George Bush: State of the Union
Watched Bush’s State of the Union last night. Made my 14 year old son watch it too — history is being made, I told him. First impressions:
- Accelerated tax cuts — Reaganomics lives!
- AIDS funding in Africa — a surprise. Bush started by quoting the numbers of people the US funding would help, and I turned to Janice and said "It’s not enough". Then he quoted the dollar figure, and I sat back and said "That’s a lot of money". Stephen Lewis, Canada’s AIDS ambassador to the UN, said in this morning’s Globe and Mail, that this would be a wake up call to the rest of the G7 to step forward. Let’s hope so.
- Iraq — the war will be underway within weeks. Next week’s meeting with Colin Powel and the Security Council is a last ditch effort to get the UN onside. The Security Council will deadlock, and at that point the US will abandon the UN and head off to war with its "coalition of the willing".
