This seems to be the week of technology as John Edwards weighed in on spectrum reallocation, John McCain talked to a conference about tech issues & Fred Thompson said he would run a tech centered presidential campaign. Now Hillary Clinton has joined in offering a plan to create higher paying jobs in technology and deal with the problems in education children in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Math).

She outlined what is being called ‘Hillary Clinton’s Innovation Agenda to a tech crown in Silicone Valley. There is also a policy outline I used while writing this on her Web site.

Why We Need It
The United States is facing what some are calling a “crisis” when it comes to being competitive in Math, Science & Engineering. American students are not focusing on STEM education leaving the United States lagging behind in the Global economy. Jobs are going overseas as corporations seek skilled labor in other countries and the next economy after the Internet/Computer revolution is taking shape with less participation by the United States.

What It Does
First Clinton addresses a problem that many in Silicon Valley (most recently and notably Bill Gates) have outlined as a major problem for the industry, recruiting overseas workers for employment in the U.S. A great deal of braintrust exists in places like Japan, China, Russia etc. but the number of H1B temporary visa’s to get them here is limited.

Clinton says she will raise the number of visas offered to help keep companies competitive and in the United States. This will help solve the temporary problems the tech industry faces.

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Well we have one day left in February so I thought I would go ahead and put together my monthly recap.

Little actually happened in the campaign this month. Some people announced their runs, No big surprises, and two candidates got into a spat, not such a big deal if you ask me. When David Geffen & Maureen Dowd are the epicenter of a political fight I wouldn’t exactly say it was substantive.

The spat did two things. First it filled a void of little to nothing major to report on this month. Sure there was Anna Nicole and Britney but not hard news. Nor was Obama and Hillary but without them somebody might actually have had to look into what is going on in Iran. I mean, someone other than Seymour Hersh.

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Because studying politics is as much about making predictions as it is knowing the facts and figures, each and every month until November 2008 I am going to take some time out and post my thoughts on the State of 08 and offer up my personal predictions for not just the presidency but eventually the House and Senate races too.

On this Super Bowl weekend in February (yeah, yeah, I didn’t think of this until February so I am late on January) here is what I see as the State of 2008 for the month of January.

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