Well, knock me over with a feather....

[gate_pourri]

This is just a lame attempt to pander to his conservative base and keep his poll numbers from going even further into the tank.

I can say, that as a very conservative Republican who supports Bush, I personally thought the speech was awful. I felt like it was very weak, and that the President was giving into pressure for Vincente Fox. I am tired of the PC bull and wish that the President would take some real action.

 

[eclectics]

Let's not kid ourselves. 6000 National Guard troops on a 2000 mile border aren't going to be able to do anything about securing that border, (3 per mile) assuming they are on duty 24/7.

This is just a lame attempt to pander to his conservative base and keep his poll numbers from going even further into the tank.

I can't see how anyone can be happy with untrained Reservists on their 2 week rotation being plopped on the border. It's a drop in the bucket, at best. That stupid fence idea is just as ineffective. Stop the monetary incentives here for the illegals and stop pandering to Mr. Fox. We are permitting him to sit back and ignore Mexico's poverty. I don't understand how this speech will comfort Conservatives. He is still promising Amnesty. He is just giving it a different name. He is doing what the right kept accusing Clinton of doing, trying to please everybody. It doesn't work. You end up pleasing no one.

 

[Teejay32]

Conservatives will settle for nothing less than that big wall, while who knows how many of their complaints could be solved just by asking their own states to comply with existing laws. You'd think people would begin at opposing ESL and overly generous welfare benefits, but I don't even see that. I see people who have preemptively surrendered on that front, and are now demanding that the respective Presidents protect them from their own fellow citizens who hire, educate, and doctor illegals, and their own states which subsidize this. I have no idea why this is. But it is. They're looking at the two guys who are supposed to do everything in their power to maintain cordiality and strengthen ties, and build mutually beneficial policies, and people can't figure out why someone hasn't promised them a wall yet.

 

[flaps]

Well, knock me over with a feather....

Okay, take your pick...

 

[bicker]

And your Rome analogy is ridiculous. We haven't conquered or defeated illegal immigrants. Not only are they here completely by choice, but they are here basically against our wishes. If anyone is displaying a sense of entitlement, it's illegals marching in our streets, under the banner of the Mexican flag, chanting in Spanish about their rights here in the U.S. Unbelievable!

In your anger and bravado, you totally missed the point I was making. Your tone make me disinclined to explain it to you. Read it again. My point was pretty-much the opposite of what you thought it was. I agree completely with your points about illegal immigrants.

 

[bicker]

We the people run this country. If we choose not to participate, then the problems are ours. Getting all upset because the President interrupted our television program just gets to the core of the problem.

Only if that is all it was. Rather, the point is that the President dragged his feet for five and half years, and was practically dragged kicking and screaming towards a more reasonable position, which he then decided to get on television to talk about, not because his doing so would have any positive impact on anything other than his own approval ratings. His interrupting the television schedule was totally selfish. That's why people are upset.

If we took as much interest in what was going on in our country and not what we were going to watch on TV, or where we were going to eat dinner, these problems might not have to be solved 5 1/2 years later.

That's silly. Your comment reflects a lack of understanding of this President and his motivations.

 

[bicker]

I bet it would have been a great time being intergrated into the Roman Empire. NOT. Lets see the two choices: 1. Gladiator (sounds fun but not for me, thanks anyway). 2nd choice. Slave (this doesn't sound good to me either).

Third choice: Citizen. The point is that Rome originally acknowledged that the way to be a successful world leader was to make nice with the other nations. In their case, they decided to offer those nations incorporation into the Empire. The United States used to have alliances where we respected the other signatories. Later in Rome's history, they stopped respecting their neighbors and the nations they conquered. That's akin to Bush's overt disrespect for our former allies -- how he has, practically single-handedly -- destroyed the respect for the United States, by his words and deeds.

 

[bicker]

Well then, we can see what's most important in YOUR life

Surely not President Bush trying to improve his approval ratings with self-indulgant meaninglessness.

 

[AllyandJack]

I didn't watch the speech (thank you, SoapNet!), but I heard little bits of it on the news, despite my best efforts to avoid it. One thing that got me was his attitude of "rounding up millions of people isn't feasible." Well, gee....isn't that what we're trying to do with terrorists? We're over in the Middle East randomly blowing crap up in the name of "rounding up" the terrorists, but that same concept over here isn't feasible. Why not take that attitude with other segments of society? Heck, there are SO many drug dealers on the street, it's really not feasible to get them all, so let's make drugs legal. There are SO many internet predators out there and they can fly under the radar so easily, it's just not possible to catch them all, so why even bother?

This is why I don't listen to Bush. I voted for the guy - and I'd do it again if he was my only Republican option - but, I just can't listen to him. He's such a disappointment. I try to focus on the positive....I might get a year without being sucked into the AMT. So, for that, I don't completely regret my vote. Other than that.....I'm waiting for 2008 to try again.

So, to the millions of people on a waiting list to come over and work the right way - ha, losers.

 

[momof2inPA]

..This is why I don't listen to Bush. I voted for the guy - and I'd do it again if he was my only Republican option - but, I just can't listen to him. ..

Then, you truly deserve his poor governance, and you have no right to complain.

 

[TCPluto]

Yet, he still can't get it right: He thought it made sense to interrupt season finales of television programs? This isn't something that could have waited a week, when his choice of timing wouldn't have been so much the source of derision?

Sadly, I think you're serious.

How dare something important interupt mind numbimg television.

 

[BibbidiBobbidiBOO]

untrained Reservists

They are actually National Guard, not Reservist.
And they are certainly not untrained.

 

[eclectics]

They are actually National Guard, not Reservist.
And they are certainly not untrained.

I meant National Guard but was thinking Army Reserve, sorry, but are you saying all the National Guard personel is trained in border control? Surely I think it would take a bit of specialized training to do that job properly. Will they get it? If someone in the media mentioned it, I missed it. I still say their presence is not going to make much difference.

 

[Caradana]

Policy analysts have a hilarious name for this speech already. It's called the "How to Distract Americans from $3.18/gallon Speech."
Aren't you feeling a little warm and fuzzy about the President now? After all, he is protecting you from those short undereducated brown non-english speaking people who drink and deface your streets as day-laborers, and are in direct competition with you for that $2/hour asparagus-picking job, right? (there are so many Americans quietly thinking that). Thank you, George, for stepping up to the plate on this one with a plan that sounds amazing in theory and is absolutely impossible to implement in practice. I was really dying to drop another $2B on this unenforcable task, so I can dig my future children further into the deficit - that deficit that will have ten times the impact on them as illegal immigrants ever will, given inflation and macroeconomics. By the way, George, while you are at it, please save us from the Canadians? That's another border that we're not enforcing in our sovereignity. I think back and remember a video of 9/11 terrorists passing through a security checkpoint in Portland, Maine ... didn't see them in Tijuana ...

One of the early drafts of last night's speech mentioned Mary Nagle, who was brutally killed by an illegal immigrant who was powerwashing her house. He was sentenced yesterday. Here's the kicker ... under George's plan, this immigrant would've qualified for expedited citizenship. Oops ... let's cut that from the speech. That being said, I do feel horrible for Mary Nagle's family and wish them much peace.

Lord save us from the immigrants.

- Dana (first generation)

 

[momof2inPA]

Lord save us from the immigrants.

- Dana (first generation)

Illegal immigrants, or illegal aliens. Lord save our country from the illegal immigrants!

 

[ECurto]

Yea I really hope he takes his own advice on "learning english".

My all time favorite plan of his is the "build a fence" one.

 

[shortbun]

We watched the NBA playoffs. I"ve quit watching the POTUS. I'm not seeing Poseidon either. Ooops, wrong thread.

 

[bicker]

How dare something important interupt mind numbimg television.

No: How dare that specific person, doing that specific, selfish act, interrupt.

What I find really interesting in this thread is this: I've been here seven years, and NOT as a lurker. If you've been here any amount of time, you know that I don't normally put television over governance. Over and over again in this thread I've made the point that my objection was this person, this time, this instance, this act. I can only assume that people who continue to ignore the distinction must have no real defense for this President's action.

 

[Viking]

Third choice: Citizen. The point is that Rome originally acknowledged that the way to be a successful world leader was to make nice with the other nations. In their case, they decided to offer those nations incorporation into the Empire. The United States used to have alliances where we respected the other signatories. Later in Rome's history, they stopped respecting their neighbors and the nations they conquered. That's akin to Bush's overt disrespect for our former allies -- how he has, practically single-handedly -- destroyed the respect for the United States, by his words and deeds.

As a citizen of one of America's allies I can only say that you're 100% right. The USA's reputation over here went more or less down the gutter and that is 100% a result of Bush's actions.
It is so far down that people, whom I told that I will be vacationing in the USA again this year, ask me how I could do that.

 

[Viking]

Illegal immigrants, or illegal aliens. Lord save our country from the illegal immigrants!

If your 'lord' had intended to do this, he would have sunk the Mayflower