OK, so the President didn't use my suggestions on what to say about innovation (see yesterday's posting). But I did like the President's speech. It was a positive speech, a forward looking speech, and, at times, an in-your-face speech. One of the re-occurring themes was "I won't back down." I was especially pleased to hear this in reference to the Administration's policies on worker retraining and on funding for the development of clean energy technologies. These programs have been under attack lately - so it was good to hear the President defend them. While I believe these programs are not enough, the idea that we should cut them back is wrong. The easy course for the President would have been to side step them. Instead he choose to push forward.
In an interesting twist, the White House has prepared a slideshow to accompany the speech and a background paper on the economic policies -- Blueprint for an America Built to Last. Unfortunately, both the speech and the Blueprint did not break any new ground when it come to innovation. The President reiterated his support for small business and entrepreneurship, for basic R&D and for clean energy technologies. In this time of tight budgets, such a limited set of proposals may be all we can realistically expect. And even there, we may not get all that is needed (for example in the R&D budget).
So the fight continues.
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