Three critical components comprise a successful State of the Union address by a President of the United States: the Preview; the Speech; and, the Afterglow. Events worked against President Donald Trump before he ever stepped to the podium.
First, the chaos that is Iowa carried the Caucus/delegate count story that should have ended Monday night or Tuesday morning into the run-up to the State of the Union. Every major public affairs news broadcast had to cover the 62% of reported votes coming out of Iowa released just a few hours before the speech. Results that diminished a former Vice President and elevated a young mayor from South Bend, Indiana were not final nor are they determinative, but the initial results and their immediate implications dominated the news taking away attention from any State of the Union Preview.
Getting to the speech in a moment, consider what is snuffing out any possible Afterglow. First, final numbers in Iowa send the pundits scrambling to either confirm or adjust initial judgements. Then, the Senate goes into session just several hours after the speech to determine whether or not the Impeachment case presented to them by the House of Representatives necessitates removing the President from office. While removal from office is given no chance, the mere fact the vote occurs dominates the news.
With two out of the three critical components sailing into horrendous headwinds, everything rests with the speech. This put an enormous burden on a single element of the State of the Union trifecta making a chance for real impact on the long-term thinking of voters extraordinarily unlikely.
Which brings us to the speech…was anything new? No. Was it tempered politically? Yes, most of the time. Were there moving stories about guests in the gallery? Yes (even tear jerking). Was there a laundry list of great numbers? Yes, but the facts are being quickly rebutted – in fact, sitting behind the President, the Speaker was visibly shaking her head and saying, “that’s not true” during the speech. Throughout the night, the visuals were just so awkward, and the images speak volumes about the rupture between Congress and the President. Overall, delivery was good – some called it “Teleprompter Trump” – but the content gets forgotten by sunrise as Washington returns to the stories of the moment and the tweets of the day.
Summing up….SOTU 2020 has come and gone, likely to suffer a near total eclipse from the white hot political fires burning brightly throughout the land.
Craig Fuller served four years in the White House as assistant to President Reagan for Cabinet Affairs, followed by four years as chief of staff to Vice President George H.W. Bush. Having been engaged in five presidential campaigns and run public affairs firms and associations in Washington, D.C., he now resides on the Eastern Shore.
Mike Huffstetler says
Craig:
Simply because Speaker Pelosi or other Democrats in Congress claim things stated by President Trump in his SOTU to be untrue does not make that so.
I found the President’s State of the Union speech to be one of the best, if not the best, I have ever heard, and I’m not young. All of the many accomplishments stated in his speech were also accurate. Unfortunately President Trump had very little assistance from any Democrats in achieving those accomplishments, nor has the main stream media chosen to devote any coverage to those many achievements.
I found Speaker Pelosi’s action of tearing President Trump’s speech in the background at the end of such speech to be disgusting and deplorable, similar to Democratic efforts to remove a duly elected President from office using the Trump Russian Collusion Hoax and the Ukrainian Impeachment Hoax. Speaker Pelosi, Congressmen Jerry Nadler & Adam Schiff, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer are clearly no longer fit to serve in Congress.
Sadly and unfortunately I feel we will only be forced to endure more of this nonsense until voters remove a number of incompetent members of the House of Representatives & Senate. Hopefully this will occur in 2020, as President Trump is re-elected for a second term.
Fortunately, unlike Senator Romney, the majority of our United States Senators still believe in the basic due process tenet of “innocence until proven guilty” and a majority of Senators will vote in a few minutes to acquit President Trump from these two absurdly unsupportable, unproven, and unconstitutional Articles of Impeachment.
It’s time for Democrats to cease and desist their nonsensical efforts to remove a duly elected President and to instead focus on improving the livelihood of American citizens as they were elected to do.
I truly hope the Democrats in Congress can do what they were elected to do in the next 9 months. If not, the only solution is to vote them out of office in November (in the case of House members and some Senate members) and at their next re-election (in the case of Romney and other Senate members).
Carol Voyles says
Tempered politically could be a slight improvement over alternative facts. Positive movement welcomed – and fewer speeches torn.
Deirdre LaMotte says
We have a ” President” who shreds the Constitution and people are worried about Speaker Pelosi’s action? Now that is
scary.
The Medal of Freedom being given to a rich, belligerent windbag who has spewed hate for years? The same award that has always been awarded to those who have given so much, in a positive way? Wow, just wow.
Trump is slime and he has trashed our nation. Very sad many feel his reality show SOTU was entertaining. It was meant to be, sucker.