Quote of the Day

"Our troops come from every corner of this country – they are black, white, Latino, Asian and Native American. They are Christian and Hindu, Jewish and Muslim. And, yes, we know that some of them are gay. Starting this year, no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love because of who they love. And with that change, I call on all of our college campuses to open their doors to our military recruiters and the ROTC. It is time to leave behind the divisive battles of the past. It is time to move forward as one nation."

--President Obama in tonight's State of the Union Address.  Significant, although it was the only mention of any gay issue in the speech.  Here are a few other points:

There was a great deal of talk about competitiveness.  "The future is ours to win."  "We need to out-innovate, out-educate, and out build the rest of the world."  "This is our Sputnik moment."  Competitiveness was the over-arching theme of the speech.     

"Eliminate the billions in tax dollars currently given to oil companies."  Great words.  Never happen.

Simplify the tax code.  Everyone agrees.  Never happen.

He's open to ideas to make health care reform better.  He hit on the advantages of the new law and did a pretty decent job of defending it.  Boehner looks constipated.

He called for medical malpractice reform.  Really?  How very Rick Perry 2003 of him. 

He called for a freeze on "annual domestic spending" for five years.  Gimmick.  Never happen. 

"I will veto any bill with earmarks."  I've got to hand it to the President.  He knows how to get ahead of a Republican issue.  This one brought a standing ovation from Sen. McCain. 

"American Muslims are a part of our American family."  It needed to be said and took some guts.

"This July we will begin to bring our troops home from Afghanistan."  Like they're home from Iraq?

The President is a master at saying things that Republicans have to applaud, whether they like it or not.  I was impressed that Republicans and Democrats sat together.  According to Rachel Maddow, the bipartisan Congressional Women's Softball Team sat together.  Naturally, she noted that.

Basically, the speech can be summed up as follows:  we're going to compete, resolve the deficit, kill the terrorists, and come home from Afghanistan.  I don't exactly know how we're going to do all of those things, but they sounded great.