The state of the Union . . . The state of our Union . . . What exactly is the state of our Union?
I will say right off the bat that there were some points I actually agreed with in the President's speech. I agree that the government should make it easier, in all ways, for business to function successfully in the United States. Obama's statement about lowering taxes for stateside corporations is something I agree with. But make no mistake, that is a fiscally conservative perspective. Since I know that Obama is not a fiscal conservative I have to wonder what sort of strings would be attached to this plan. In other words, what would corporations have to give up in order to receive a lower tax rate? I suppose I should amend my statement from above. This is probably the only part of Obama's speech that I agreed with. OH! My apologies. I also agree that the government should not subsidize the wealthiest people in our country. They should not receive farm subsidies for growing organic vegetables. They should not receive favorable tax breaks that average-income Americans are not entitled to.
I was alarmed at how many task forces the President intends on forming. My first question was, "Where is the money going to come from to fund these task forces?" And then at some point I heard the President tell Congress to spend the money they would have spent on the war in Iraq on some other program the President was selling. It was then that I understood that Obama is one of the many in government who sees tax revenue as "their money". Had he chosen to be more accurate he would have said, spend the American people's money on this new program I'm selling.
If I'm not mistaken, one of these task forces had something to do with illegal immigrants going to college, and granting them citizenship because they were educated in our country. Obama said something to the effect of it's a shame that foreign nationals are being educated in our country and then going back to their own country to make it better; and why aren't we trying to keep these people in our country? So his solution is to form a task force to deal with this issue. With all due respect Mr. President, there are many reasons why we don't need to recruit foreign nationals to live in our country. We have yet to deal with the problem of illegal immigration in and of itself. There are still not enough jobs in our country to support our own American born citizens. (As I understand it, that's one of the issues of the Occupy protesters. They have a college education and student loan debt but no job.) I think I may have a much simpler and cost-effective solution to this issue. How about we decide not to educate illegal immigrants/foreign nationals? How about that? What if the public university system in our country decided that they would no longer grant admission to illegals? What if they also put a moratorium on educating foreign nationals who have every intention of returning to their country upon graduation? And I'm talking about public universities that receive funding from the government. Private universities can do whatever they want. They don't get government money. Wouldn't that solve the problem that the President is concerned about? If you are an illegal immigrant living in the United States, and you have legal status somewhere else, go back there to get your education. I don't care what the reason is for your illegal status. I'm sorry that you weren't born here. But in any other country on this Earth, correct me if I'm wrong, if I live there as an illegal immigrant, I won't be able to attend their universities. In many cases I wouldn't be able to obtain legal employment. We are the only country that I know of that has an open door policy to the rest of the world. Come on in! We'll take care of you! We'll give you a place to live, we'll pay for it for you, we'll give you food to eat, we'll give you spending money, health care, a job, an education . . . anything else you want? We are here to meet your needs! Meanwhile there are citizens of this nation losing their homes, unable to find work, on welfare and food stamps for the first time in their lives. They can't just go to another country to make a better life for themselves. The government in our nation in general has just decided that the problem of illegal immigration either isn't really a problem, or it really isn't having a negative impact on our country. Either way, they're wrong.
The President presented a rather rosy outlook on the jobs situation. He made a strong claim that the economy was bouncing back and things were looking up. According to his own numbers 8 million jobs have been lost since 2008. He boasted that there had been 3 million jobs added since he took office. Mr. President, that is hardly bouncing back. That means we have 5 million jobs to add until we reach 2008 levels. In December of 2008 our national unemployment rate was 7.8%. So in actuality we want to add probably 6 to 7 million jobs to get unemployment back to around 6%. We have a long way to go yet. We are not bouncing back. If anything, it's getting worse. The jobless numbers look better because so many people have run out of benefits. They no longer have unemployment benefits, but they haven't worked so they can't file a new claim. So basically they are just without an income - permanently unemployed. So while it's true that the number of new jobless claims has declined, the reason is not because more people are back to work. What does that mean for our economy? While the number of people who have been surviving on unemployment benefits declines, these same people will probably lose their homes. Foreclosures will go up. With no new jobs being added, we are potentially facing something similar to the Great Depression. What are all of these homeless, jobless families going to do? Where are they going to go? We will see soup lines, homeless camps, etc., and it will not be pretty.
What is the state of our Nation? Land of the free, home of the brave . . . is it? Are we free? Do you honestly feel free? The state of our Nation is bleak. The once brightly shining beacon of inspiration and resourcefulness and individuality and strength and freedom, has become a tarnished, flat, dull and forgotten trinket in the drawer of humanity and government.
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