The press are filtering into the building. The Capitol Police are towing parked cars between 16th street and the Capitol along Pennsylvania Ave. The Republicans are preparing their talking points about how poorly things have become while the Democrats prepare to go on TV with their counts of how many times the President was interrupted with clapping.

Its obviously a late and rare Wednesday evening SotU, Obama recently being crushed by reports of health care dying in the Senate over Ted Kennedy's replacement. So what I wonder is, what can we expect we don't already know. Most of us can agree things may be a little better than this time last year (arguably worse for my family with my girlfriend losing her job) but ultimately his first year has been a bit underwhelming. Nevermind the government really doesn't have much money left to spend.

Ultimately, do you think he can he save the midterms tonight? Does he even realize where he went wrong?

Ultimately, do you think he can he save the midterms tonight? No.

Does he even realize where he went wrong? Yes.

As far as the mid-terms go, its going to be a Republican sweep. People want jobs and non-intervention as well as some reasurance that our debt is not going to drag our nation down. Health care is probably a secondary concern over just having the ability to put food on the table. Since Obama has decided that the cart needs to go in front of the horse and also the USG can't spend its way out of the fact that we have over outsourced many of our better paying jobs, it is going to be more upon the business community and fostering a business friendly environment that is going to get the economy rolling. Pissing off the banks and the large corps is NOT how to encourage business and the economy is all people give a rats ass about. Republicans tend to traditionally be the more business savy of the bunch and some pandering to big business might vastly help if it can get people to work. Also, the issue of Gitmo and the 2 wars and all the broken promices that go along with them will wiegh in.

And yes, Obama knows what he has done wrong. He might even know there is little he can do about it other than to cave to the Pubs and try to foster some bi-partisanship by scrapping healthcare and putting his foot down on following up with what he promiced he would do. We just can't afford huge government entitlements, 2 wars and a deep recession all at the same time and how he concedes his errors and defeats to the opposition may very well decide if he gets another term or if he should just resign. If he mans up and admits to being wrong, commits to working with the Pubs and not just be the sterotypical tax and spend Liberal Democrat then he might get somewhere. Then we can get real "change" which is a politician excecuting what they said they would. His spending freezes also need to go much deeper.

So, thoughts?

I didn't intend to watch it, these days I usually just get the sound bites the next day, but we did watch most of the speech. Right now I'm enjoying listening to Fox rip it apart, and then jumping back to other stations blindly praising him.

Could not watch it. I am at work right now.

Based on the notes I saw about it...again he seems to be trying to address too much.

He nailed the speech, big time. I'll believe it when I see it though.

Would also be good to see some fact checking on some of that.

It was, like most of his speeches, beautiful to listen to - and woefully short on either cohesiveness of vision or concrete proposals. He spent the bulk of his speech making an appeal to the ideals of fair play and dignity in public discourse, openly scolding the Republicans, the Democrats, and the Supreme Court in turn for their parts in contributing to the current dysfunction of government, and the public's loss of faith in it (resulting in Justice Alito's own 'You lie!' moment, already captured on YouTube), and both opening and closing his speech by referring to the resilience of the American people and reminding the floor of what they 'deserve'. The speech started and ended with a gravity befitting the seriousness of the country's current state, but he seemed remarkably at ease and even made a few jokes during the hour and twenty minutes - he is truly a gifted orator and I could not help but notice during the latter part of the speech when he was winding up his rhetoric how much he seems to have picked up from the Reagan playbook.

That having been said...

For all that I respect both the man and his cause (and make no mistake, it is a cause, his desire to bring dignity and integrity back to the public discourse), he is taking the wrong tack in his crusade.

People have been listening to moving, dignified speeches from President Obama since he was campaigning. This one was better than most - and he was right on in calling out the systemic problems facing us both within and without the government - but his proposed solutions were small potatoes (various tax credits, not bad ideas, but not game-changing, a much-buzzed about 'freeze' which is actually for an insignificant sum and won't affect most areas of the government, an appeal to pass healthcare reform that sounded pleading and, I'm sure, reminded progressives of just how far that dream has already been sold out) and lacked the courage of his enormous claimed (and I tend to believe him) convictions.

What Barack Obama desperately needs to understand, and doesn't get, is that despite being called out, the Republicans and especially the lobbyists don't give a rat's ass about civility and sincerity in public discourse - they care about achieving their objectives, and Obama needs to understand that this is a take-no-prisoners game. If he can't, along with his ideology, sell a concrete enough vision for Joe Six-Pack to understand (and many many people have been desperately waiting for him to provide that vision because they *know* in their hearts that they've been sold a bill of goods over the last 30 years), there are others that will continue to wrap the seeds of their destruction in the American flag and fill that void. The vision Barack Obama offers is, while well-meaning, too esoteric and lacking in meat to feed the souls of the suffering, who are looking for (as are their public servant-whores) another FDR to *force* a paradigm shift, not ask politely for it over tea and hope the bullies currently running the bankrupt game agree that it might be a good idea.

He proposed a second jobs bill tonight, which people had been hoping to hear - but offered no specifics whatsoever. Most of the rest of the concrete items could have come straight out of the late Clinton or even Reagan administrations (I was actually *pleasantly* surprised to hear him advocating for nuclear power), but on the whole I felt that this was was another beautiful and dignified speech that will be swept up and forgotten along with the waste paper as the dysfunctional corporatocracy that is our government grinds on...

Regards,
Nydia

Just got home and I'm mad tired so I'll write more tomorrow, but one thing you may have noticed was the Republican side was SILENT. Some clapped sometimes, but there wasn't a single boo, hiss, or even disgruntled chatter during the speech. They must have been under pretty strict orders to keep their mouths shut after Joe Wilson's little outburst last year.

The main part that stood out to me was that the Democrats are in the majority and what a majority it is - they need to fucking do something. I hope it happens.

I would rather talk about Geithner and Paulson's grilling. How many times was it brought up about the amount and strategic placement of ex Goldman employees in the financial arms of the government? At one point Geithner's chief of staff at the NY fed was being asked about stock purchases? This whole bailout is a massive, scandalous, can of worms that is about to explode all over everyone.

So far the conspiracy theory stands as, the entire bailout of AIG was created just so that Goldman could be paid in full for all outstanding contracts with AIG, simply because Goldman has alumni everywhere in the government. They waited as long as possible to pull the trigger, hoping many competitors would fail. Unfortunately only Bear Stearns and Lehman failed before Goldman couldnt hold their breath any longer.

Another thought on the Republican party. Be careful what you wish for! So far it has been easy going just obstructing every policy. Once you ride the tide back into power later this year, you better be prepared to take action.

By action I dont mean a repeat of the last 8 years, tax cuts for the rich, 2 wars and medicare part D. Btw, what percent of the 12 trillion dollar debt have those three items contributed? 50%? Has the Bush tax cuts trickled down? Has the middle class had wage stagnation for the past 10 years?

If you want to have a turn at the wheel, you better know how to drive!

The board isn't accepting my edits again and I've enabled EVERYTHING on the page (growl). Kelraz, to answer your initial question, no, I don't think he saved the midterms - there was simply little of substance here for the disaffected masses to sink their teeth into (for good or ill). Furthermore, 'understanding' what someone is going through (however sincere), does not resonate the way 'I feel your pain' (however insincere) does. Obama's tragic flaw is that although he may have great empathy for common Americans (including those he works with ;) ), he does not really understand them.

Regards,
Nydia

On an unrelated note, I like how people assume that despite a huge majority in both houses and reasonably decent approval ratings given the high unemployment and other catastrophes, that it is a given that the Republicans will win back a significant number of seats ... because .... oh yeah, they still have absolutely nothing going for them other than obstructionism and no viable political leaders. Overall polling of most state electorates is still about the same as it was last year, other than the usual much lower predicted turnouts.

Obama may not be winning any elections for his party at the moment, but it's not like the Democrats abdicated all their seats. Pundits desperatively want to think it's 1993 all over again, but Newt Gingrich and Tom DeLay are long gone.

I'd be interested in hearing some other folks' take on the speech - and to give Obama his due, it *was* a beautiful speech, displaying honesty, humility, a reasonable amount of passion, and an strong appeal to *conscience* which is the major unifying theme of Obama's oeuvre. It's clear that he's diligently striving to win the *war* (for the Republic), but his inability to handle the concrete and dirty fighting of government may cost him as dearly as it ultimately cost Gorbachev, the last Idealist leader of a major world power in recent times. And while I hardly feel that the Democratic majority is doomed, I didn't see anything in this speech likely to halt the loss of enthusiasm his base, not to mention independents, have had with him over the last six months in particular - I did find it amusing that he called the Democrats out and reminded them that they *had* a majority and were far from helpless though ;).

Yup flowery speaches are nice. But you know what? Fuck all that. I would rather be given the straight scoop and also see our government actually soundly and undivided TACKLE one issue at a time as a team as opposed to this constant monkey shit fight going on at Capitol Hill. Hopefully the ones that matter most. Like getting people to work. Actions always speak louder than words and so far, yah not much action going on. Fuck healthcare until that is addressed. If you starve to death or freeze in the street does it honestly matter if you can afford health insurance? Save that for later. Don't take it off the stove but back burner it. Perhaps the Republicans will kill it off later (which they will if they have their majority in November) but then hey...they will have to answer to the people on that one and if that is what the majority of the people want then you can't fault the Pubs.
Malse, perhaps it won't be a total coup and even if there is, Clinton survived it and so perhaps Obama can too. Ultimately though if it takes the Democratic party's majority going away just to get the Republicans back on board as a participant in government and not just a cockblock then fine. Maybe then there might...I dunno.....be something accomplished. Otherwise its just Democrats shooting for the stars, wishing for things our government can't even afford and the Republicans only offering "No" as their imput while offering no viable alternatives. In the end we need to pick a model and stick to it and have the balls to follow through. People will forgive Obama for postponment of some promices if it means he can actually deliver. People will also elect Republicans enmass if they beat him to the punch. You can bet they are plotting, scheming and rubbing their hands with fiendish glee on how they can reverse the inept state of affairs they were so intrumental in causing to begin with. If they can sell it to the people, then they win. Its a good bet they have had plenty of time to plan how to pull it off.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8474611.stm

Interesting take on it all.