United Liberty

Big extravagant events like presidential speeches to Congress are something I find unappealing. As a writer and a bigger fan of radio than television, I tend to gravitate towards smaller, one on one human reactions. It would be preferable to me if presidents addressed the people in less ceremonial fashion, in front of a camera, where they would be less likely to get caught up in the desire for adoration, more likely to be candid and less likely to say just what will get cheers.

President Obama, like other presidents, probably has a far different disposition than myself on such matters. I imagine that someone who would run for president has a massive sense of ego and wants to be liked. Nevertheless, these massive coronations that every president takes part in seem much more like something that would occur in the Ottoman Empire or Victorian England than the Land of the Free. All the “pomp and circumstance,” as a friend called it, is mildly disgusting.

When it came to Obama’s actual speech, I found myself caught up in many of the promises. If we’re going to be dosing out huge levels of taxpayer dollars, having them pay for everyday folks’ health care seems a lot better than having it pay for some executive’s refurnishing. It seemed like alot, however, to believe that we could pay for all of this and also curb the deficit. Obama never said that we would get rid of it and I don’t recall hearing “surplus” in his speech.

I also liked that college tuition plans have strings attached, so that only students who volunteer or do something other than play video games and watch movies will get their tuition paid. More small colleges should be developed as well, so that students don’t find themselves having only one choice of public university, which is massive and faceless and suffering from bloated tuition due to very high demand.

Because this speech was mainly focussed on energy, the economy and education, not much was alluded to regarding Iraq except a few lines about leaving the country to the Iraqi people. Anti-War Radio has reported disagreement between Obama and the generals on exit strategy (and possibly whether there should even be an exit strategy). This is still a critical issue that we must confront. There’s no way we’ll be able to weather economic turmoil while simultaneously fighting two possibly endless counterinsurgencies.

NOTE TO READERS: I expect that I’m going to get some comments from our “miniarchist” and anarcho-capitalist branch of readers, deriding my praise for health care reform and decentralized but still government funded education. A preemptive clarification is thus in order: I’m for government programs that help us in the long run and give us something back for our investment. This, to me, doesn’t cease to make me a libertarian. I’m in good company, as well. America’s most libertarian president, Thomas Jefferson, founded the University of Virginia, a public university.