No Runny Eggs

Tomorrow evening, President Obama will address a joint session of Congress and present the annual State of the Union Address.  We here at NRE will be joining the festivities and Drunkblog the event live, or as close to “live” as several Tanqueray martinis will allow me to be.

You can watch the SOTU address and determine for yourself, whether Obama has become the centrist that the MSM claims he has been reincarnated as or whether he remains the hard leftist that brought us Placebocare, stimulus and bail outs for all of his leftist friends.

As a public service, NRE brings you the following preview of the SOTU address:

Do you remember the Godzilla movies? Do you remember how the sound tracks were never in sync with the video?

Exactly two weeks prior to the SOTU address, President Obama went to Arizona to address the memorial for those killed in the assassination attempt on Representative Giffords. In that address, Obama lectured us about civility. He did so even though he himself, and those advisers like Rahm Emanuel, who have been closest to him, have rarely had a second thought about using graphic, violent language to describe a political opponent or policy they don’t agree with.

It was as I watched the Arizona address that the visual of the old Godzilla films hit me. Like them, the words that come from Obama’s mouth rarely match the actions of his administration or himself.

Tuesday night you will hear Obama talk about our need for fiscal responsibility. You’ll hear Obama give a nod to things like smart and efficient oversight that is somehow intended to be different than the ever increasing excesses that all administration agencies have lorded over their subjects. You may also hear Obama talk about corporate tax reform but don’t be fooled. Regardless of what you hear from his lips that may have you saying “Clintonesque,” ignore it. There is no “center” or “movement to the center” with Obama.

The Godzilla movies were fairly formulaic: monster arrives, monster destroys everything in sight, monster is subdued by a resilient people. Our national Godzilla movie has seen the first two acts. Will we see the resilient people subdue Godzilla?

Revisions/extensions (6:54 am 1/25/2011, steveegg) – I’m just adding a little reminder widget from Cover It Live so you guys will know where to head tonight.

I have a riddle for you:

Q.  What do Russia and Cuba have that the United States doesn’t?

No, it’s not a massive federal deficit; they each have that.

No, it’s not a hard core leftist as the leader;they each have that.

Nope, it’s not a government that is more interested in itself than it’s citizens; they each have that.

The correct answer is: Federal employment that is being reduced.

After announcing earlier that they would be reducing the size of their federal government employment, Russian President Medvedev signed a decree  that will reduce the number of people employed by the Russian government by 20% over the next few years.

The civilian federal employment jumped over 10% from 2008 to 2010 and that is after subtracting the temporary census workers.  2011 is slated to grow that number by another 3.5%.  So federal employment has grown by double digit percentages will private employment has decreased by millions.

An area for the new GOP House to focus on for balancing the budget is the number of people employed by the federal government. 

Senator Orrin Hatch introduced a bill last year, that would have reduced federal employment to 2008 levels.  According to Hatch, this would be a reduction of 20% although I don’t think his math is quite right as he’s including the temporary census workers.  Not surprisingly, Senator Hatch’s bill went no where. 

Fewer federal employees would be good for at least three reasons:

1.  Fewer employees means fewer dollars spent today.

2.  Fewer employees should be coupled with privatizing more of the things that the federal government does but doesn’t need to do.

3.  Fewer employees means fewer dollars spent tomorrow in the way of pensions and other retirement benefits.

The next few weeks will be interesting to watch.  By the end of January, we should know whether the message of reducing spending, has been received by Congress.  I know the message hasn’t been received by President Obama but we’ll cross one bridge at a time.