State of the Union Highlights

I was at scouts last night and couldn't watch the State of the Union Address, but as I've browsed through it there are several items that I believe are worth highlighting.  The theme was Win the Future, which I guess is the new Hope and Change.  In both cases, President Obama wants to exude optimism, which is something, as I've said before, we dearly lack around here.  So with optimism in mind, here are a few things worth looking at.

As some of you know, I'm a proud and moralistic environmentalist, so I appreciated the renewed emphasis on renewable energy:

It's Probably Time For A Little More Optimism Around Here

In the latest iteration of how we treat our planet, we have now released probably between 50 to 100 million gallons of oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and we're probably only about halfway through the the release.

It is the sort of disaster that just makes you sick.  Birds and dolphins and fish are dying and people are losing their livelihoods.  We care so much about cheap energy that we are willing to downplay or ignore even the most heinous risks to get it.  Doing the hard things and making the hard decisions for our long-term good is not a particularly strong attribute for us, and the gulf oil spill is the perfect reminder of that fact.

And this applies to more than just the environment.  Israel and Palestine won't make the hard decisions in order to come to peace.  The same goes for many other nations, including America, which value short-term benefits and military force over long-term solutions and true and lasting peace.