OPINION:
I don’t put much stock in presidential State of the Union speeches. Last night’s speech by President Obama was no exception - flat and uninspiring, especially in comparison to his powerful Tucson speech.
State of the Union speeches are an opportunity for presidents to promote their agendas. The speeches are typically full of fluff and low on fiber. Mr. Obama’s latest was like eating an artificially flavored air sandwich. Other than pundits, few Americans give State of the Union speeches any credence. By noon tomorrow, this lackluster speech will have fallen off the radar screen for everyone but the Beltway obsessive-compulsive disorder crowd.
The thrust of Mr. Obama’s speech was the economy and job creation. He spoke about how the economy is growing again, how his policies are turning things around, how 1 million private-sector jobs were created in 2010. The problem? It’s bunk.
Spin it any way you want, but our economy remains sluggish, the dollar weak, the cost of food and fuel rising, our border porous, those green-energy jobs imaginary, the debt and deficit staggering, and the business community remains leery of Fedzilla’s heavy hand. The result: Millions of Americans are unemployed or underemployed, leading to hundreds of thousands of homes being repossessed.
Mr. Obama and the Democrats can’t be blamed for the entire economic malaise, but the decisions they have made in the last two years have made things much worse - as in $4 trillion in new spending worse. Our economy was already thrashing about in deep water when Mr. Obama joined House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, and Sen. Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, and came along and threw it a concrete block and called it a life preserver.
Mr. Obama spoke of bringing down business taxes and has launched a review of unnecessary regulations that are strangling businesses. Our business taxes should be reduced to the lowest in the world. As it pertains to identifying and eliminating unnecessary regulations, we would be wise to wait and review the findings of his new regulation-elimination initiative.
Mr. Obama spoke about new investment in clean-energy technology and other sectors. When you hear politicians speak of “new investments,” watch your wallet. New investment are code words for more borrowing and spending, which is exactly what is burying our economy and killing our future.
The cleanest energy is nuclear energy - not solar, wind or hydro. To meet our energy demands, nuclear energy is the way ahead. Nuke power is the safest, most efficient and cleanest energy source on the planet. The goal should be 200 new nuclear power plants in the next 10 years.
Mr. Obama is right about reforming education and raising educational expectations. What we don’t need to do is pour more money into the teacher-union-controlled public education system. America spends more on public education but get less results than any other nation in the history of the world. More tax money for education isn’t the answer.
Mr. Obama spoke about simplifying the tax code. He must have been reading my opinion articles. Burn the existing bureaucratic tax code and replace it with a flat or fair tax. That would be real reform.
And now he says he wants to reform Fedzilla, make government more accountable, more fiscally responsible. Yeah, right. And I’ll be wearing a pink tutu playing an accordion as the grand marshal at a gay rights parade any day now.
There is no argument that Mr. Obama is the most liberal president in the history of the nation. The hallmark of liberals is more control, more taxes and more spending. The future of America will not be bright with liberals in charge. Less government bureaucracy, less spending, less control and less borrowing is the way ahead. Get cracking, GOP.
Ted Nugent is an American rock ’n’ roll, sporting and political activist icon. He is the author of “Ted, White and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto” and “God, Guns & Rock ’N’ Roll” (Regnery Publishing).
Please read our comment policy before commenting.