Mr. President, is your economy running?

I got home barely in time to hear the President defend his war strategy ("I ask you to give it a chance to work."--what was that line about "won't get fooled again"?) and thank Dikembe Mutombo (above) for his charitable works.

I found the full State of the Union text, and here are some thoughts.

First of all, it's hard to take the President seriously when he starts out with bromides about "being willing to cross that aisle", or reads laughers like "Extending hope and opportunity depends on a stable supply of energy that keeps America's economy running and America's environment clean." Hmmm, I guess we environmentalists should be using more energy then!

Actually, it's nice to see him talk about energy conservation and alternative and renewable energy, even if he is late to the party and still a bit of an awkward wallflower.

For a speech that was billed as heavy on domestic issues, the President spent little time dispensing with his domestic agenda. He spend far more time in his comfort zone: confusing the war on terror and the war on Iraq and riffing on the evil plans of the terrorists. He is right, of course, when he says that "every one of us wishes that this war [in Iraq] were over and won." Unfortunately, most of us believe that we have already lost.

It is hard to see how our continued military presence in Iraq is going to make things better for Iraqis, who have suffered from the President's misguided strategy (which he still defends in this speech) to "stay on the offense" and "take the fight to the enemy."