The Deficit We Inherited and Volcano Monitoring

Tonight we had the opportunity to hear President Obama’s first address to the  Joint Congress.  Promptly after, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal offered the Republican response.

Obama seemed to bring his standard message of Hope, but fortunately he laid out several more specific goals focused around the economy, health care, and education.  His message was hopeful and incredibly ambitious, but I suppose that’s better than the alternative.  Here’s a snippet of his hour long address.

As for Jindal, I was very excited to see “the future of the Republican party” in action, but after watching his performance I can only imagine the RNC had second thoughts on having chose him for the Republican response.  While speaking with the conviction of a high school debate participant, he attacked Democrats in Congress for rejecting the Republicans’ plan to “create jobs by lowering income tax rates” and “stabilizing home values by creating a new tax credit for home buyers.”  Somehow, these “new” ideas are supposed to reverse the damage of eight years of similar policies.

I’m afraid Jindal will have to do more than repeat the tired, fiscal-conservative message (tax cuts, tax cuts, increase the defense budget, repeat) and blasting every move Democrats make if he wants to appeal to the broader electorate and unseat Obama in 2012.  And another very important tip for Jindal…since Obama’s stage presence and oratory abilities are second-to-none, create your own style (any style would be an improvement) and don’t try to out-Obama Obama.

If you need to see more (or just want to hear him refer to the “Soviet Menace”), here’s part two of Jindal’s speech.

- Matt

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