{"id":16588,"date":"2010-01-27T20:54:00","date_gmt":"2010-01-28T03:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=16588"},"modified":"2010-01-27T20:54:00","modified_gmt":"2010-01-28T03:54:00","slug":"state-of-the-union-2010","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2010\/01\/27\/state-of-the-union-2010.html","title":{"rendered":"State of the Union 2010"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, just did a live-Twitter of the SOTU.\u00a0 And now for my impressions (which will no doubt be buffeted and tempered by the various pundits over the coming days).<\/p>\n

\"Obama<\/a>
Obama and the State of the Union 2010<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

1. Obama remains a hell of a speaker.\u00a0 Compared to the stammering, yammering, good-ol-boy Dubya years, if he does nothing else in his presidency he will have reinvigorated the state of public speaking.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 He does best when speaking in generalities, as an inspiration, as a leader, as someone speaking of our ideals, reminding us of our values, stern but hopeful.\u00a0 He hit some great populist notes talking about banks, bailouts, and partisan difficulties.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 He does less well when he gets wonky-policy-bound. Those are the toughest part of any speech, to be sure, and the easiest to critique, but he tends to be a weaker speaker.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Policy-wise, it was a mixed bag.\u00a0 Many of the specific items he raised were technical and uncontroversial. His support for health care reform was rhetorically firm but didn’t offer anything new or inspirational to actually make it happen.\u00a0 He “came out” to declare his intent to (work with Congress) to get rid of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell — but sandwiched it with equal pay enforcement and immigration reform.<\/p>\n

The most controversial (previewed) portion of the speech was a freeze on discretionary federal spending starting in 2011.\u00a0 And he followed through with that plan, despite objections from most mainstream economists that during an economic downturn government spending can help fuel a recovery, even if it adds to debt.\u00a0 And even if he thinks it might earn some points from some of the citizenry (despite GOP decifit-mongering), he promptly weakened it by noting that it wouldn’t start until next FY, by which time the recession should (might, maybe) be into recovery.<\/p>\n

And, of course, the amount of the federal budget that is actually discretionary, when you explicitly leave out social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and national security, is a tiny fraction, the result is that actual savings tend to be minimal, everyone’s ox gets gored, and nobody’s happy about it.<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0 Obama made several stabs at the Bipartisanship meme.\u00a0 It’s a theme he needs to shout from the rooftops, because the American people actually like <\/em>bipartisanship, and the GOP is hoping they can make them forget that.<\/p>\n

Certainly I don’t expect Obama’s pointed comments (ostensibly directed at both parties, but issued facing mostly toward the GOP side of the chamber) to change the tenor of the Republican obstructionists — but they were points well-made, and if the Dems are willing to run on their record (rather than flee from it) and against the GOP “Party of No” (rather than acting like it), they can actually stand a chance next year.<\/p>\n

6.\u00a0 CSPAN rocks.\u00a0 No infuriating talking heads blathering on before or after the speech.\u00a0 Just — open camera and live mic.\u00a0 So refreshing.\u00a0 When I become King of the World and wear a shiny hat, every network will be required to cover my speeches like CSPAN does.<\/p>\n

7. The “official response of the opposing party” thang will be seen as emblematic of the decay and fall of American Democracy by future historians.\u00a0 You just wait and see.\u00a0 I couldn’t stand them when it was the Dems issuing talking points after Dubya’s SOTUs.\u00a0 I can’t stand them even more now.<\/p>\n

8. Twittering the whole speech was interesting.\u00a0 I used the web client (since I suspect the API might be congested), and it worked just fine.\u00a0 It was difficult to digest some of the key points, but it certainly helped me focus on what was being said.\u00a0 Hopefully it was not too annoying to my Twitter followers.<\/p>\n

9.\u00a0 Obama is not the progressive change-and-hope candidate I voted for — but he’s also (and by a larger margin) not the far less savory ticket I voted against <\/em>in 2008.\u00a0 When he\u00a0 speaks of ideals, he’s still got me by the guts.\u00a0 When he turns to policy, his bipartisan – pragmatic – “let’s let Congress live up to what they should be doing” shilly-shallying is frustrating.<\/p>\n

This SOTU could have been a clarion call to action, a declaration that, after a year of trying to govern jointly with both parties, it was time to forge ahead to the vision the electorate had when it put him in office.\u00a0 Instead, it was inspiring but safe.\u00a0 It was soaring in generalities and quiet in specifics.\u00a0 That won’t stop the Right from continuing to lambaste him as “the most radical Marxist \/ Nazi \/ Muslim \/ Anarchist \/ Fascist ever to sit in the White House,” but it will, sadly, somewhat defang that huge majority his party has (on paper) in Congress.\u00a0 Yes, Congressional leadership needs to step up, but even LBJ (a legislator from the git-go) knew the invaluable power that the White House held to sway recalcitrant congresscritters.<\/p>\n

In the end, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d feared, but nowhere near as good as I’d wished.<\/p>\n

And, sadly, it will be back to business as usual in DC tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, just did a live-Twitter of the SOTU.\u00a0 And now for my impressions (which will no doubt be buffeted and tempered by the various pundits over the coming days). 1. Obama remains a hell of a speaker.\u00a0 Compared to the stammering, yammering, good-ol-boy Dubya years, if he does nothing else in his presidency he will … Continue reading “State of the Union 2010”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16589,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fourth-estate","category-politics-law"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/01\/obama-sotu10.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":128137,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/09\/22\/the-universal-new-yorker-cartoon-caption.html","url_meta":{"origin":16588,"position":0},"title":"The Universal "New Yorker" Cartoon Caption","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 22-Sep-15 7:26pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Which, for a variety of personal reasons, is a hell of a lot funnier now than it would have been six months ago. A New Caption That Works for Every 'New Yorker' Cartoon And it's not \"Christ, what an asshole.\" View on Google+","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12535,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/03\/31\/potpourri_for_the_end_of.html","url_meta":{"origin":16588,"position":1},"title":"Potpourri for the End of March","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 31-Mar-08 1:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I can't believe March is over. Yeesh. Wiki Woman\u00a0- An article on the Wikipedia wars on both Obama and Clinton's pages. 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Putting aside Moore's claim to be in it for the humor, the column points out the...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":32847,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/03\/22\/elvis-has-left-the-building-cosmic-edition.html","url_meta":{"origin":16588,"position":4},"title":"Elvis has left the building (cosmic edition)","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 22-Mar-13 10:12am","format":false,"excerpt":"Worth clicking through to the cartoon just to read the ToolTip caption. \u00a0(h\/t +Amy Shira Teitel)Reshared post from +Jason MajorLOL @ this. ;-)(Via\u00a0http:\/\/xkcd.com\/1189\/) View this post on Google+","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2216,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/07\/24\/sure_guvner_he.html","url_meta":{"origin":16588,"position":5},"title":"“Sure, guvner, he has a flat right up behind the clock face!”","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 24-Jul-02 8:30am","format":false,"excerpt":"The content of the story aside, I find it amusing that the BBC, in describing the arrest of an al-Qa'eda suspect in Denver, uses a (mediocre) photo of downtown with...","rel":"","context":"In "Fourth Estate"","block_context":{"text":"Fourth Estate","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/fourth-estate"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}