Last Exit

Tonight's State of the Union address is basically the last exit on the politics highway before the bridge to the 2016 election.  Official announcements will start soon (Barack Obama announced in February 2007) and once one serious candidate announces, everything after that is about the election.  That's not to say this speech will have nothing to do with the 2016 election, but it's the last big political thing that isn't entirely about the 2016 election.  So, if you hate elections, this is pretty much it for you.

I watched most of the pre-speech coverage on MSNBC, just out of nostalgia for when they used to actually be a news network, but I managed to switch to Fox long enough to witness O'Reilly and John Stossel having a fair and balanced debate about whether or not the President (and his wife, for some reason) are true believers in socialism or if they're just dirty liars about it for political gain.  Bill thinks they're true believers.  I think Stossel's point was that it doesn't matter because what they want to do won't work either way.  Glad to see Fox hasn't changed.  Bill teased his next segment, which was about how you're not allowed to criticize Beyonce.  The inside of Bill's mind must be terrifying.

I switched to CNN for five seconds and their breaking news at the bottom of the screen was that Barack Obama was going to leave the White House.  Not that he had left the White House, but that he was going to.  Glad CNN figured that out for us.  I have to go back to MSNBC now because I just feel sad for CNN.  It's like how old baseball writers always talk about Willie Mays limping around in a Mets' uniform.  I don't want to remember you this way CNN!

I almost decided not to do this again this year, and after just about 20 minutes of cable news I'm already regretting my decision to do it.  We had better just get started.

8:53PM - 6 of the 9 Supreme Court justices just walked in.  The other three are apparently way too busy and can't be bothered with this kind of nonsense.  I'd like to criticize them for being childish and petty, but I think if I was a Supreme Court justice I'd want to be one of the justices who's too cool for the State of the Union.

8:57PM - I swear I just saw Paul Ryan do the John Cena "you can't see me" gesture.  You probably think that's ridiculous and there's no way it happened, but I know what I saw.

8:59PM - Rachel Maddow on the Supreme Court: "They're all wicked old".  Did someone give Rachel a "be less smart and more folksy" note at some point?  You're from Massachusetts, we get it.

9:00PM - MSNBC just gave us a 6 second shot of a pencil on a desk.  Apparently Congress will be waiving them to express support for freedom of expression.  Congress is super into freedom of expression, as long as you're mocking gods they don't really believe in.

9:06PM - Here comes the Prez.  I would love to see the President just walk in and not shake any hands one year.  He could start the speech with "I'm here to give a speech, not shake hands with dumbasses".  These are the things that would entertain me.

9:11PM - We're starting with a quick recap of the first 15 years of the 21st century.  They've been....less than optimal.  But guess what everybody?!?  We're turning the page now!!!  YAY!!!

9:13PM - "Our combat mission in Afghanistan is over".  He added "I mean, ya know, sort of, for now at least".  Then he used the phrase "this 9/11 generation".  Can that not be a thing?  Please?

9:14PM - If you had "strong" for the state of the union, you win the pool.  If you had anything else, you really haven't watched one of these before, have you?

9:15PM - We just got a clear "woo" for "an economy where only a few of us do extremely well".  Who let Mitt in here?

9:17PM - The lady standing next to Michelle Obama is named Rebecca, and she's pretty adorable.  Apparently she goes to community college and her husband works in construction.  I'm not sure how that got her next to the First Lady at the State of the Union, but she seems super likable so it's fine I guess.

9:20PM - I had to switch to Fox because MSNBC's stupid real time polls are blocking the bottom third of the screen.  The question they're asking is "Do you agree with what the President is saying?"  What does that even mean?  He's mostly just stating facts right now.

9:21PM - The title of this section of speech would most accurately be "I fixed the economy and if you idiots try to pass something that will break it again I will veto the shit out of that bill".

9:22PM - "We need to set our sets higher than making sure that government doesn't just screw things up".  You gotta walk before you run though, right?  Can we try not screwing things up first and see how it goes?

9:23PM - Rebecca's kids are named Jack and Henry.  Jack is a solid name.  I'm not wild about Henry, but I think it works in Minnesota.

9:25PM - George W. Bush left hundreds of post-its with Presidenting advice lying around the White House.  The one Barack actually listened to?  Call people folks a lot.  Folks love when you call them folks.

9:27PM - Obama says child care isn't a "women's issue", it's a national economic priority.  The Republicans seem to disagree.  They aren't big fans of paid sick leave either, and don't even get them started on equal pay for women.

9;29PM - We've reached the point in the night when Democrats applaud loudly for raising the minimum wage and Republicans try hiding under their desks.

9:31PM - The President is talking about better job training for American workers.  I know for a fact that he told Joe Biden to take care of that during last year's speech.  Great job Biden!  You suck so hard!

9:32PM - The President wants to lower the cost of community college to $0.  Republicans are a no on that for some reason.  I'm a no on that too, because I work at a non-community college and I need money to buy food.  I feel like free community college might impact my earning power a bit.  Do all the Republicans work at non-community colleges too?  I never see them at conferences.

9:34PM - Wait, now the President says Biden did do some hard work on job training.  Well then why isn't it fixed yet?  What else is Biden doing?

9:36PM - We seem to be in the middle of a multi-part economic plan.  You know what voters love more than anything?  Multi-part economic plans.  Just ask Mitt Romney, or John Kerry.

9:39PM - Seamless transition from curing cancer to protecting a free and open internet.  I feel like both of those things are important, but one is clearly more important.

9:40PM - He just did a solid minute on the space program.  Just because Congress is too stupid to understand the space program doesn't mean the rest of us shouldn't get to have one.  He should have said that.  Why can't I write for the President?

9:43PM - Uh oh.  It's foreign policy time.  Everybody get your spare pair of pants ready.

9:45PM - Looks like the pencil waiving was isolated to one lady.  I couldn't tell for sure from the camera angle, but that's what it looked like.

9:46PM - Every time one of these guys talks about supporting the moderate opposition in Syria I'm compelled to ask this question.  Have we just not been writing things down for the last 50 years?  Is it not possible for us to access the history of what happens when we back the lesser of two evils in an unstable country in the middle east?  What could possibly convince us that it will work out great this time?

9:48PM - On Cuba "when what you're doing doesn't work for 50 years, it's time to try something new".  Marco Rubio countered "Oh come on!  Just like 20 more years and I swear it'll work!"

9:50PM - The President sure has said the word veto a lot tonight.  This is going to be a feisty couple of years.  And by feisty, I mean gridlocked and pointless.

9:52PM - Biden and Boehner look positively frosty tonight.  I'm assuming they were taking turns insulting each other's moms and then Biden took it too far because you're not supposed to call Boehner's mom fat because she has a glandular problem and it's NOT FUNNY!

9:54PM - On climate change, the President says it's OK if you're not a scientist, you just have to listen to scientists.  But what about that one scientist Fox News found who says climate change isn't real and that opinion has nothing to do with the six figure consulting fee he gets from the coal lobby?  What about him???

9:57PM - "It's time to close GTMO".  Yeah, but we're not going to, sooo....

10:00PM - I feel like openly arguing with political pundits during the State of the Union address is a misguided effort.

10:02PM - Standing ovation from Democrats for same-sex marriage.  Look at them growing some balls once the polls show a position is overwhelmingly popular.  I can't wait for Hillary Clinton to tell me again how she evolved.

10:03PM - I think seven years in is a little late for "a better politics" and "appealing to common decency".  I don't know if you heard buddy, but there's an election coming up.  There will be no decency.

10:06PM - Hey!  I haven't seen Cory Booker once tonight.  Is it maybe because he's too busy buying plane tickets to Iowa?  Booker 2016!

10:07PM - "I have no more campaigns to run...I know because I won both of them".  For the 100th time, condescending and sarcastic Obama is by far my favorite Obama.

10:10PM - Coming in for a landing and we go back to Rebecca one more time.  I'm a big fan of Rebecca.

While we wait for one of the five (you heard me) Republican responses, here's a quick list of things that seemed to mostly get left out of the speech, except for maybe a vague reference (I apologize if I'm wrong about any of these, I admit I drifted away a couple of times):

-Wall Street reform
-Gun control
-Police shooting unarmed citizens
-The fact that it's 2015 and we don't have hoverboards yet
-Al Qaeda
-Russia

I actually give the President some credit for the last one.  Hard to resist kicking Putin while he's down.

I mentioned five Republican responses.  I'll be watching the official Republican response from Joni Ernst, which I'm not looking forward to.  There will also be one from the tea people, one in Spanish, one from Rand Paul and one from Ted Cruz.  Rand can get away with that because nobody agrees with Rand on everything and he can only really represent himself.  Cruz is just a malignant narcissist.
So, Joni Ernst started by first pointing out that while we may not always agree, it's good to hear other points of view.  I see she was in the debate club in high school.  Then, she openly admitted that she has no interest in actually responding to the President's speech, which is annoying because what she's doing is literally called a response, but it's also refreshing, because at least she's admitting it.

Joni Ernst only had one good pair of shoes growing up.  It's a good old-fashioned Republican poor-off!  Later Ted Cruz will tell you about his great-grandpa who was a turd miner in Cuba.

Apparently Republicans are going to start calling the Keystone pipeline the Keystone jobs bill.  Shit that's good.  Damn you Frank Luntz!

Give Joni Ernst some real credit.  Giving a nationally televised speech while staring directly into the camera in an empty room after the other guy just gave his speech in a huge and full room is a crappy job, and I'd say she did it pretty well.  She's a Republican, so a lot of what she said was silly nonsense, but still, she said it pretty well.

Another Round

You have to think the President is getting bored with this whole State of the Union thing.  You know at least once in the last week he sarcastically asked someone if he really has to do this every year.  I suggest he try breaking it up a little with some insult comedy:

"Good evening everybody...look at you weirdos.  I kid, I kid, but seriously folks, it's great to be here.  Paul Ryan's here tonight, give him a hand everybody.  Man looks like a muppet!  Haha, I kid Paul.  And Nancy Pelosi is here.  Nancy, why are you giving me the crazy eyes?  Oh that's right, that's just your face!  Zing!  I kid Nancy, she's the best..."

Here are some highlights from the pre-game:
1) Chris Matthews got through a whole sentence without saying the words Chris Christie.
2) Apparently there will be four Republican responses to tonight's speech.  Four.  Including one unsolicited response from Rand Paul on behalf of just Rand Paul.
3) Bill O'Reilly was yelling at someone.
4) Cory Booker arrived.  Booker 2016!!!

Most importantly, the President is going to announce that he's raising the minimum wage for government contractors.  That's fantastic.  You can't fix the whole economy by raising the minimum wage, and you certainly can't fix it by raising the minimum wage for just one group of people (though it is a big group), but the President, as the CEO of the federal government, is acting as a responsible employer.  Leadership by example, it's still a thing.

If the President is going to complain about Congress not doing anything (and I suspect he will continue to do that), then he has to be willing to do the things that he can do.  This is an example of a thing he can do and he deserves a lot of credit.  Especially since this wasn't some candy-ass 25 cents an hour raise. The minimum wage for government contractors is going up to $10.10 an hour.  That's not exactly ski trip money, but it might actually let people afford food every day.  I'm sure the Republicans will object.

And no, that isn't a cheap shot at Republicans.  If you oppose a raise in the comically low minimum wage while also supporting cuts to food stamps, then you don't give a shit about poor people being able to feed themselves.  Some things are really complicated, this isn't one of them.

9:04PM: The President's Cabinet has been entering the chamber for roughly 7 hours now.

9:05PM: Matthews says New York Congressman Peter King may run for President.  Please no.  I realize Peter King is what passes for a moderate Republican these days, but I promise you, he's still a crazy person.

9:06PM: By the way, I'm watching on MSNBC tonight just to see if they find ways to work Chris Christie into the actual speech.  I may switch over to CNN a few times just to check out whatever silly nonsense they're doing with graphics.

9:09PM: MSNBC has Al Sharpton on the pre-show panel, because that's necessary.  Also, it's 9:09PM and I'm still listening to the pre-show panel.  One year this speech is just going to be an hour and a half of people entering the chamber and then the Speaker saying goodnight.

9:10PM: Here comes the Prez!  Why is Eric Cantor always right behind him?  It makes me nervous.

9:11PM: The President is dishing out some pretty aggressive handshakes.  If you've got a hand, the President is going to shake it.

9:15PM: We started off with heart touching stories about hypothetical Americans doing hypothetical good things.  Today in America, the President stood up before Congress and said things that were probably true.

9:22PM: When the President says he's building ladders of opportunity into the middle class, that's not a metaphor.  Congress will only fund him for ladders, so the President is going to send you one and you can do whatever you want with it to try and make more money.

9:24PM: The President just spent a minute praising someone in the audience named Michelle Obama.  I wonder if he knows her.  I know a certain President who's getting laid tonight.

9:25PM:  Boehner isn't wearing an American flag pin!  Why isn't he being arrested and questioned?

9:26PM: Closing loopholes in the tax code you say?  Man, that's a great idea! Why hasn't anyone thought of that before?

9:27PM: The Republicans will clap for anything they don't have to do.

9:29PM: Did you know that small business owners are the greatest people in the history of the Universe?

9:30PM: Quick shot of David Vitter looking bored.  The State of the Union address is the longest amount of time each year that he has to go without a prostitute.

9:32PM: Biden and Boehner are exchanging fart jokes while the President talks about natural gas.

9:37PM: I swear I could watch Biden and Boehner for hours and never get bored.  The President just said he's appointing Biden to do something about job training.  Biden responded by looking at Boehner and shrugging his shoulders, then they both laughed about it.  What were they saying?  I have no idea, but I bet it was unintentionally hilarious.

9:38PM: After disarming everyone by mentioning Biden, the President quickly hammered Congress for cutting off long term unemployment insurance.  But the Congress has a good point here, unemployed people don't need money.  Food and housing are free, right?

9:43PM: The President points out that last year he asked Congress to make pre-K education available to everyone, and he's asking this year, because that shit didn't happen last year, and it isn't going to.  To be honest, I still don't see the appeal.  I think I learned to count in nursery school, but I suspect I would have figured that out on my own eventually.

9:46PM: "a mother deserves a day off to care for a sick child...and a father does too".  Look at the President being all gender inclusive and shit.  Next year he's going to try saying that line without it sounding like he almost forgot to add the part about the father and then just barely remembered it at the last second.

9:49PM: Here comes the part about raising the minimum wage.  This is such a no-brainer, but still only gets a sarcastic smirk from Boehner.  It's really a shame that both parties can't at least get together on this.  If you wonder why people are so cynical about government, this is a perfect example.  535 eight year olds could agree on raising the minimum wage, but that's only because there are no eight year old lobbyists....yet.

9:55PM: The President is openly challenging Republicans to come up with a health care reform idea of their own, and mocking their 40+ repeal votes.  Sarcastic and slightly mean Obama is by far my favorite Obama.

9:58PM: The President is in favor of calling your mom.  In about an hour, tea party Republican Mike Lee will tell you why calling your mom is an un-American part of the liberal feminazi agenda.

10:00PM: Congress will do anything they can to stop gun violence, as long as it doesn't in any way involve gun control.  I've come around to the sad conclusion that it's more likely Congress will fund buying a bullet-proof vest for every American than it is that they'll actually do something about guns, and I think the President has too.  He didn't hang around on gun control for too long.

10:03PM: Allow me to summarize the foreign policy part of every State of the Union since about 2002: "something something men and women in uniform...clap clap clap...ever vigilant...clap clap clap...ending whatever war we're currently fighting...clap clap clap...diplomacy...clap clap clap...nuclear and chemical weapons are bad...clap clap clap...Israel non sequitur...clap clap clap".

10:09PM: We seem overly concerned about Iran.  The President spent 15 seconds talking about gun violence in America, and half of that was Democrats clapping.  He spent at least 4 minutes talking about Iran.  Do you think Iran is 16 times more important then thousands of Americans being killed by other Americans?  I don't.

10:14PM: Republicans are all about helping veterans as long as they don't have to help them buy food.

10:16PM: I think we're coming in for a landing here, we've reached the touching human interest story part of the speech.  I'll give the President some credit though, he's not talking about some clown who opened a small business, he's talking about a veteran who appears to have had a hole blown in the side of his head.  Now that's a guy you point to during a speech!  That dude literally gave large pieces of himself for his country.  He got a two minute standing ovation.  Well deserved.

10:20PM: Chris Matthews immediately declared the speech "masterful".  Quick switch to Fox and the first word I heard from Charles Krauthammer was "embarrassing".  Cable news is fun.

10:26PM: I'm going to try and stick around for the Republican response, being given by Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, who I have literally never heard of.  Apparently she's the highest ranking Republican woman in the House, so that's partially my bad.  But it's also partially MSNBC and Fox's bad because I watch a ton cable news and I've never once heard either network mention the highest ranking Republican woman in the House.

10:30PM: So far I've learned that Cathy McMorris Rodgers has three kids and used to work at McDonald's.  Not to be a dick, but if she was a dude would Fox feel the need to tell me how many kids she has?  Also, some guy on Fox just told me she's not the most polished speaker on Congress, which is sort of like when a guy gets picked in the NBA draft and the ESPN guys say he needs to work on his athleticism.

10:32PM: Brett Baier wouldn't shut up in time for Congresswoman Rodgers to start talking, so I missed her first sentence.  Didn't somebody tell her a man was still talking?

10:34PM: This is like some sort of middle-America nightmare speech.  I've already heard about apple picking and a county fair.

10:36PM: "Hi, I'm Cathy McMorris Rodgers and I apparently have no interest in actually responding to what the President just said so let me tell you my entire life story".

10:38PM: Republicans are working on a step by step immigration plan.  For those of you who aren't familiar with politics, that means doing all of the steps they want to do first and then forgetting about the other steps.

10:41PM: Hey, this lady seems perfectly reasonable.  Can somebody find out if she'd like to run for President?  Sure, she said god a lot, but so does every Republican.  In general, she seems not dumb and would definitely be a better option than Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio or Rand Paul.  The speech was sort of blah, but she was pretty solid.

OK, that's it.  This gets a little less fun every year, but that's only because nothing ever changes and we pretty much have the same problems every year, and that's not really my fault.