(no subject)
Well, it's been pretty warm these last few days, but the weather report says it's supposed to snow tomorrow, just in time for the damn spring fitness test. I really don't want to run in the snow. Still, some things are looking up. I just had my lesson in Unarmed Combat II. It was kind of fun playing "find the fresh bruises" after class every day, but it was way too much time and effort to be very enjoyable, especially because of the headaches it caused. Still, I managed to hold my own in just about all of my fights, except against the 185 lb former wrestling champion. Now, I'm done with the last of the "haze" PE classes. Later this spring, I'll stretch my muscles learning to play golf. Next year, it's SCUBA and volleyball. Damn it feels good to be a junior.
Political stuff down below. Be warned.
Anyone else see the state of the union address? I watched it a few hours ago. It's kinda interesting: this is the first time I've been informed enough in current politics that I could listen to the speech and tell exactly who was going to clap for which points. Usually, the republicans of course support their president, but on a few issues the democrats joined along, at least in principle. It's kinda funny how such a small group controls the entire future of our nation. When a congressman spoke in my intelligence class last semester, I came to a realization. Congressmen and senators and the president are really just ordinary people; they're not larger than life, like you'd think. At least, the congressmen aren't. If Bush comes and speaks at my graduation and hands out diplomas, I'll look him in the eye when I salute him, and then I guess I'll know. It comes through in the speech. Although it was televised to millions, you could tell that some points of the speech were really directed solely at those 600-odd decisionmakers. Most of the points were pretty predictible, like his defense of the executive giving the NSA unlimited wiretap power awhile back, which was really, really iffy in terms of constitutionality. Other points were more interesting, like a 22 percent increase in spending on renewable energy. In his speech, he also talked about making cleaner cars with more efficient batteries. It's a nice goal, but of all the bits and pieces of technology, batteries are just about the hardest to improve. For instance, growth of computing power and capabilities in cell phones has grown exponentially since their introduction, so they're maybe 100 times more powerful than they were early on. Battery life, however, has only gone up to 2 or 3 times as much. If only it weren't like that, and we could have appliances that could last for hundreds of hours.
The other two things about the speech which interested me were Bush's discussion on Iran and his mention of the line-item veto. He mentioned how Iran is controlled by a bad regime...yadayadayada...and said we should take a strong stance to prevent their obtaining nuclear weapons. Which is basically what we've been saying for a long time. The part that got me was how he addressed our future with Iran. Bush made a direct statement to the Iranian people, saying that they should have self-determination and make a good government. At the end of that bit, he said he looked forward to the US being "the closest of friends with a free and democratic Iran." Now, i'm probably just imagining things, but that line kind of scared me. When he said that, the first thing that jumped into my mind was "yeah, like we're friends with a free and democratic Iraq?" Probably, we're not looking at another war or anything in the near future, but that language sounded really suspicious to me. The other thing that threw me off guard was his mention of the line-item veto. He talked of getting rid of pork-barreling in congress, and said something like "we'll be able to solve this problem together if you pass the line-item veto." Now, I thought it was a joke, but the applause sounded fairly genuine. So we're retrying that which was deemed unconstitutional under clinton? I don't know. It was probably just a bad joke.
Political stuff down below. Be warned.
Anyone else see the state of the union address? I watched it a few hours ago. It's kinda interesting: this is the first time I've been informed enough in current politics that I could listen to the speech and tell exactly who was going to clap for which points. Usually, the republicans of course support their president, but on a few issues the democrats joined along, at least in principle. It's kinda funny how such a small group controls the entire future of our nation. When a congressman spoke in my intelligence class last semester, I came to a realization. Congressmen and senators and the president are really just ordinary people; they're not larger than life, like you'd think. At least, the congressmen aren't. If Bush comes and speaks at my graduation and hands out diplomas, I'll look him in the eye when I salute him, and then I guess I'll know. It comes through in the speech. Although it was televised to millions, you could tell that some points of the speech were really directed solely at those 600-odd decisionmakers. Most of the points were pretty predictible, like his defense of the executive giving the NSA unlimited wiretap power awhile back, which was really, really iffy in terms of constitutionality. Other points were more interesting, like a 22 percent increase in spending on renewable energy. In his speech, he also talked about making cleaner cars with more efficient batteries. It's a nice goal, but of all the bits and pieces of technology, batteries are just about the hardest to improve. For instance, growth of computing power and capabilities in cell phones has grown exponentially since their introduction, so they're maybe 100 times more powerful than they were early on. Battery life, however, has only gone up to 2 or 3 times as much. If only it weren't like that, and we could have appliances that could last for hundreds of hours.
The other two things about the speech which interested me were Bush's discussion on Iran and his mention of the line-item veto. He mentioned how Iran is controlled by a bad regime...yadayadayada...and said we should take a strong stance to prevent their obtaining nuclear weapons. Which is basically what we've been saying for a long time. The part that got me was how he addressed our future with Iran. Bush made a direct statement to the Iranian people, saying that they should have self-determination and make a good government. At the end of that bit, he said he looked forward to the US being "the closest of friends with a free and democratic Iran." Now, i'm probably just imagining things, but that line kind of scared me. When he said that, the first thing that jumped into my mind was "yeah, like we're friends with a free and democratic Iraq?" Probably, we're not looking at another war or anything in the near future, but that language sounded really suspicious to me. The other thing that threw me off guard was his mention of the line-item veto. He talked of getting rid of pork-barreling in congress, and said something like "we'll be able to solve this problem together if you pass the line-item veto." Now, I thought it was a joke, but the applause sounded fairly genuine. So we're retrying that which was deemed unconstitutional under clinton? I don't know. It was probably just a bad joke.