SOTU: Biden’s style and substance

Created
Thu, 09/02/2023 - 01:00
Updated
Thu, 09/02/2023 - 01:00
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. “The heckling from Republicans only helped make his points.” Biden ran through a list of his administration’s accomplishments to date: a record number of new jobs, Covid tamed, new infrastructure funded, the Electoral Count Reform Act, the Respect for Marriage Act, computer chip factories underway, a 50-year low in unemployment, including for Black and Hispanic workers. Made in America, etc. “We’ve got to finish the job” was a recurrent them. Speaker Kevin McCarthy asked Biden ahead of time not to use past divisive language like “extreme MAGA Republicans.” He didn’t. But Biden wasn’t there to play beanbag either. He threw punches. He knew the MAGAs would be there and he anticipated heckling. When Biden…