State of the Union: The biggest non-event of the year; Update: Jennifer Loven hit piece spotted! Update: Video: Jim Webb responds; Update: World’s worst anti-Bush song lyrics added!

posted at 8:38 pm on January 23, 2007 by Allahpundit
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I’ve never understood the fuss, particularly given that it’s Bush. By my count, he’s delivered exactly four memorable speeches in the past six years and only one of them is still remembered fondly: the address to Congress after 9/11, the “axis of evil” SOTU, the “Mission Accomplished” speech, and the second inaugural address. We’re looking at an hour of energy-policy wonkery, global-warming alarmism, and shopworn bromides about how crucial victory in Iraq is. What’s left to say? If it’s worth watching at all, it’s only to see at which key phrases Hillary ostentatiously rolls her eyes.

Captain Ed and Mary K are liveblogging it. You all may consider this an open thread. In the unlikely event that anything video-worthy happens, we’d of course appreciate it if you tipped us to it. In the meantime, read Barnett’s amusing Q&A, in which he attempts to convince himself — unsuccessfully — that this will be at all redeeming or useful. Or read this, which isn’t so much good news as delightful news. Or, if you’re in the mood for class warfare, read the transcript of Jim Webb’s rebuttal at Drudge. In two words: lose faster.

Here’s a left-wing comedy preview of the address, which is as tired in its own way as Bush is in his. The segment at the end with “Hillary” and “Obama” is almost amusing, though.

Update: It hasn’t started yet but Ace has already finished liveblogging it.

“He seemed uncomfortable and repeated many of the same tired slogans of the past. He proposed a raft of new spending initiatives designed primarily to win over the support of those who hate him more — much more — than Osama bin Ladin. He also basically said that Mexicans were good, nice people who deserved jobs more than Amercians.”

Update (Ian):

Reaction (Bryan): This speech was a snooze. The SOTU, with its laundry lists of government programs and we’re-here-to-help bromides, has become the most liberal moment of the year. I’m glad it’s over and my wallet is still in my possession. For now, anyway.

Still, it’s revealing that the Democrats stand up when the President mentions Darfur–where there are no US troops and won’t be any US troops–but sit on their hands when he mentions Iraq–where there are US troops and where there will be US troops fighting hard for a while to come. What possesses a group of people to take Sudan more seriously than Iraq as a crisis? What possesses a group of people to rank the importance of international crises in an inverse relationship to those crises’ effect on US national security? I already skewered one Democrat over this phenomenon last month, so I’ll just apply that post to the entire Democrat party minus Joe Lieberman. What a bunch of unserious buffoons.

I won’t stick around for Webb’s response, though, again it’s telling who the Democrats picked to deliver it. Webb has a son in Iraq, but he’s a Sheehan on the war, and is most recently famous for being rude to the President. What a guy!

Update: Barnett, having not learned his lesson about pessimism from the election, says he’s pleasantly surprised and will have something gushy first thing in the a.m.

Update: Mary K sees an inbound attack from left-wing shill/“reporter” Jennifer Loven — and intercepts it!

Update (Ian): 84% say Bush was excellent:

Update (Ian): In the Democratic response Sen. Jim Webb (VA) threatens to show President Bush “the way”:

Update: Here’s what passes for an op-ed in the New York Times these days. The bard? Randy Newman.

I’d like to say a few words
In defense of our country
Whose people aren’t bad nor are they mean
Now the leaders we have
While they’re the worst that we’ve had
Are hardly the worst this poor world has seen…

A president once said,
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”
Now it seems like we’re supposed to be afraid
It’s patriotic in fact and color coded
And what are we supposed to be afraid of?
Why, of being afraid
That’s what terror means, doesn’t it?
That’s what it used to mean

The end of an empire is messy at best
And this empire is ending
Like all the rest
Like the Spanish Armada adrift on the sea
We’re adrift in the land of the brave
And the home of the free
Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye.

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