Status quo

I didn’t catch the State of the Union speech last night. I was watching Katherine while Margie was at a business dinner, and we got into watching DVDs (Jungle Book, then most of Monsters Inc.), and then when she went up to bed, I tossed in the FotR disc without even thinking. Didn’t even think of it until after Margie was home and Randy called and I heard them chatting about it.

Doesn’t sound, though, like I missed much, especially as I scan around the Net this morning. Folks who thought Iraq was the Greatest Menace Since the Nemesis Asteroid still think so. Folks who thought Iraq was a naked power grab for oil still think so. Folks who thought Iraq was an insufficiently justified aggression still think so. Folks whose special interests were mentioned by Bush were either enthused or skeptically pleased; those who weren’t are disappointed. Folks who thought the President’s tax cuts are a lunatic idea didn’t hear anything that made them think otherwise (except for more spending plans). Folks who thought homeland defense is a Horrible Threat still think so; folks who thought it’s horribly underfunded by the administration still think so, too.

The only thing that was in there that caused any surprise — be it skeptical or not — was Bush’s commitment to $15b over the next three years for AIDS relief in Africa. I doubt we’ll actually see it, and if we see it I doubt that most people involved will agree with how it’s spent, but it was the one unexpected left-field item I’ve heard mentioned several times.

All in all, it was going to be a no-win situation for Bush, anyway. The rallying cry went out last year, and continued rallying is unnecessary for the converted, not useful for the opposition. The only thing to do now is to either push forward with action on Iraq, reveal some intel that will sway some more people (though I’ve little doubt that there will always remain many who will discount anything they hear) and then take action, or back down. On the domestic front, Bush is stymied by an economy that he can only hurt further — it’s in a doldrums of its own making, and the more he diddles with the system (coughtaxcutcough), the more out of whack it’s likley to get. Which then only leaves intractable policy issues, like national health care, and intractable social issues, like abortion and race, to reduce his popularity with.

In some ways, after all the build-up to the SOTU speech, it sounds like it was something of a let-down. But, shot of waving a file folder and claiming that it had “the names of forty-seven card-carrying members of Al-Qa’eda who are working in the Iraqi government!” there wasn’t much else it could really be. It’s a difficult time, and the prospects for it getting less difficult save through further difficult times are not all that bright.

UPDATE: For what it’s worth, reactions I read about the Democratic response were either “lackluster and amateurish” or “professional and profound,” depending on the pre-existing perspective of the observer.