9:02 PM: Yep, just watching these folks walk in like you.
9:03 PM: Rather amazing, all three members of the conservative faction (Thomas, Scalia and Alito) on the Supreme Court chose not to attend tonight.
9:05 PM: Off to a promising start, Rep. Randy Weber (R-TX) starts the evening calling President Obama a “socialistic dictator.”
9:11 PM: As you may know, each State of the Union there’s a designated survivor chosen from the President’s cabinet. Basically, if something truly awful happened and everyone in the chamber died, that one surviving member of the Cabinet would assume the Presidency. Today it’s Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. So they’ve got him tucked away at some undisclosed location.
9:17 PM: If you want to follow along at home here’s the full text of the President’s speech.
9:20 PM: Okay, not being sarcastic about this. But Speaker Boehner looks seriously fried. Like red. Like not orange but seriously red. Like maybe 30 hours in the sun or something. Is it my TV or are you seeing the same thing?
9:27 PM: GOP Reps and Senators rush to get pictures taken with Duck Dynasty star. Pix.
9:30 PM: Mitch McConnell should love this part of the speech on Obamacare …
And if you want to know the real impact this law is having, just talk to Governor Steve Beshear of Kentucky, who’s here tonight. Kentucky’s not the most liberal part of the country, but he’s like a man possessed when it comes to covering his commonwealth’s families. “They are our friends and neighbors,” he said. “They are people we shop and go to church with…farmers out on the tractors…grocery clerks…they are people who go to work every morning praying they don’t get sick. No one deserves to live that way.”
Steve’s right. That’s why, tonight, I ask every American who knows someone without health insurance to help them get covered by March 31st. Moms, get on your kids to sign up. Kids, call your mom and walk her through the application. It will give her some peace of mind – plus, she’ll appreciate hearing from you.
9:38 PM: Presidents are always snappy during SOTUs. But Obama seems particularly pumped and forceful. Maybe more than I’ve heard him recently and more than the sense of malaise around his presidency would seem to suggest? Again, presidents don’t come to these things droopy. But it’s just the feel I get about this one.
9:40 PM: I must be out of the loop on this. But what’s the “reforming unemployment insurance” about? Here’s the reference …
I’m also convinced we can help Americans return to the workforce faster by reforming unemployment insurance so that it’s more effective in today’s economy. But first, this Congress needs to restore the unemployment insurance you just let expire for 1.6 million people.
Nothing and I mean nothing gets into a SOTU address by chance. There’s a story there. A reader on twitter flags this policy paper from Council of Economic Advisors from 2012. Perhaps this is what he’s referring to?
9:54 PM: Okay, that’s what I call quality White House speechwriting research.
9:56 PM: The Kentucky example is really a great thing. A sign of what political leaders really interested in helping ordinary citizens can accomplish.
10:00 PM: Okay, I’m going to be hearing that line from twitter trolls for six months about how Obama’s signaling mass gun confiscation by executive order.
10:05 PM: “America must move off a permanent war footing.” … “That’s why, working with this Congress, I will reform our surveillance programs – because the vital work of our intelligence community depends on public confidence, here and abroad, that the privacy of ordinary people is not being violated.”
10:17 PM: Man, some things just kinda bust through your cynicism.
I mentioned during the speech that the President seemed to have a bit more jump in his step than I expected, perhaps more than the dented poll numbers and sense of malaise hanging over the White House would suggest. The mere words of the speech are here. But the words of a State of the Union speech are like a libretto which is seldom the real essence of an opera or symphony. That’s the score.
What was the music the President was playing?
NY1 is reporting that Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) physically threatened one of its reporters during a post-State of the Union interview in the Capitol.
Just out from the Bergen Record …
Governor Christie’s brother, Todd Christie, and two business partners have bought and sold a handful of properties within walking distance of the PATH station in Harrison, slated for a $256 million renovation funded by the Port Authority and championed by the governor, records show.
Rep. Michael Grimm, the Staten Island Republican, has released a statement about tonight’s incident in the Capitol in which he reportedly told a NY1 reporter, among other things: “I’ll break you in half. Like a boy.” Here’s the statement, according to NY1:
NY1 reporter Michael Scotto describes being threatened by Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) following the State of the Union.
What am I missing?
When a sitting member of Congress tells a reporter he’s going to “throw you off this fucking balcony”, with a menacing affect, in a place where the balconies are high enough that you could totally do a Sopranos style execution, isn’t that the kind of thing that body has to take some cognizance of? Like a reprimand or a censure? I mean, Congress is at a low pass. But this isn’t the Sopranos.
I guess fear of prison make a guy crazy.
TPM Reader PA says we need to put more focus on diction in understanding the Rep. Grimm story …
You really should start using the correct term for Grimm’s threat against the reporter: defenestration.