I think he performed quite well.

He's a good speaker, although he's MUCH better when given the script beforehand.

As for substance?

I give him a "C".

He made some salient points regarding a hodgepodge of subjects, but in regards to the economy I think he missed by a mile.

First off: We KNOW that you "inherited" this economy. You don't have to say it (not once, but twice) as if we thought it was your fault. And for the record, we never heard Bush blame Clinton for the Enron/Worldcom/Tyco et al scandals, nor the bursting of the false economy under the dot com bubble, and hell not even for the terrorist attacks.

Next, his "goal" of creating 4 Million jobs will be IMPOSSIBLE to measure. Yet that is the VERY item that he stated would be THE measuring stick.

If America loses 2 million jobs in the next 12 months, he can claim that it would have been 6 million.

Please. How can the democratic talking heads consider this a well thought out response??

And the Recovery Plan in general?

Don't tell me that we need to pass the plan simply because our government should do something.

That's ridiculous on a million levels.

We need to do the RIGHT thing. If that takes a few more weeks, then we'll survive. Decision made in haste are almost ALWAYS wrong.

Pointing fingers at others who "over spend" while piecing together the single largest pork laden bill in history?

Pointing fingers at Republicans in the house and calling their tactics Old Tricks?

Why can't he use the mirror once and a while and stop laying blame elsewhere.

He's at the top now.

He needs to start acting like it.

He is an excellent speaker......scares me a little with the thought of an even bigger government...

Charlie

Check out the c-span link on the Racism thread. Scary. These are the people that are on the side of our President.

"Who is John Galt?"

I'm with Charlie on this one. I do believe he's a great speaker - gifted even. But, I would hate to see government get any bigger. In fact, he should be looking to reduce government and return the power to the States (where it belongs).

Gentlemen

It's SOCIALISM!

Welcome to France!

Am I gonna have to eat snails and frog legs now???

How do you know the re-education camp menu?

I'm close personal friends with John Galt. You'd be amazed at the things he has discovered.

Obama is da Devils evangelist/..

hahaha, he couldn't say a certain country in the middle east has nukes....he cut off helen thomas whe she tried to follow up with her question, . hmmmmm........was he scared? wow, wow, wow and no one in the "main stream" media is taling about it. big surprise! oh, wait, a certain country never signed the nuclear nonploferation treaty....hmmmmmm......is it no wonder iran wants a nuke or two?

From Wikipedia:

Proliferation begets proliferation is a concept described by Scott Sagan in his article, Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons? This concept can be described as a strategic chain reaction. If one state produces a nuclear weapon it creates almost a domino effect within the region. States in the region will seek to acquire nuclear weapons to balance or eliminate the security threat. Sagan describes this reaction best in his article when he states, “Every time one state develops nuclear weapons to balance against its main rival, it also creates a nuclear threat to another region, which then has to initiate its own nuclear weapons program to maintain its national security” (Sagan, pg. 70). Going back through history we can see how this has taken place. When the United States demonstrated that it had nuclear power capabilities after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Russians started to develop their program in preparation for the Cold War. With the Russian military buildup, France and Great Britain perceived this as a security threat and therefore they pursued nuclear weapons (Sagan, pg 71). think about it, why does iran want nukes so bad?

and he knew beforehand who to call and what would be asked, what kind of "free-press" is this? what a sham!

should't the press be allowed to freely ask questions of our president? this was staged. this is a travesty......is it not? and this "very important" topic of a-rod using steroids, gimme a break! what aboout wresting? what about THAT sport/entertainment industry? oh yeah, baseball is "sacred," you cannot tarnish it, it is the american pasttime, sorry...... utter hypocricy, ridiculous. uhhhhh and this guy has to uhhhhhh, and uhhhhh and uhhhhhhh and ehhhhh and uhhhhhhhh, great speaker? my hairy ass! uhhhhhhhh freaking stuttering fool. how did this guy get elected? not even one term served in the senate, questionable birthplace, ridiculous. just ridiculous. ha, he shoud bring up rush limbaugh more often, that would really take the cake.

excuse me, had to vent a little........uhhhhhh, uhhhhhhh, uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh and another uhhhhhhhhh (wow, i am a great speaker) what was i going to say, oh yeah, hope and change, my, in case you missed it, un-shaved, un-waxed, hairy behind!

my bad, thread 11, those were my words after the quote from wiki......sagan did not say, "is it no wonder iran wants ni=ukes so bad." my bad.

"think about it, why does iran want nukes so bad?"

my words, not mr. sagan's, sorry mr. sagan......oh wait you passed in 1996, my bad, sorry mr. sagan's estate..........

You are an idiot.

Helen Thomas has regained her seat that GWB's crew took away from her, they had her in back of room where she belongs......she looks like an old Indian carving of some kind sitting there snarling....

Charlie

I heard the President say his goal is to "create or maintain 4 million jobs." What does that mean? I know I am biased against at least some of his philosophy, i.e. "liberalism" or "progressivism"(is that a word?); I personally think conservative philosophy makes more sense. I am hoping that it was my bias that made me think the President was very bad last night, but I was disappointed in much of what he said and how he said it. I am hoping the fans of liberalism and the President (actually, I guess I am a fan of the President, or at least I don't hate the guy) will say he actually was pretty good. Or maybe he just needs practice with the news conferences. I guess I was expecting and hoping for a much better presentation. He did nothing to give me confidence in what he is proposing.

#15- no you are an idiot. i can call people names too. ha! dumbass, fool, typical ignorant jackass.

I watched the press conference on Fox (the channel, not Fox News) and the commentator did say afterwards that the questions were canned and really didn't dig deep into any issue.

I would have to agree it was somewhat staged and the answers were canned. Some of the responses were more of a ramble than an answer. Typical politics no matter which party is at the helm.

Somehow, I don't see the press continuing to be too friendly too long. I'm sure they will start asking the harder questions at some point because it's in their nature to be repulsive, overbearing, and looking for their 15 minutes of fame. I withhold my judgment until Obama has a few more press conferences under his belt and the press starts getting restless.

"I've noticed a pattern with our opponent. Maybe you have, too.

We've all heard his dramatic speeches before devoted followers. And there is much to like and admire about our opponent.

How are you going to be better off if our opponent adds a massive tax burden to the American economy?

But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate.

This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word "victory" except when he's talking about his own campaign. But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed... when the roar of the crowd fades away... when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot - what exactly is our opponent's plan?

What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he's done turning back the waters and healing the planet? The answer is to make government bigger... take more of your money... give you more orders from Washington... and to reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world. America needs more energy... our opponent is against producing it.

Victory in Iraq is finally in sight... he wants to forfeit.

Terrorist states are seeking nuclear weapons without delay... he wants to meet them without preconditions.

Al-Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights? Government is too big... he wants to grow it.

Congress spends too much... he promises more. Taxes are too high... he wants to raise them. His tax increases are the fine print in his economic plan, and let me be specific.

The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes... raise payroll taxes... raise investment income taxes... raise the death tax... raise business taxes... and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."

Seems like only yesterday. She foretold the future and America blinked. America believed the SNL character instead of the real woman. She was the one with the truth. She'll be able to say "I told ya so". I don't think she will though.