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The State of the Union Is Meaningless
The problem with a Joe Biden speech is that he doesn’t believe anything he says.
When Reagan claimed to hate the dirty red commies, his personal history and actions in office backed up the statement. When George H.W. Bush promised to spread democracy around the world, even his harshest critics knew he believed it — and shuddered.
Not so with Biden. He boasts of bipartisanship in one paragraph, then accuses Republicans of killing Social Security in the next. One sentence on unity, the next ties a lefty nudist’s attack on Paul Pelosi to January 6. He demands an end to fentanyl, then ignores the issue until the next State of the Union.
Between his stilted cadence and mumble-whisper-SCREAM delivery, you wonder if Biden even knows what he’s saying.
In other words, 2023’s SOTU was about the same as 2022 and 2021.
The difference came from the crowd, which heckled, booed, and mocked the president. I’m no professional orator, but it’s a bad sign when half the audience keeps openly laughing at you.
It was hard to blame Republican congressmen and senators objecting to Biden’s ludicrous claims. A few examples:
Some of my Republican friends want to take the economy hostage unless I agree to their economic plans.
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Other Republicans say if we don’t cut Social Security and Medicare, they’ll let America default on its debt for the first time in our history.
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America’s border problems won’t be fixed until Congress acts.
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Now, some members here are threatening to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act. Make no mistake, if you try to do anything to raise the cost of prescription drugs, I will veto it.
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But make no mistake: as we made clear last week, if China’s threatens our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country. And we did.
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Just a few months ago, unhinged by the Big Lie, an assailant unleashed political violence in the home of the then-Speaker of this House of Representatives. Using the very same language that insurrectionists who stalked these halls chanted on January 6th.
As Republicans ridiculed the claims in real-time, Biden shot back at them, removing any dignity this annual tradition once held. It’s long past time to revert the SOTU address to a written letter.
It wasn’t much easier on the TV audience. Biden’s stumbling, creaky, old-man voice lulls the viewer into a fugue state. Then, out of nowhere, “NAME ME A WORLD LEADER WHO WOULD CHANGE PLACES WITH XI JINPING!” I nearly spilled my martini.
Published in Politics
Interesting. So he has thought about it. I wonder if anyone else ever has.
The proper drink for a Biden SotU is Mad Dog 20/20.
It may be credible that no POTUS before Biden deserved to be openly heckled, but Biden sure does. At every possible opportunity.
I caught a bit of Mark Levin while on the road today. At one point, IIRC, Levin said that Slow Joe had asked when he was declared the winner in 2020 what he had to do to be the most consequential and most remembered prez ever. The answer was that he had to out-do FDR. So we have a senile old fool put in office by morons who thinks he has to spend more, tackle more than anyone else has. If he makes a pig’s breakfast of everything and bankrupts the country? Hey, that’s just the price of being The Big Guy.
I don’t. Joe is barely there anymore. The continuous evolution of the balloon saga shows that nobody is running the store anymore.
It’s a remarkably stupid utterance. And are we to expect a flurry of tut-tut editorials about racist Sinophobia now? No?
I’m assuming, of course, that no speechwriter would put that in except under duress.
Like so much of modern political theatre (debates, polls, etc) the in-person SOTU exists primarily for the media. So it should die.
Okaaaay… here’s my question: since SOTU was long after my bedtime, now getting this crisp, succinct review from the esteemed Mr. Gabriel, is it worth the time listening to the reply from the esteemed Governor of Arkansas?
Gut instinct is that it is not.
The beginning wasn’t bad, but I drifted off before the end.
I’d love to hear a few speechwriters weigh in.
Biden was pitch perfect for his audience. Your mistake is you think you are his audience. And Republicans only reinforced Joe’s message to the intended audience.
This is a lie on top of a lie. In front of congress and the American people.
It’s fairly amazing that the guy busted for plagiarism still summons the courage to call other people liars.
So he’s going to put more Asian-Americans into internment camps that FDR?
It’s good to have goals.
Which won’t matter, because his audience is already all-in.
It’s the middle that matters. Having a hard time believing anyone who’s paying attention doesn’t see Biden as a dumpster fire, but, as always:
Half the country votes.
Half the country pays no net income taxes.
Of the half of the country that *does* pay income taxes, the top 50% of that half pays 97% of all income taxes.
Which means, basically, that the real bite in the can from a tax perspective doesn’t fall on the majority of the people, so why would anyone complain about policies they’re not paying attention to and aren’t paying for?
My only real concern is perception, which is reality: If foreign leaders had any doubts about the capability of the soft, doughy pillow of a president currently stumbling around the White House, that’s probably been erased clean off the chalkboard. I’d expect more provocations and incursions from the usual suspects – China, Russia, drug cartels, illegal immigration wholly supported by the Mexican government, etc, because of the lame duck and limp crapweasel of a sham of a President.
His lie that the Repubs wanted to cut Medicare and Social Security raised ire and led to boos. And he was ridiculous enough to say, you mean you don’t want to do that? Great, so that means we’re all on the same page. Let’s not cut them. So he tried to make it sound like he had lectured them into caving and going along with him. Good grief.
Stolen elections have consequences.
Your errors:
You still think there’s a middle.
You still think in terms of voters rather than ballots.
You don’t think the entire system is cartelized.
if you try to do anything to raise the cost of prescription drugs, I will veto it..
Are you working off a written transcript, because that’s not what came out of his mouth?
Don’t we want to cut social security and medicare? I thought that fiscal soundness was only possible in part by doing that.
Crimenutely. It was my coffee that almost went bottoms-up. I think he actually shouts “NAME ME A WORLD LEADER WHO CHANGED PLACES WITH XI JINPING!! And then just in case anyone is likely to take him up on the challenge, he shouts even louder, “NAME ME ONE!!! NAME ME ONE!!!!” Glory be.
Then there’s this:
I thought it was a pretty good speech, and it was nice to see her again. However, although she spoke glowingly of Trump’s secret visit to Iraq at Christmas of 2018, she repeatedly (four times, I think) also said that “it is time for a new generation of Republican leadership.”
When Sarah Sanders says that, that many times, it’s got to be indicative of something….
What does that even mean? Is he trying to suggest that Xi is shaking in his boots because he feels threatened by . . . Joe Biden???
I think I need a little context. If there is any.
Even with all the challenges facing China (demographic implosion, virus manufacturing gone awry, totalitarian control of billions of people. . . ) most commie tyrants die peacefully in their beds at a ripe old age. I get the sense Xi isn’t too worried about anything.
All State of the Unions suck – Listening to Biden hopped on speed and mumbling for more government was more than I can bear
That line itself sounds like Biden’s rotten old core programming still humming away in the dusty racks of an abandoned data center. Written in NeanderBOL, it generates vaguely topical logical trainwrecks designed to stop the other person, not find answers or make points. This sort of comment is what prompts logical people (bear with me) to say “That’s not even wrong.” It can not be rebutted because it makes no sense. Sure, maybe XJ has it tough. But why would any world leader “trade places” regardless of how well or poorly he’s doing?
It’s a combination of homework assignment, non sequitur, primal hostility (teeth and shouting), and a topical hook. It doesn’t matter what he says, and to the extent that you think it does, you lose. People who retain their faculties may try to unpack the question and begin addressing the missing assumptions (would a trading world leader actually become Chinese, or would the Chineseness of China stop mattering after the trade?) and so forth. Annnd you lost.
People do that here, too. We just don’t elect them President.
The man is an absolute disgrace.
Neither do I . . .
This is Woodrow Wilson’s fault, yes? Isn’t he the president who decided his tongue was so silver that SOTU addresses should happen in person?
I don’t know.
I suppose George Washington’s Farewell Address could be described as a type of SOTU, which was printed, not spoken. I teach tiny excerpts of that bit of eloquence that sprung mostly from the pen of Alexander Hamilton almost every term…. I don’t like to engage in hagiography when it comes to founding fathers. They were mere humans who were often hard-nosed politicians. But holy cow. At least I still admire them.
I haven’t admired American “leaders” for a very long time now, and I certainly don’t believe Joe Biden is anything other than a blow-hard prevaricator, which he has always been. Now he’s more feeble, but so what? He is himself still. And that “self” is just not very impressive.
How about the rights taken away, when the virus of unknown origin, and a 98.5% survival rate, showed up?