I missed W last night, because I’m still only successfully breathing out of one nostril, but I’m catching up on the morning shows.
His statement that America needs to develop alternative fuel sources seemed to be the highlight of the speech. Joe Biden was enthusiastic on the Today show.
Any impression of the speech?
UPDATE: Matt Yglesias — One doesn’t have high expectations for these things, but it continues to be a bit shocking to me how confortable the President is putting straw men at the center of his national security worldview. The country, in his speeches, is populated by all sorts of nutty folks who don’t think terrorists should be wiretapped, who think it’s bad for other countries to become freer, and now with these shady isolationists.
Apt. 11d 
I wouldn’t really call that the highlight of the speech. I think someone at The Oil Drum estimated that he spent all of 2 minutes on energy issues. Vs. at least 18 minutes blathering on about how we’re FREEEEE! We need to fight terrrrism! We need to make ’em all democratic!
(Sorry–all in all, I thought it sucked. And even though I don’t like W, I’ve heard better speeches from him.)
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For those of us in New Orleans, it deepened our sense that the federal government doesn’t care about us. Some parts of the nation matter more than others.
From what I understand, when Bush says $85 billion has been spent down here (or “in that part of the world,” as he often says), this figure includes payments from the federal flood insurance program. I guess for Bush actually fulfilling the federal government’s part of an agreement is an act of charity.
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Ianqui — The Times and the morning shows all made it out like the alternative fuel sources item was the biggest point of the speech. Shows you how the media can distort things.
Frolic — I hope that you write more about your experiences in New Orleans on your blog. The only news about New Orleans that we get these days is about your mayor, Montell Williams, and his big mouth.
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I will be writing more about New Orleans. After months of exile, I just got back two weeks ago.
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Oh it was so horrible and had no meaning whatsoever. Alternative fuel was given a 20 year window to get it done. 20 YEARS! How The problem is that emerging markets are going to leap from this technology(see Wired re: China and the hydrogen powered car).
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Yglesias is wrong-the “straw men” he describes are the very real men and women of the (elected) Democratic party, who think the global war on terror is George Bush’s personal ego trip.
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If Bush saw it as something else, he might be actually trying to do it competantly
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And as been pointed out in other places, we’ve gotten to the point where cabinet secretaries can tell people that some of the president’s statements were not to be taken literally (e.g., ‘Middle East’), and this doesn’t cause a stir. Imagine if Clinton’s energy secretary had gone in front of the press the day after a SOTUS, talking about things not being ‘literal’!
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