Dumb Letters: Whatever It Is, I'm Against It

Some of them just leave you scratching your heads. This one is almost entirely incoherent. I have no idea what the writer is really getting at, other than "I'm a concerned citizen and I have something to say." Although the Globe editorial board tried to give it some focus in its title.

I am an unenrolled voter. President Obama did not say anything in his State of the Union address that he should not have said long before, and he could not list a single achievement.

Um, okay. So would he have been better off not saying it at all, then? So you could then complain about how he never said it? And if he had listed his achievements, I'm guessing you would have complained that the speech was self-congratulatory and called him an arrogant narcissist. Right?

He chided the Republicans in attendance, and made a misguided attack on the Supreme Court of the United States, by calling for legislation around its recent ruling on campaign spending.

Some of us don't consider this misguided. In fact, most of us don't. The Supreme Court has a long history of making bad decisions. And Congress has a long history of passing laws to mitigate the effects of Supreme Court decisions, most recently the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay act. Often the Supreme Court makes a ruling in a certain way because Congress has not been clear on what the law should be and so the court reverts to the closest constituional interpretation they can make. If this doesn't sit well with Congress, they clarify the law. If the court doesn't like this, they strike the new law down when a case comes before them. It's called checks and balances. Don't like it? Get a new country.

Oh, and if anyone ever deserved a good chiding, it was the Republicans in attendance. He said nothing out of line about them. In fact, under the circumstances, he was downright charitable towards them. He's done nothing but reach out to them to try and work with the minority party. He's received nothing but scorn (and zero votes) for his efforts. It takes two to tango. And one party isn't dancing. GWB was much much worse when it came to chiding the opposition party over not following his demands.

He promised to open up the rolls in the military to special interests, which
should be the military’s call.

And who is the commander-in-chief of the military? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? And how much do like that "special interests" business? Exactly which "special interest" are we discussing here? The oil lobby?

President Obama has a long way to go, and continuing to put down traditional
American values will not get him far.

If anyone can point to a single instance of Obama doing anything of the sort I haven't seen it. Exactly what "traditional American values" are we talking about here? Fairness? Equality? (Whiteness, maybe?) This dude is making this up. And I'm not sure how "far" he wants to go, but right now he's the POTUS. And he didn't get there by being anything other than what he is right now.

The nation has woken up, but the current leadership has not.

When did this happen? Woken up from what? The implication here is that the 2008 election happened in some kind of drunken stupor and that cute flight attendant has turned out to be, in the harsh light of day, not only 15-20 years older than we thought but also of dubious gender. And married to a member of the Gambino family. Now that we're all right and sane we don't like what we really liked just a year ago. Okay, bud. Whatever you say.

There is still time for the president to lead and prosper. However, his State of the Union address was unconvincing as to his willingness to put country first.

What the hell is that supposed to mean? Which country was he talking about when he said "my fellow Americans" and "God bless the United States of America"? Slovenia? This was the McCain campaign's slogan and they proved how country-first they were by picking an uneducated spokesmodel to be one rather irregular heartbeat away from the presidency. If Obama isn't putting country first, then what exactly is he doing? Is there some agenda that we don't know about that is ahead of the country's? The writer doesn't say. Which is par for the course.