that he kept referring to. That is such a relief...

Oh, and he also signed a bunch of trade agreements with a bunch of these other countries to help provide more jobs for a few hundred thousand Americans. The reason? America needs more jobs. Oh, but he doesn't want to send illegal immigrants back home because they'll only compete against us. Instead, we should educate them (paid for by American taxpayers) and then find them jobs here in America where they can work for us! That's a great plan. Let's just not think about how that will still keep actual Americans from finding work in their own country.

Let's see...what else. Oh yes, he talked more about "our new healthcare law". Yes, it's that same law I wrote about back when it was passed. I still hate it. But the president really really wants both sides to come together on this and to make it better so that everyone will be happy with it. Um, couldn't that have happened a year ago before the democrats (and the president himself) pushed it through before anyone else had a say?

Anyway, I suppose he also said a few good things, but to me the speech left me with a feeling of dread rather than pride. President Obama is a speech. He's all talk. He made big promises when he ran for office and hasn't followed through on any of them. And now the "plans" he currently has for this country don't sound sincere. HE doesn't sound sincere. He left me feeling like I live in a crappy country rather than the greatest country ever and to me, that's a problem.

What did I get out of this speech? We need a new President. One who actually believes in America and doesn't just say those things we want to hear. He wants me to rise to the occasion and work my butt off for America? Then he needs to do the same thing! He needs to stop telling me that China is better than we are. He needs to stop telling me that I need to work harder for this country and then turn around and take my hard earned money to pay for the education of illegal immigrants who will then take my job away from me. Being able to inspire an entire country to work harder and achieve success requires a leader who is not only inspiring, but one who is willing to do the same thing. And right now, we don't have that.