President Bush and The State of The Union

George Wenschhof

On Monday evening, President George W. Bush will deliver the annual state of the union address. I have been thinking about what he may have to say concerning the many issues facing Americans today.

I wrote a column that was published on TheTentacle.com dated May 19, 2003. It was entitled "Questions are Many for Presidential Candidates to Answer". Here is the link -
http://www.thetentacle.com/ShowArticle.cfm?mydocid=503

I was asking the Bush administration back then over a year prior to the 2004 election many of the same questions I still have today.

The questions are still many, beginning with the need for a coherent foreign policy based on a foundation of promoting "human rights" around the world. In addition, the Bush administration has failed to develop a national energy program leading to weaning the U.S. of it's dependency of oil is being felt even harder today.

The lack of a national health insurance program is felt by way too many Americans as they fail to seek medical attention when they are ill for they can not afford to do so. Younger Americans are fearing if social security will even be there for them when they retire and need it. As to trade, the agreements have been made with an emphasis on providing riches to the private sector wealthiest companies without regard to the impact on the worker abroad or in the U.S.

How will the President explain the growing economic problem facing Americans today? This is not a new issue and it is shameful the Bush administration has waited until now to recognize a need for some type of a economic stimulus plan.

The Republican theory of taxing the rich less for the trickle down effect will benefit the less fortunate has never worked and the last recession the U.S. experienced was a result of the voodoo economics of the Reagan and Bush Sr. administrations. It took a Democrat in the White House to get the country back on track then and it will take a Democrat in the White House today to straighten out the mess of this current administration.

We can do better than this.