We heard the State Of The Union speech and this columnist was less than impressed.  When President Obama was a candidate I referred to him as an empty suit.  During his first year, I said he was an empty suit whose pants were on fire.  I also mentioned that he was all wind and no sail.  I thought worse things but didn’t write about them.

I could be criticized for being negative, but I remember the things the Liberals said about George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Sarah Palin and John McCain. That makes me think if they didn’t say anything nice about them, I should be OK with my commentary. 

I heard two things he said in his speech that made sense.  One was that he was going to open the oil fields for off shore drilling.  I don’t recall any promises about opening the Bakkan Oil Fields, but that should be part of the energy deal.  He also said he wanted to use green energy and nuclear power.  That is great.  We are too dependent upon foreign oil.

Which brings up another subject he didn’t talk about.  For years this column has urged the presidents (George W. included) to abolish the Department of Energy.  Do that or publish their lists of accomplishments.  I do a lot of research and don’t recall ever seeing any justification for their existence.  It is a big bureaucracy costing billions of dollars and I have never seen any documentation of how many BTUs they have produced.

I don’t remember any other issue he spoke of that I liked. There had to be something that was believable, but most of the speech was rhetoric and more promises.  If he keeps these promises the way he kept his campaign promises, this should be a good year for Republicans in the upcoming elections.

The biggest joke of his campaign was about how he was going to make government transparent and that the voters would have a chance to read any bill at least five days before he would sign it.  So what happened with that promise?  The health care “reform” was more than a thousand pages long (kind of like reading War and Peace) and the deals were made in secrecy.  Not only were the doors closed, they were locked.

Then there was the unbridled bribery to get the votes of a few Democrats to make the vote count sixty.  Of course our Senators Schumer and Gillibrand were in lock step with the president and voted for the complete bill.  It didn’t matter that Governor Patterson said it would cost the taxpayers in New York about a billion dollars more than they are paying now for health care.

A reasonable person would think that the New York senators would scream against such a proposal considering the rotten financial disaster the state is facing.  Other state senators got concessions for their vote.  Our senators didn’t see anything wrong with creating bigger deficits for the Empire State.  Maybe it is time for a change in our Senate “representatives.”

I also think about the Cap and Trade bill so eagerly accepted and supported by the New York Democrats.  This, if implemented, will make energy for the average working person so expensive that it will be the same as a huge tax increase.

President Obama said he was going to freeze non-military expenses.  When that happens, look to the sky to count the number of pigs flying.  We know how well he speaks, and how convincing he was during the campaign.  This speech was well delivered and for those who base success on style, he did well.  Those who hoped for substance and real solutions to problems were sadly disappointed. 

We heard a lot of promises.  I will believe them when I see them.  What’s this world coming to when you can’t rely on a politician’s promise?