I just wondered where the steroid use by pro athletes fit into that straight line? After spending the first part of the speech cautioning (chiding?) us about all the big real dangers and problems in the world it seems that even a few comments on a topic as tiny as steroid use by pro athletes was out of place. Maybe I am just nitpicking, (or he is tossing bones to the religous right) but ditto for abstinence programs and the critical need to defend marriage. (I enjoyed Andrew Sullivans comments on this subject.)

Hey, I know we are busy building democracies in Afgahnistan and Iraq, attempting to eradicate global terror, continuing to pull our ecomony out of a slump,and even dream about manned exploration of Mars, but what we really need to concentrate on is keeping our role model pro athletes drug free and counseling teenagers to not have sex.

Silence,

I wish I could disagree with you and defend my President. But I can't. You're absolutely right. For a CONSERVATIVE to see reason for Federal involvement in such affairs is dispiriting.

My stock W defense is that he screws up the little things like crazy -- but he gets the big things right. For this he will have my vote and some of my money in '04.

But you are right, feel free to rub it in a little. There are no excuses.

JK,

I would never think of rubbing it in. (Well, maybe for a fleeting instant) Even though I am not a huge Bush fan I respect that you can support the guy without agreeing with his every move. Kind of how I felt about Clinton.

W didn't call for federal action on steroid use, he used the bully pulpit to put pressure on pro sports leagues and unions to ban them. He did call for multi-million dollar increases in anti-drug, abstinence education and prisoner release transition programs. But let's look at this from the other side. Meryl Streep said she didn't think people wanting to dedicate their lives to each other 'til death do they part or steroid use by pro athletes were "the two biggest problems facing our country." Well no, they're not, but mobody claimed that they were the biggest problems. And excepting the gay marriage issue, who can argue that Americans wouldn't be better off if these changes were made? Don't misunderestimate me, I don't think the government should be spending my money to keep kids out of the back seat, but if we can keep the bureaucrats busy with innocuous stuff like this they're less free to dream up new ways to fleece the taxpayer.

I'd like to think you were right johngalt, but I look at it as a Hayekian coercion by the government. The ability to meddle at low levels gives the State a lot of power through capricious enforcement.

Plus, it breaks the backs of those who believe in Liberty. I want the government to allow private money, legalize soft drugs and switch to consumption tax so I don't have to tell them where or how much money I make. Once they spread into minutia, thoughts of radical reclamation of Liberty seem distant.