This piece in the Atlantic wonders why the 2024 presidential field is so slow to materialize. When Donald Trump gave his 2019 State of the Union address, several of the Democrats listening inside the House chamber had already declared their plans to run against him. But when Joe Biden delivers his speech tomorrow night, his only official competition will be Trump. My colleague Russell Berman wondered over the weekend, Does anyone want to be president? By the time a president gives the State of the Union address at the beginning of his third year in office, at least half a dozen people are typically already in the presidential race, Russell explained. But this year is different. Besides former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who is expected to announce her candidacy next week, the 2024 campaign is off to an extremely slow start. “This [is] what happens when you have a former president who lost reelection but still inspires fear in his party, along with a Democratic incumbent—the oldest to ever serve—who is not exactly itching to campaign,” Russell explained.
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He wielded them both “Here’s my message to all of you out there: I have your back,” President Joe Biden told Americans in his second State of the Union Address. Biden’s 2022 SOTU audience topped 38 million. His speech Tuesday night would be his most-watched of the year. He might not be able to match the right’s 24-hour disinformation networks for daily screen time, but for 75 minutes last night he had as much of the nation’s attention as he would have this year. He knew it and he used it. Democrats cheered. Republicans, many of them, jeered. Their style is their only substance. Biden brought both. If he meant to contrast his administration with his opposition’s chaos, he succeeded famously. “Biden made perhaps the best speech of his presidency,” tweeted The New Yorker‘s Susan Glasser.
No agenda except trolling I missed this observation but Marcy didn’t: Former House Speaker Nacny Pelosi told CNN that the GOP heckling during the State of the Union Address was “showbiz” to cover putting Medicare and Social Security “on the table.” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) told reporters after the SOTU that he considers Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) “a sick puppy” who had no business being there. Cameras caught their exchange on the House floor but not the dialogue. It’s who they are. It’s all they have left. Talk about waste, fraud, and abuse, we’re paying their salaries.
I use an eBike to commute 2.5 miles to work most days. It is faster than driving and parking, and much cheaper than Uber/Lyft. A few details: Uber/Lyft costs $12 each way, so $5/mile Uber/Lyft takes 20 minutes: 10 minutes … Continue reading
State of the Union preview. I go off on a tangent. It’s tonight at 9:00 p.m. ET. Pfeiffer: Tonight, Joe Biden will stand before Congress and the nation to give what will almost certainly be his most important speech of 2023. Last year, 38 million people tuned in to watch President Biden deliver his constitutionally mandated report on the state of the union. A similar number will watch tonight’s speech. Absent a major national event on par with the Space Shuttle Challenger crash or the operation to take out Osama Bin Laden, the audience tonight will be more than ten times larger than that of any other speech Biden will give this year. The speech will also receive a ton of press attention. It has already been the subject of approximately one million thumb-sucking think pieces. The State of the Union really is a tradition like no other. The State of the Union is also a weird speech. It’s a grand venue with a big audience in the room and across the nation. Even the least presidential Presidents look somewhat presidential giving the speech. In many ways, the State of the Union is a high-floor, low-ceiling speech.
You mean not start with hostility? Efforts to reform policing in this country usually involve reworking the training, more of it, eliminating qualified immunity, or technical solutions like body cameras. Mona Charon offers a novel start at police reform that requires politeness. The first thing the Memphis “Scorpion Unit” did when it stopped Tyre Nichols before beating him to death, Charon writes, was to curse at him. Over alleged reckless driving. Why? In a society as gun-saturated as ours, I can understand an order like Let me see your hands, or if the police are planning a roadside sobriety check, a request to Step out of the car. But there is no reason that both of those orders cannot be preceded by Sir or Please or both. Our judicial system is founded on the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Yet our police interactions with citizens too often seem grounded in the opposite assumption. Obviously, in the Nichols’ case, the profanity was the least of the offenses the cops (and others) committed, but it seems that some police lapse into profanity with citizens regularly.
Aaron says this is Trumpesque, which it is on one level. But really, this is Viktor Orban all the way: Note the Orwellian “Truth” running behind him.It’s very creepy. Orban’s method of media dominance probably wouldn’t work here in the US with our media system but the intent is the same. And I could easily see President DeSantis trying some of these tactics. If they can simultaneously weaken the judiciary some of them could work: As Orbán has consolidated his grip on Hungary, his control of the media is now nearly absolute. In 2010, he cut all state advertising funds to critical news outlets and threatened to sever contracts with private advertisers that continued to support targeted media. The following year, he established a Fidesz-controlled media council with the power to levy bankrupting fines against news outlets that did not favor the Fidesz worldview. Hit on all sides by financial attacks, independent and opposition media began to fail just as news media across the globe were struggling financially to adapt to the online world.
I think we can all name quite a few people like this. But it really does define the Republican party these days. I don’t think that all narcissists are fascists but it’s almost certain that all fascists are narcissists.
It’s that time again … Yes, we are hearing all sorts of rumbling hat Biden needs to step aside for the next generation because he can’t beat DeSantis/Trump/whomever and the Democrats need new leadership. This always happens and it won’t make a bit of difference in the end. If Biden wants to run he will run and he will win the nomination because he’s the incumbent. JV Last with a helpful reminder: It’s worth remembering that the in-party frequently has doubts about the prospects of the incumbent. For instance, here are some headlines from 2010-2011: This is a dance we do. How often? Buckle up for some history, courtesy of Pew and National Journal: Drink that in. (1) Obama, Clinton, and Reagan were all < 50 percent on “should they run for reelect.” (2) The only two presidents who were > 50 percent were the two who ultimately lost reelection. It’s out of our hands. If Biden wants it it’s his no matter what. If he doesn’t want it then let the games begin. But there’s no point in wringing our hands over it. *And yes, if he drops dead before the election then the deck is scrambled.
It’s hard to believe that Sarah Huckabee Sanders is now a Governor but that says it all about today’s Republican Party. She’ll be giving the State of the Union rebuttal, a slot reserved for the GOP’s “rising stars.” Huffington Post gathered a list of Sarah’s lies and outrageous rhetoric as press secretary just to remind you all of what qualified her for her new prestigious post: During Sanders’ two-year tenure as the press secretary for Donald Trump’s White House, stint as a Fox News commentator and new job as Arkansas’ Republican governor, Sanders has earned a reputation among her critics for lying with ease ― something she’s admitted under oath to doing ― and fiercely defending Trump’s most offensive behavior.