Military helicopters are roaming frequently throughout the sky, classes are being cancelled and police are swarming to Bascom Hill like bees to their hive. With all this commotion, one would think that we are welcoming the Pope to heaven or at least some hero home from the battlefield. However, we are not celebrating the great deeds of one man – we are only listening to him plead for a second chance to fulfill his duty. 

Two years ago President Barack Obama came to Madison in a similar manner and tried to convince the people of Madison, mostly students, that his ideas of hope and change were working. Today President Obama will speak in Madison for a second time, and I believe that he will focus on his ideas of hope and change once again. I would like to hear him echo a different tune.

I would rather have him focus on the real issues instead of his hope and change nonsense. He should at least be honest with the American people and inform them of our $16 trillion of national debt, our 8.1 percent unemployment, our $1.3 trillion budget deficit or even the fact that his administration could not pass a budget for the past several years.
Perhaps he could even customize his speech for students by telling us that we are not better off than we were four years ago. He could give us the facts and explain to us how education costs have risen roughly 40 percent over the past decade, how the average debt per UW student after graduation has increased to over $20,000 or how we will not be able to find employment after college because of the dismal job market.

However, President Obama cannot stick to these facts. If he spoke on these talking points he would never be reelected. Instead, I imagine that he will continue to portray his ideas of “hope and change.” By speaking eloquently about his unobtainable ideals and ignoring the facts, President Obama hopes to be reelected. Hopefully the students of Madison will come to their senses and tear down the fading Obama posters in their rooms before it is too late.

Zachary Walters is majoring in management and human resources. He is a member or University of Wisconsin-Madison College Republicans.