The first thing to go would be the clapping. At the first round of applause, I would wait for it to die down and then say, ``Would you kindly shut the fuck up? I'm trying to give a speech here. If you want to applaud, wait until the end when you aren't wasting my time and the time from every commercial network carrying this speech.

The next thing is that I'd present facts and figures and paint a picture of the country as it is. If I had taken the country to war and had publicly declared benchmarks on how to gauge victory, I'd compare current progress against those benchmarks. I'd give an overview of actions the federal government has taken in key areas and give summaries of the results of those actions. Then based on this, I'd give suggestions for the best way to move forward.

The other thing I'd do is hold up a copy of a recent bill that had been passed that I'd yet to either sign or veto and I'd ask every member of congress to who'd voted either yea or nay on the bill to stand. Then I'd ask those who'd read the bill in its entirety to remain standing and for the punters who didn't bother to read the legislation they voted on to sit. At that point, I'd extol the virtues of anyone remaining standing and castigate everyone sitting as being one of the reasons that the US of A is so fucked up in this or that fashion. Then I'd call for Congress to keep bills focused and on target and if they want to bargain and negotiate `I'll vote for this if you vote for that'', that's fine but they need to keep it in separate bills so that every bill is narrow, focused, comprehensible and written in plain English.

And what's up with the milk toast Democratic `rebuttal'? Bush the Apostate deserves to be verbally burned at the stake. Probably the present best common ground to build the future of the nation is the vilification of Bush the Apostate.