Response to the President's address to Netroots Nation

My reaction? I'm an advocate for change. I'm going to keep pushing for change, and the acceleration of that change. The Federal Government needs to do two things. First, prop up the state governments that are facing deficits. No more cuts to state education budgets, or health care budgets, or unemployment benefits. Put resources into the hands of people, not banks or corporations. Second, make a huge, HUGE, investment in renewable energy, one that makes up for the last 30 years of inaction. We need solar panels on the roof of every government building in the country. We need a line of solar panels along every inch of Federal Highway. We need to revitalize our rail infrastructure and push it forward 50 years with high speed rail paralleling the Highways from coast to coast, border to border.

All of this is going to take money. It's money that we have to spend if we are going to save our country, or civilization and our planet. I honestly believe that it is possible for us to reverse course and fix the problems that we have created over the past 200 years through the industrial revolution. Yes, we can do this.

If we don't... If we continue as we are now... If we advocate for, or even tolerate the systems and attitudes that we see in the media today... Well, then we are sentencing our children to death. We will not just hand the next generation the problems we have created, we will have ended their future. I have friends that tell me that I'm wrong, that there will be small pockets of humanity that survive in specific places around the globe. Is that really what we want to resign ourselves to?

Mr. President, you have done a lot over the last year and a half. Thank you for working so hard. I'm not going to say that you have done a poor job. I think you've done the best job that you could do with the tools that you have. But as you said on the campaign trail, it's not up to you. It's up to us.