What I couldn't believe is that there were protesters outside where he was giving the speech...and I was thinking, "what kind of a jerk do you have to be to be opposed to the 'stay in school, study hard so you can have a good future' message. " What, having kids drop out of school, barely support themselves on minimum wage jobs, or go on welfare is better? Go figure. Jerks.

The smear attempt over the speech may not have been so had previous presidents set a similar example - had they been one.... ( story reading during worse national catastrophy in history noi included).

The act demonstrates the character of Obama and the values he has on education, and accompolishements he has had based on them. What better role model ? Unfortunaltey, the Obama smeer campaign is only temporarily on pause for now.

This is probably not simply a smear. It is a slow but persistent hammering on his coalition. The Republicans are not afraid of health care although some of their fund sources are. They are reeling from having become the third party in a two party system. As adg said, not only not silent but not the majority. They need to divide the mandate of the last election and the most vulnerable to that are the far left member who expected Obama to ride in and slay all dragons in the first year. By using the high expectations set to increase the frustration, they can use the behavioral habits engendered to heighten emotions and divide loyalties.

This is classic "let's you and him fight" which is why it is important to become less reactionary and more turtle like: slow and persistent.

Remember the space cowboy question: "Are you a turtle?" The correct answer is "You bet your sweet ass I am." It was inherited by the missile gypsies from the jet test pilot gypsies. When working close to the edge, slow as you go is how you stay in the game.

It doesn't matter that there is so much stupid for them to recruit. It matters that smart doesn't act stupid because of frustration. Al Franken handled that well. Know the answers to the important questions and don't be drawn in.

Education may be the same threat to republicans that it was to slave owners in the 19th century.

Someone told me that before HW's speech to school kids a stink was raised and hearings held about whether a president is allowed to waste money on such things as addressing the nation. I have nothing to back that up. I was just told so.
Either way and on either side of the fence it is about the most unpatriotic things I ever heard of.

Right or wrong, there was a time in this country when presidents served as role models and even heros to the common folk as opposed to the same for certain intrests. I'd be afraid too if my job was to get republicans elected!

I remember my JROTC Colonel expressing shock that any of us could doubt the word of the President (then LBJ and then Nixon), that the POTUS could actually lie to the people. That bit of mythology was about to disappear into the same place that roach clips and guitar picks go never to return.

Still, until Reagan there was a certain amount of respect left on the left for the office even if not the man and after Shrub, not from the right either. Obama, as a man, had done nothing to deserve this shellacking except to win. Now he is appearing weak, indecisive and simply to inexperienced to govern just as JFK did and continued to do despite the rosy view in the rear view of American history.

The danger, as I said, is he had a mandate that is rapidly evaporating just as the first real important battle (health care) is being fought and that says nothing good about the commitment of his core supporters to get in there and fight. My initial trepidation about his candidacy, that he is an empty suit, seems to be validated and given the enormous emotional entanglements created by his election, that ain't good. It leaves no focus. We resemble the post-war Italian society that could never get a solid consensus for anything.

Health care would appear to be a no-brainer yet it and this speech distraction tell me something is rotten at the core of American society today. We've lost our sense of national identity and resorted to the isms regional and otherwise that swell our hearts with empty pride and useless indignation instead of reaching for the common good.

len, he didn't appear to be an empty suit last night giving the health-care speech. I heard "if it's war you want, it's war you've got"! He grew a pair and is ready to take on his opponents.


mikey

Speeches are easy, Mikey. Getting down and dirty with opponents is hard. The Beltway is a zero-sum game. He better be ready to play hardball.

Let's see.

yep, that capital "H" Definately did it for me.

Trying to be a turtle, but smart did not act stupid last night.

Instead you saw one of the smartest guys on the face of the earth today who happens to be our president call it as he saw it , with courage. What I heard is it is unrestrained capitalism. My take was Insurance and docs together are going for maximum profit on employers and taxpayers backs.

Several other threads here address this, so I won't, even though I hate to break my streak of posting off topic

so staying on the speech,
I saw a guy who wanted to put the economy in a safer place.
Working in the health care industry all my life , since grad school in 1978 until present ( with the exception of a few lost years in Boulder) my take is that the pharmaceutical companies AND the Universities, are building empires off the current health plans.

As it is a speech, certainly he simply wants to give one which most of the people there would want to hear. If he said otherwise, people would go ballistic wouldn't they ?