i got your weapons of mass destruction-related program activities right here

As the cacophony of pundit analyses of the SOTU and Iowa caucus grows louder, it is naturally time to add my thoughts to the list.

Dean's loss, while surprising, does not spell the end of his campaign. As the candidate with the most money and the best national organization, I still think he's in the best position to get the Democratic nomination. Kerry and (to a lesser extent) Edwards have demonstrated their abilities to put together a state campaign in a short period of time. However, whether they can put together similar organizations in other states will prove pivotal. Particularly as Clark (and, I suppose Lieberman) enter the race and the calendar accelerates.

The State of the Union had its usual gag moments, including

"You need to renew the Patriot Act"

and

"we will double federal funding for abstinecnce programs, so schools can teach this fact of life: Abstinence for young people is the only certain way to avoid sexually transmitted diseases."

I thought the domestic policy half of the speech was a bit weak. However the first half — citing foreign policy achievements — was very strong. I think the President has dramatically improved his speaking abilities (contrasted with his stilted, sometimes clumsy speeches a couple of years ago), and has demonstrated that as President, he will be a formidable candidate. Assuming, of course, the American public don’t care about the misleading economic data.

The best/worst line from the speech, however, has to be:

”…the Kay Report identified dozens of weapons of mass destruction related program activities…”

Uh oh. It’s a good thing we invaded, otherwise,

”...weapons of mass destruction programs would continue to this day…”

Well, now that we don’t have to worry about program activities attacking us, I feel much better. How big did you say the deficit was going to be?