Moore Musings

2010 State of the Union Address Synopsis

President Obama's 2010 State of the Union address had the usual components. There was a mix of rhetoric, patriotic fervor, and announcement of policies he plans to enact. Having listened to the speech, I took notes and will here attempt to condense all points related to actual policy.
While I am happy to discuss and present my opinions on the speech, I want to first establish what he said.

1) Bank fees to recover monies lent to bail-out banks
2) A New Jobs bill which gives tax credits to small businesses and reduces capital gains tax for small businesses. Also, provides incentives to businesses of all sizes to make capital investments.
3) New jobs developing national infrastructure.
4) Tax breaks for local jobs, rather then overseas jobs.
5) New and clean nuclear energy plants.
6) Closer look at offshore drilling (implying more drilling)
7) Energy and Climate bill to make clean energy “profitable”
8) Increase exports by adjusting export regulation and providing incentives
9) New trade agreements
10) 10K tax credit for 4 year college students
11) 10% income cap on student loan repayment
12) School debts forgiven after 20 years, 10 years for those in public service jobs
13) Retirement accounts available to all Americans
14) Health Insurance reform, not just health care.
15) An insurance market preserving competition, saving 1 trillion over 20 years, and preserving your current Doctor and plan if desired
16) In 2000, there was a 200 billion government surplus. By 2008, there was a 1 trillion deficit, due to recession aid, prescription drug program, 2 wars, and lowering of taxes
17) Starting in 2011, he will freeze all government spending for 3 years except for national security, medicare, medicade, and social security (according to Wikipedia, in 2009 these 4 expenses totaled 60% of the government budget)
18) Eliminate tax cuts for those making 250K+, and various large companies
19) A government finance commission was blocked by the Senate, so he has established it by Executive Order
20) Address the ruling by the Supreme Court allowing no spending or source limit on elections
21) Require online publishing of all bill earmarks in Congress pre-vote
22) Currently increasing Afghan troop presence, but will have them home in 2011
23) All “combat troops” out of Iraq by August 2010
24) Secure all nuclear weapons in the world (with help of other nations) and establish and enforce restrictions on nonconforming nations
25) Repeal “don't ask don't tell”
26) Fix immigration problems
27) Fix gender job pay discrimination

What are your thoughts on his policies and goals?

Over Edited

I am always amused when I see an article that has apparently been edited to the point of failure. See this example:

She had been lying in the snow for over two hours before the rescue team arrived on Monday night after injuring her leg.

On the behalf or Randy and Wilson, I pray for editors everywhere.

Another Reason to Love Linux

Where else can you get error messages like this?

I'm still watching for the "Delete Whatsoever" command.

Football Simplified

Sharon has convinced me to watch some football, and I've come to enjoy it.

However, I found that keeping track of all the team names was too difficult. So, I've taken to using more familiar terms to identify the teams based on their jersey colors.

Ohio State has red-white jerseys, so they are Boros.
Oregon is green-white, so they are Selesnya.