“The Crowd Goes Wild!”

Over and over and over and over and over again!

Somebody needs to explain to the U.S. government the concept of "too much of a good thing".

I watched President Bush's address to Congress this evening (he's still talking, I'm listening on the radio now). Shane and I counted: in a five minute time span, he was interrupted eleven times by standing ovations. Seemed everything he said made most of the crowd very happy.

It's stupid! Shut up and let him talk! I'm not listening to this for the applause! If they'd only applaud the important stuff, every few minutes, it would be bearable, but giving a standing-O for every little thing he says even seems to annoy the Prez. At one point he looked like he was going to tell them to knock it off, but he restrained himself. Too bad.

They showed Senator Hillary Clinton at one point, looking as annoyed with it all as I am. She had a really sour look on her face (so what else is new?), and her clapping was a bit exaggerated.

They're all going to go home and soak their hands in cold water, I'm sure.

What about the issues? Well, I actually like a big chunk of what he's saying. Compared to the Democratic leanings of the govermnet for the last eight years, even a moderate Republican like W seems a little like an Independent, which is fine with me. Essentially, he's cutting back on a lot of things that I think should be eliminated entirely. Unfortunately, he's also increasing the spending in a lot of areas.

One apparent conflict I heard in his speech was related to education. I'm paraphrasing from memory, but consider the following two sentences.

"I believe in local control of schools and education, not Federal control."

"Education needs increased funding, but schools will be required to meet higher standards to receive that funding." (Those would be FEDERAL standards.)

Along with those funding comments, he mentioned standardized testing for the schools. The indication was that this is how the schools would be measured on those standards.

Anyway, I'm guessing there was about 30 minutes of speech in the 55 minute talk, and 25 minutes of clapping. I wonder if the room was encouraged to clap, or even instructed to do so, so that those listening at home wouldn't have to concentrate on anything longer than twenty second sound bytes. There's a sad thought, but it wouldn't surprise me.