Back in 2001, I wondered about the same thing. Why is the first address to a joint session of Congress in a new President’s term not called a “State of the Union” address? And isn’t a State of the Union message required by the Constitution every year?
I’m on the road this week (and next), so I’m short on time to find out the answers to those questions. If anyone has the answers, or any other thoughts on tonight’s address to a joint session of Congress by President Barack Hussein Obama, please feel free to share them in comments…
Update: Thanks to commenter “Jon in Iowa”, for the link to CNN’s explanation of the above questions.
Update 7:32pm PT: Minority Off!
Wow…this thing is a stem-winder!
Affordable college for everyone who serves their community or country?
Everyone’s gotta go back to school for a year?!
Two trillion dollars to be cut from government budget over the next ten years?
He ain’t kidding around…At least tonight…
“For seven years we’ve been a nation at war. No longer will we hide its price.”
Hear, hear.
CNN’s got an answer for you: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITIC...otu/index.html
Thanks, Jon. That answers the first question. Updated the original article above. But doesn’t the Constitution require a SOTU, no matter what the Prez wants to call it? Or does this count, and he can call it whatever he wants, I guess?
Thanks for being my Google! And stay warm in MN!
Actually, the article addresses that; he’s only required to address Congress about the nation’s health “from time to time,” under whatever name he likes. The modern tradition was started by Woodrow Wilson.
Ah, that’s right! “from time to time”. I recall that now. Thank you, Jon! Check’s in the mail! (From Obama, not me.)
Jindal’s response: “Republicans lost your trust, and rightly so.”
Wow. Snap!
Jindal Bells Jindal Smells Jindal Go Away ~
Bobby the more you talk the more you look like a Buffoon … Take a Que from clarence thomas …
It’s better to say nothing and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt …
GOP Rehearsing Grumpy Facial Expressions for Obama’s Speech
Gotta love Andy
Obama the new saviour. Please spare us.
LOL! My second thought after, “Who’s that guy,” was, “Damn, the Republicans are trying to ride the coattails of Slumdog Millionaire!”
Some other thoughts about tonight’s address(from a McKinney/Clemente voter, to out my bias)…
Nancy always has the best Botox job, much better than the Hollywood celebs, but tonight her eye make-up was throwing me off. It looked like she had two pairs of eyebrows.
Obama is a great orator, and a master at blowing shunshine, but the moment and phrase that jumped out at me was when he started talking about brandâ„¢ America’s® values:
The phrase “and will seek swift and certain justice for captured terrorists” seemed out of place in this context (as if capturing terrorists is an American® value), and just thrown in to sound macho to balance the un-macho “closing Guantanamo.” Conspicuous in it’s absence was how the Obama DOJ is doing everything in it’s power(and some things not in it’s power) to deny innocent people who were captured and mistaken for terrorists, their right to redress.
He then had the audacity to follow that up with his best Bush impersonation when he passionately declared:
I guess “…torture ANYMORE!” would not have sounded so tough and self righteous. Again, conspicuous is the omission that the Obama DOJ is doing all it can to prevent punishment for those high ranking government officials and their lawyers who ordered and enabled torture, and justice for those that were tortured.
And finally, I tried to play the drinking game, “take a shot of beer for every standing O,” but thankfully, I ran out of beer or I would have been a puking mess.
I was driving all day and half the night, so I just played a rerun on C-SPAN. My mother had greeted me upon my arrival with all kinds of beaming, thrilled about the Obama speech…. I said, yeah, sure, he could talk you out of your undies, but he’s not doing so well… and off I go griping about the Fourth Amendment and the Geneva Conventions and the fucking emails, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and she just waves the air and runs back to soak up the latest drama on America’s Biggest Loser.
So I come in and crank up her funky PC, update all her protections, defrag, straighten out the old broad’s scene and tune in to the big speech. I’m sitting here, zoning out in spots because I’m so sick of all his campaign speeches and mad that no one chained him to his desk, that I don’t wanna hear no more soft soapin’ hope shit, okay?
Jobs, yadda, health care, yadda, yadda, higher education, yadda, yadda, yadda… riiiiight… with money from Mars, okay? Hope, change, hope, hope, change, yadda, yadda…. Repeal the Patriot Act. Put back Posse Comitatus. Is my habeas corpus okay? [short version of my noisy gripes]
But… well… did he say they’d already found TWO TRILLION DOLLARS from programs and pork that don’t work????????
I have to go back and listen to the whole thing over again because, I could swear the president just told us we have the money to do all this stuff. Which might actually mean we will do all this stuff.
I was probably hallucinating.
In case I wasn’t, though, I might find a little more patience with him if all that is true….
[Nancy’s dress was a travesty, and her face looked as bad as her dress. She looked as though she’d been held hostage somewhere damp for about a week. And Biden didn’t look very perky either. Have they been working?]
BTW ~ Bobby, I could neva trust a guy with eyes that close togetha . . .
Jindal seemed to be doing some kind of sadistic Mr. Rogers routine. Setting up that botched Katrina Federal response scenario like it’s a bedtime story? (THAT’s a good reason to turn down stimulus money, Creepy Uncle Bobby. Now read to us from ‘Oh, the Places You’ll Sleep!’)
And did he slip in (yet another) lame, empty condemnation of the “Light Rail to Sin-Town” item that did NOT end up in the stimulus bill? Wow. Note to rising stars of the GOP: never follow Obama. You’re only making it worse.
…and better – like a really bad open mike. Carry on doing nothing. That response was so painfully awkward, so lampoon-able, I was wildly entertained.
Oh, he said they’d already found two trillion dollars the government can save over the next ten years….
I knew I was hallucinating.
99, you weren’t hallucinating. I think the context was ‘programs that are unnecessary or don’t work that if cut will save the country 2T over the next 10 years.’ And they were continuing to look. I was not particularly surprised by the number and have no doubt that this is just the uppermost peak of a mountain. I suspect that each program is pork at it’s finest and to cut any one will be a vicious fight with some Senator or Representative and the lobbyist’s that control them. Having said that, I suspect that so much waste, fraud and abuse will be easily revealed that they’ll have to give up a good chunk of it so the country will get some of it back.
It seemed to me that he made it pretty clear that he has three priorities; the economy, health care (There are serious talks going on behind the scenes at the invitation of Sen. Kennedy and they seem to be industry heavy in membership; groundwork for something is being laid.I don’t like the idea of that, it looks like big players are getting their position solidified before the rest of the ‘public’ committee even gets to the table.) and education. These things have tangential policy initiatives that play into them well like alternate energy, a renewed emphasis on science etc. but his speech didn’t leave those three major topics in any depth or a meaningful way.
I think there is room for optimism. Just chipping away at the big ticket items by getting a lot of the tangential programs implemented could make a huge difference.
Yes, the thought of real fiscal responsibility is pretty nice, and I, of course, hope for the best. I just got a little woozy there when I thought he’d pulled two trillion out of waste and fraud and failed programs to use on this other stuff. I was fried from the road and I’ve developed a ‘tude over the last few days behind some of the ugly stuff coming out of the White House; to wit: [1] no rights for Bagram prisoners, and the prison is being expanded to hold something like six times more prisoners, Amnesty having to beg him to follow Geneva and no dice; [2] the whole standing behind *’s failure to produce those emails thing; and [3] keeping up the murderating drone attacks on Pakistani civilians. All in one day.
So basically, now, after listening carefully, despite how tired I am of his quasi-hypnotic sleights of tongue, I’m at least happy that people like my mom are tickled, people who have never understood, will never understand, the foreign policy and legalistic and fascistic problems going on right in front of them. I’m happy for them. If they’re as old as my mom, especially. No sense ruining their last little while alive, but I’m beside myself wishing America would stop ruining everyone else’s time alive to line the pockets of trillionaires.
Aaaaaaaaaaggggggghhhhhhhh! 🙁
wow. how do u guys stand it- watching all that trumped up applause? watch just the 1st 2 & a half minutes & i’m sick already.
will try 2 stomach the rest when i rise. maybe i better eat 1st…
To Those of Us Who Don’t See Barack as Savior,
I’m all for raising holy hell about the continuing nonsense, hypocrisy, and lawlessness still rampant on the national scene but I would counsel(if anyone asked, which no one has)looking inward for a slightly more joyous expression as we continue the good fight.
For all Obama’s blind spots, which are significant, what an enormous sea change for the better he is. We, his complainers, know this. And please remember that he constantly invoked the public’s help in setting the agenda should he get elected. I believe he means it. So let’s use the opportunity of having a president with a brain(and that he’s not afraid to use) to hold his feet to the fire with a sense of purpose but also with a little more humor and lightness, please. I’m convinced this will increase our chances of being heard.
And now for my own complaint. I know there is no way in hell a public official could ever say this in these times but I’m sick and tired of hearing how great and noble our soldiers are. I feel terrible that they have been put in the situations they are in in Iraq and Afghanistan and so have compassion for them as suffering, struggling human beings put in an untenable position, but there just is not a hell of a lot you can be noble about about when you are involved in senseless, criminal, immoral activities like war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Because of our delicate national psyche we seem to have to pretend, even if against the wars(I realize far fewer are against the Afghan War as I am), that our boys and girls are doing a great job. This pretense helps validate unconscionable behavior and policies. The testimonies of Dahr Jamail(in his book) and of the Winter Soldiers(on their return to this country), I believe, are much closer to the mark. I wish more people would hear their words.
love,
Dave
How did you know Jon works for a large bank?
😉
It seems that the 400 billion dollar gorilla in the room is the military budget. Add to that, that the war in Iraq isn’t included in that 400 billion.
This is quite old but still relevant. Ben of Ben and Jerry’s Ice cream puts it into perspective.
http://www.truemajority.org/oreos/
Do we really NEED to be outspending the entire rest of the world combined on our military? I’m very pro- keep a strong military…. but how strong is enough? When does it become overkill or simply useless? (How effective can our military even be when they’re constrained by things like the Pakistani/Afghan border region and suicide bombers and roadside bombs in Iraq?).
Its political suicide to even MENTION cutting US military expenditures. Why hasn’t the media brought it up?
[ed note: Glad you liked the speech, Tinky, but please read our rules for commenting. Thank you. –99]
The Republicans should have to apologize constantly for the next eight years for the past eight years. Jindal had nothing to say, and should not have bothered showing that to us.