Last night, while making chicken and dumplings*, I listened to the entirety of President Obama's speech about the budget and the deficit. If you missed it, I would encourage you to listen to the speech, because it touches on issues that will keep coming up for the next few months:

And I think, especially in the beginning, there, it's a very good speech that highlights the ideological battle we're facing. With Paul Ryan's ridiculously named Path to Prosperity budget plan, Republicans are trying to change the course of America; this is a pretty bold legislative move for a party that was on the ropes two years ago. Obama is arguing for an America that believes in taking care of its neighbors; he's chastising Ryan and the Republicans for trying to return to a pre-FDR America, with little or no social safety net and very little in the way of investments in education or even a planned infrastructure.

Of course, Republicans are outraged that Obama came out swinging. Dig this crazy Wall Street Journal editorial about the speech, and Ryan's waaaaahmbulance ride. What they're really mad about is the way Obama told the truth about their "Path to Prosperity" and the way he reframed their apocalyptic scenarios—the Chinese are going to buy your baby!—into a serious problem that will require an adult response. As far as a preview of the presidential campaign goes, it was a good one. And as Mike Allen at Politico points out, "If President Obama manages to seal a long-term fiscal deal, the GOP will have little to run on" in 2012. It'll be interesting to see if Republicans try to stall and sabotage these negotiations for a year and a half; if they don't make this budget battle last, they'll have to try to hold their lead on the House and re-take the Senate and White House on non-starting issues like immigration and...stem cells, I guess?

* That recipe is okay, but I have yet to find a really, really good chicken and dumplings recipe on the internet.