The State of the Union
In a Word, Lousy

By: Bryan Zepp Jamieson

Back in the nineties, it used to be fun watching Republicans during Clinton's SOTU speeches. Clinton would quite often leave the teleprompter, and wing it for five or ten minutes at a time, presenting a dazzling array of knowledge and statistics, and never, ever making a mistake. It was a virtuoso performance by a political master, and the more adversity Clinton faced, the better and more stirring he became, and the longer the Republican faces grew.

I could understand how they felt. Back in the decade before, Reagan could also take his political opponents and make them his bitch on the last Tuesday in January. He often enjoyed a bounce in the polls of five or ten points, even as such catastrophes such as Beirut, Iran/Contra, and the Challenger explosion swirled about him.

Such a gift for seizing the opportunity has not been vouchsafed to our boy George. Oh, they have worked with him on his delivery, polishing it a bit. I noticed that his habit of pausing after each recitation, and gazing about the chamber with that trademark smirk had been quite reduced. Last year, when he was still milking 9/11 for all it was worth, a lot of people noticed that smirk and wondered, many for the first time, if there was any link at all between the man's words and his inner thoughts and feelings, if any.

I noticed that the Congressional response was, by SOTU standards, lackadaisical. One reason Presidents love the SOTU is that not only do they get the biggest television audience of the year (outside of national emergencies and tragedies), but they do so in front of a audience where at least 40% of the participants are going to cheer him even if he spins around and drops his trousers.

Putsch started out on the right track, playing to his party, lauding tax cuts and how the rich were to American happiness.

Announcers dutifully noted that he had received 75 "ovations" during his speech. If that seems a little low, it is. Most Presidents break 100, and Clinton often got 125 (Granted, Clinton was a windbag who often went for 80 or 100 minutes, too). Even more disconcerting to his handlers is that none of the ovations went more than 30 seconds, and only a few seemed to have any real enthusiasm.

The fact is that Putsch didn't give the Republicans much to cheer about. In hopes of boosting interest, the White House had leaked a report to the dutiful media that Putsch would be disclosing new and damning information about the situation in Iraq. That backfired. He didn't. Instead, it was the usual laundry list of complaints that the administration has been making, complaints given, as always, without hard evidence, and laced with absurdities and glaring omissions. One of the more absurd claims was that Saddam was blocking U2 flights over Iraq. How's he doing that, George? The man barely has the capability to shoot down a kite. Missing from George's exposition of damning evidence was the one that was entrenched most firmly in the public's minds; the "chemical weapon casings" which turned out to be nothing more than 122 mm artillery shells.

He spent the first half of his speech on domestic issues, largely omitting discussion of the economy save only to proffer it as a rationale for... ta da... faster and bigger tax cuts! Republicans cheered, but it wasn't very wild applause. I suspect a lot of them are hearing from their constituents, and a lot of them are dismayed to learn that most of their constituents oppose the tax cuts Putsch has proposed.

One of the more cynical moments came when he spoke in favor of developing hydrogen fueled cars. This is the same man who eliminated federal funding for that very purpose. The motive was obvious; he had to say something to show that he wasn't just a puppet of big oil. It didn't work.

On medical care, he reaffirmed his notion that the elderly should get prescription coverage, but only if they drop out of Medicare and enrol in an HMO. He managed the neat trick of doing this without mentioning the magic letters:"HMO". (In a hilarious sequel, Bill Frist, appearing in the friendly confines of Faux News, was asked if the plan meant seniors had to join HMO'. He replied firmly: "It means they are being given a choice." That undescribed "choice" being "join an HMO or no prescription coverage". But Bill, part-owner of a major HMO and familiar with the public perception of them, wasn't about to say that particular combination of letters either.

One of the more awkward moments came when he talked about increasing funding for drug addiction care by $600 million, which he claimed would save 300,000 addicts over three years. (Let's see, that works out to about $40 per addict per week. Wow, must be some program.) It became clear that he was talking about giving the money to churches and religious "rehab clinics" where various god-struck sorts would presumably pray at the addicts and make them all better. A lot of Republicans looked like they wished they didn't have to choose between being this type of Christian, or being Americans, loyal to the Constitution. The applause was noticeably attenuated and strained.

He made the arresting assertion that "al Qaida isn't a problem any more" claiming that they had rounded up most of the important members. (No trials - you would think he would want the captives in the news to show that something was being done about terrorism, but apparently that isn't the case). Then he spent the next 25 minutes talking about how America had to continue to be vigilant, be strong, and throw away all freedoms in the fight against terrorism.

He got the most applause when he praised American virtues, both real and imagined. Playing to the audience for cheap claps, and that's what he got, and most viewers probably sensed it. He actually described America as "gods' gift to the world". No, really. I'm not making that up.

After the speech, I grinned and went over to Faux News. If any outfit stood prepared to make a silk purse out of this sow's ear of a speech, it would be Rupert Murdoch's boys.

Fred Barnes was game, as were his guest commentators, but it was pretty obvious that Putsch had given them little to be happy about. Fred remarked about how detailed the speech was, and how he seemed to have a wide array of facts and figures at his fingertips (no further away then the teleprompter, anyway), a remark that always caused marveling when talking about Clinton. Here, it just reminded everyone that Putsch was no Clinton.

I then went over to C-Span and listened to the call-ins for a bit. Normally, right wingers swamp the lines after a significant even like the SOTU, but this time, they seemed muted. Most of the callers didn't agree with Putsch's speech, and those that did were reduced to the right wing boilerplate of injured outrage that the right wing is always ready to manufacture when they can't think of anything concrete to say. Democrats hate America first, Saddam is a madman who only wants to kill us all, and we need to get terrorists or lose. Yeah.

They didn't have anything to say about any of the elements of the speech, though.

By morning, there probably will be a flood of praise from the right for the speech, one that will avoid specifics, and people will still be asking: "Why are we going to war with Iraq?" and "How does handing over the national treasure to the super rich benefit the country any?"

For some reason, Putsch didn't address those particular questions.

Whatever it was his handlers set out to do tonight, they failed.