Life With….

Tonight, the President of the United States stands before the nation and the Congress, to give a State of the Union – as dictated by Article II Section 3 of the Constitution wherein the President must update Congress and may offer policies as well and by tradition, where in it is a Speech at the end of January.   You may not agree with him, his policies, or you may agree completely with him – but the fact of the matter is that he is the Chief Executive of our nation, and the Commander – in Chief.  The office alone is worthy of respect.

Similarly, the Congress, both the people’s chamber of the House and the State’s Chamber of the Senate, are elected officials their to do the business of the people.  They owe themselves, their constituents, and their offices the respect to act with decorum, or at a minimum act as if they are interested in the proceedings much like you would a t a family dinner.

Instead I am reading and hearing that many politicians of both parties will be updating their twitter feeds and facebook pages during the speech (Rep. Joe Wilson, shockingly, comes out a hero in this opting to hold an online live streaming interactive social media response on facebook – 30 minutes after the speech concludes).  House GOP minority leader will be live blogging via his website and twitter in order to fact check the State of the Union.   As stated in the press release ““President Obama’s rhetoric is often detached from reality, so it’s important there be a place Americans can go to get the facts about his job-killing agenda,” Boehner said. “We’ll also be using this live blog to discuss Republicans’ better solutions to the challenges working families and small business owners are facing.  House Republicans have had great success over the last year using the Internet and social media to connect with the American people.  This live blog will not only provide a place to find GOP better solutions, visitors can take advantage of the open commenting feature to exchange ideas with House Republicans and each other. Working together, we can hold Washington Democrats accountable.” Others, such as Senator Claire McCkasill may opt only to tweet during the conclusion and introduction – as she claims to have been called out by her mother on her lack of decorum during the September address to Congress.

It is true that more Republicans than Democrats are expected to be tweeting or facebooking during the speech.  This has to do with the fact that somehow the House Republicans dominate social media, an ironic fact given the last campaign where social media killed the Republican’s chance.  Even more ironic that the conservative party, that is supposedly pro-family values and shows of respect for the office of the President and military would be the ones more likely to be falling in the aspect of decors action.

I do not doubt that people, and the Congress, would love to pummel the President on questions, but the fact of the matter this is the State of Union.  Our current system does not have a Prime Minster Questions session.  If you really want to question the President about the address you are free to upload a video to Citizen Tube and see if your question is one he responds to next week in an online video session.  Nor is it the 1800s when fights in Congress, on one instance, ended in bloodshed, but then again that was a time of great national crisis when the nation was fraught economically, regionally, racially, and about to go to war with itself when tensions were high and people angry and hyperbolic.

Our country has prided itself on peaceful transitions of power, and shows of respect to the office – after which the opponents pummel each others’ policies in the press and responses, or by simply voting them down and having floor speeches flowered with high rhetoric.  Today – this will all be preempted by a live blog – being written, supposedly, by someone in the same room as the President who will be giving a speech.

I know that I get frustrated, and feel that people are ignoring me if they text or tweet during dinner with me.  In a movie theater or play a person on cell phone is not only distracting himself or herself, but they distract the others around them and show no respect for the other’s interest in watching the play.   This is compounded if it s a live action play as it also distracts and shows no respect for the actor or speaker.

These actions are giving the message that using this faux English, as almost dictated by Twitters 140 character limit, when speaking and texting over dinner makes sense.  Soon a Congressman will be live video chatting during the State of the Union saying, “OMG can u blv that the Prez would lie like that – his hair is SOOO dyied.”   I hate to think what the state of our decorum, respect, and most bitterly, language will be headed when we reach that stage.

So please – I urge you – even as it makes me sound really conservative, please use real words and pay attention to others around you.  Tweet when they are in the bathroom.  Thanks.

All text and copyrights preserved by the author 02csb For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Courtney Brown

Create Your Badge  All text and copyrights preserved by the author for words and original pictures and may not be used without author's permission. For more information visit http://www.peebesalgy.com Follow me on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/peebesalgy or contact me directly through http://www.peebesalgy.com/blog/contact-me/ Courtney Brown | Create Your Badge