The State of the Union

This evening the world will stop. For a brief hour, people that should be sleeping will stay awake. People that would rather be watching crime shows will tune in, and people that hate the president’s guts will listen to him speak for one hour.

It’s a bit of politics, pageantry, history and pure magic all rolled into one speech. The State of the Union Address. The President is called to the witness stand to give us the State of the Union, from his point of view, in his version of reality.

Of course, we can already be pretty sure of what the president will speak on. He will talk about how great the economy is doing under his administration, as he reminds everyone almost every week in his weekly addresses. At some point he will make a reference to our troops. He will talk about his record, and will probably address the fact that his party just lost congress. This in turn will most likely bring about some sort of token mention of how he is for bipartisanship.

He will also talk about his new plan for free college for all, and his sceme to tax the rich more to pay for this.

But we must remember that that is the president’s view. According to a Gallup Poll yesterday half of the country disapproves of the job he is doing. And less than half approve. Many Republicans would tell you that Barak Obama is in no way interested in bipartisanship dealing, but rather has the view of deal making that says “you compromise and give me what I want, and we have ourselves a bargain.”

The economy has not healed like it should be, foreign problems are mounting, and nothing is being done about them. Race has become a problem once again, the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) is still not working the way it should, and immigration still has not been reformed.

Barak Obama is already a lame duck. He is not running again, the hourglass has already been turned over for the final time and the sand is now running out. His day in the sun is almost done, and whatever he says now, it will certainly carry less weight than before.

Some presidents have managed to keep themselves powerful right down to the very end, but so far not this one. As for the real State of the Union, many Americans do not think it is as great as Obama seems to think.

When the grand speech is given, one of the great moments every year is when the doors are opened, the president is announced, and he walks towards the stage. Some have done it with a sure stride; some have even had reason to take that walk with a swagger. But for Barak, this year, his walk will be a bit more of a limp.

Andrew C. Abbott

No Game

Atlanta, GA – The field of candidates for the Republican Candidacy is shaping up nicely. This guy and that woman are taking to the talk shows to remind Americans of their time in office/service, whatever, and to tell everyone how great their record is. (Because nobody would know how great it was if they didn’t.)

The Bushes are returning, (imagine the headlines we could make from that) Clan Romney may be making a comeback, (or from that) Dr. Carson would like to be Dr. President, and even Paul Ryan, the man who lost with Romney in 2012 may be thinking of a return to the limelight.

The papers are full of headlines such Romney Ready to Rumble? Speaking about how this man or that might steal the nomination, where they might find the money, and what sort of appeal they have.

But sometimes, oftentimes, perhaps, something is lost in all of this. The race is very much based on the men and women who are in it. But this is not a race to win the nomination or even the presidency. It is, (or at least should be) a race about who is the best man of woman to lead America for the four years after Obama gives up the reins.

We are not looking for a savior. History has had plenty of people who said they were one of those and they all turned out to look more like the devil once we got the mask off.

We are not looking for someone who was born with magic powers who can wave a wand and fix it all. That is not what this is all about.

The job description of the office of the president is simple. An imperfect human is wanted to come and lead the greatest country ever conceived. We are not expecting them never to slip up, but rather we expect them to get up when they do. We do not expect them never to make a bad decision, but we do expect them to make a decision nonetheless, and if they make the wrong one, to admit it. We are looking for wisdom, not immortality.

I do not know which of the candidates have these qualities, maybe more than one, maybe none, it is still far too early to tell. But what we can say at this early stage is this: politics can be fun-some people watch it like entertainment- but it is no game. These numbers and percentages are actual people. Their lives and livelihoods depend in real ways on the decisions made.

And as we talk about can this person beat that one, will we have our first ever Madam President, or not, let’s not forget, this is not just a complicated game of chess, it is real life. If we get it wrong, everybody loses. If we get it bad wrong, everybody dies.

Andrew C. Abbott

The Republicans Could Mess the Whole Thing Up

“Politics is a contact sport.” –Carl Rove

Jack London’s story A Piece of Steak is about Tom King, the old boxer who has to fight just to get money for food. It opens before the fight, with King bemoaning the fact that he can’t buy a piece of steak (hence the name of the story) for energy.

Nevertheless he begins winning in the opening rounds against his opponent, the younger, favored Sandel. But as the rounds go on, King’s advantage becomes less and less. As King beats his much younger opponent, the young man goes into the clinch, and King, his body up against the younger Sandel’s, can feel him regaining his strength, his body repairing itself.

The Republicans are "IN." Some editorials after the 2014 elections said the Democrats were down for the count. (They weren’t.) It is true currently the Republicans are on top, and, Carl Rove (George Bush’s advisor) can be believed, politics does in some ways resemble a boxing match.

The Democrats are battered. (Just ask Harry Reid.) But they are not out. As some would like to think. If anything they are going into a clinch position, and like King, we can feel them repairing.

The only hope for the Republicans coming into office in a divided government, with Republicans on Capitol Hill and a Democrat in the White House is bipartisanship. If the president does not like a bill, he can always veto it, and is already threatening to. The Republicans must work with him to get things passed.

If Obama does veto it, then a second possibility for bipartisanship exists. Overturning the veto. But, in the senate alone that would require 67 votes. And, with all of their new found power there are only 54 Republicans. 13 Democrats are highly unlikely to peel off, but an effort could always be made.

The first fight, apparently, is going to be over the Keystone Pipeline. The pipe that will cost over 8,000,000,000 dollars. (Eight billion.) And be over 1,000 miles long. Supposedly its capacity would be around 800,000 gallons a day of oil piping down from Canada to Texas.

The Greens claim that it is going to cause massive problems for the environment, causing global warming, (or it is now global cooling, these things to tend to change all the time) and that they have reports to prove it. While others say that the Greens are wrong, that this is really great for American jobs and industry, and they also have reports to prove it.

Either way, this pipeline, put on hold for so long, might finally be coming up for a vote in the coming days in congress. It could possibly even have some Democratic support, as the Democratic Senator from Louisiana, (since replaced) in her last days of office, in December, tried to get a bill passed allowing it. She lost with the bill, and she also lost her seat, to a Republican in the House of Representatives, who put an identical bill there as well on the same day.

Already the name calling has begun. The fighting has started. Mitch McConnell, the Majority leader in the senate for the Republicans made the first gaff, claiming that his party was responsible for the economic growth last year in the third quarter, even though it happened before the election had even taken place. The Democratic Party responded to him in an email with the subject line “DNC to McConnell: Hahahahahahahahahahaha.”
 

Whatever happens with the pipeline, the Republicans have to remember that this is not the only fight. There are more to come, many more. In A Piece of Steak Jack London tells us that the older boxer Tom King was once very rich, but wasted all of his money.
 

The Republicans have political capitol right now, as long as they can hold onto it. In the final fight, you do not want to need a political favour, only to find that suddenly you don’t have enough left for that final knockout blow.
 

To finish the story of King, because he no longer enough money for the steak, he doesn’t have enough energy in the match, and falls back when only one more punch would have done the trick. The reinvigorated Sandel then takes him to the ropes, and eventually the ground, where King is counted out.
 

Only the Republicans can decide whether or not they follow in King’s footsteps. For right now they are on top. Watch it.

Andrew C. Abbott 

The First Day of School

Today at noon in Washington DC the 114^th congress will open with a bang, literally. The session will be called to order with the speaker’s gavel calling for order. There might be bangs  in other places to.

The Republicans are in control now. Rather than the Divided Congress of the 113^th’s “do nothing” session, the Republicans now control both houses. There are around ninety congress people who will not be returning to the capitol this year. Voted out or retiring, their places will be taken by newer, younger members. The median age for the new members has dropped in the senate alone by more than fifteen years.

The New Class of 2015 is already arriving in the capitol, receiving their offices, hiring their staff, meeting the press, setting up their websites, probably practicing their smiling and trying to sound “all congressional” now that they have finally made it to the top.

The races across the country were sometimes close, often times bitter. And now that the “newbies” are in, the fighting is not yet done. There are Republicans who do not like the leadership, under Boehner, the current Republican Speaker of the House. They see him as too weak.

Boehner won reelection, and is expected to also be the Speaker of the House again. The Republicans who are planning to keep him from that spot would need to be more than twenty to even drive the vote to a second ballot, which has not happened since 1923, when on the ninth the ballot the then Speaker of the House won reelection anyway. There is a grand total of nine right now, and one of them is named Yoho, so that bang might be a bit more a clicking sound coming from somewhere in the back row of benches.

But after everyone finds their seats, gets sworn in, the applause dies down and the good feelings dissipate, (did I mention, Christmas is over), the arguing will begin. Of course, no matter what is passed by the Republicans in congress, it will have to be sent over to the White House, where in the oval office sits the Democrats last best hope, a president that more people disapprove of than approve. Obama will have to sign the bill. And there are not enough Republicans to overturn a veto.

So, if the Right Wing is planning massive frontal attacks on Healthcare, unbalanced Budgets, and other Democrat Dragons-and Mitch McConnell, the man expected to be the Republican Majority Leader in the Senate, when all the smoke clears, has said he would like to finally confirm the Keystone Pipeline-if all of that is to get done, there will have to be some amount of bipartisanship.

Speaking of confirmation, there are also a hoard of Presidential Nominees that need to be confirmed-or rejected, as the case may be.

And as for some members of congress, mostly those that were part of the class of 2012 or before, there are quite a few who may have mistaken that bang of the gavel to start congress as the gun to start the 2016 race.

Iowa will suddenly become a prime tourist spot for those with presidential ambitions, as they attempt to woo voters, convince potential donors, and remind everyone how generally awesome they are.

The Republican leadership of congress, (none of whom, apparently, have any ambitions for the White House themselves) will have to work with many young, and some not so young ambitious members who think they have a chance at becoming president, and do not want to ruin it.

They will have to convince them, (think Rubio, Paul, etc.) not only to play ball, but also to work together in the days ahead to get everything done that is on the leaders’ agendas.

As for the Democrats, they are not playing possum. The president has gotten back from Hawaii, and on the 20^th will be giving the State of the Union Address, but even before then, he will be reaching out to the people on a three-city tour. And he also appears to still have the executive action pen very much sharpened and dipped in ink.

The Republican Plans appear to have a few bangs in them as we open up 2015, but overall, the biggest bang may simply be that they are back. The numbers are good for a Republican President in 2016, so they are eager no to mess it up.

So in a way, the race has sort of already begun. If the Republican act irresponsibly or make terrible mistakes, people may not want to put a president of the same part in the oval office. On the other hand, if they behave themselves, do what they said they would do, people might think that if a Republican Congress was so good, a Republican President would be even better.

But all of that is for the future to decide. All of the oaths are not done yet, the vows not even all said. So for right now, in a moment of peace and relative tranquility in Washington, the first day in power as the 114^th Congress of the United States begins.


Andrew C. Abbott