Observations from the Window 1.29

Last Tuesday night I watched President Obama's State of the Union address. I'm not going to get into the content of the speech other than to say it was heavily into the wealth inequality that seems to be the signature issue of out time. It was a good speech that showed the President back in campaign form and maybe ready to finally take on the GOP head on. One can hope.

As watched the speech I chatted with a friend and tried to keep up with a wildly out of control twitter. It seemed as if everybody was watching and had an opinion on it which was good to see because it shows that as the election year begins people are far from turned off by it. They know what the stakes are this year and just want to get past the joke that is the GOP primary season and get to the main event. One way or another I think this is going to be a very interesting year.

I truly love politics and take some pride in usually have a good guess about what is going to happen but these primaries are driving me insane. Newt Gingrich, the very antithesis of the conservative GOP, just wont go away and at times is the front runner. Willard Romney, who I once thought was the GOP's best hope, cries of wealth envy and has most of his own wealth in the Cayman Islands. Than there is Ron Paul who continues to amass delegates but to what end? He has nowhere near the money to spend as the other candidates but seems to only need a bus ticket to the next state to add to his delegate count. What Paul plans to do with them is the first big question of the campaign.

Some election year randomness.

The always popular Rick Santorum on President Obama's policy in Libya, “We should never go to war simply to topple a dictator.” Somebody needs to hand him a history of the war in Iraq. After the GOP debates in Florida it seems Santorum is running more to be Willard Romney's running mate than anything else.

In Georgia a judge ruled President Obama must appear in court in a case which challenges his being on the Georgia ballot for the November election, once again the question is his citizenship. The President's lawyer boycotted the hearing saying it was “baseless, costly and unproductive” while lawyers for the challengers said the president should be held in contempt for not complying. Recently I talked with somebody who said he thinks Obama was born in Kenya at which point I just wanted to shake the crap out of him. In all seriousness, what must the man do for these people?

And finally as the US and Iran drift back and forth from the brink some Republicans still have the gall to accuse President Obama of appeasement. One has to wonder what Osama bin Ladin, Muammar Gaddafi, and some recently deceased Somali pirates would have to say about that.