Well, I doubt many people watched the Democratic response to the SOTU last night, and no one is talking about it (no one ever does, unless it becomes legendarily bad, like Bob Dole's stiff and ancient-looking response to Clinton in 1996), but I thought Gov. Gary Locke (WA) was right on the money with his speech. I thought that he presented the Democratic issues perfectly. And I was thrilled that he said that "Osama Bin Laden is still at large," a point Democrats HAD to make in response to Bush. He also hit Bush on the fact that Bush claimed he couldn't release $2.5 billion to the states to help them protect against terrorist attacks because "we couldn't afford it." Read the response -- it reminded me of Clinton in '96 -- Medicare, education and the environment, with Homeland Security thrown in. And sure enough, Michael Waldman, former Clinton speechwriter had a hand in it.

I support the President's plan to help African countries with AIDS, but isn't it interesting that Bush said that he couldn't afford to release that $2.5 billion to protect our country, but he managed to find an additional $10 billion of funding for AIDS in Africa (and god knows how much for a potential war in Iraq?)? Clearly, we can do both.

Also, many Senate Democrats are still furious with Bush for what happened with Max Cleland in November. Cleland, who lost three limbs in his service to this country in Vietnam, was attacked by Bush and Saxby Chambliss for being weak on national security for his opposition to Bush's plan to exempt workers in the Homeland Security Department from workplace protections. Interestingly, Robert Byrd proposed an amendment that would have provided $5 billion more in funding for Homeland Security measures (and no, it wasn't WV heavy in pork spending), but the Republicans, including Mr. Homeland Security himself, now-SENATOR Saxby Chambliss, voted against it, saying we can't afford it. Hmmm.
- posted by Joshua @ 11:20 AM