Liveblog Special -- Strong? Please Tell Me The SOTU Is Strong!

Preamble. Well, here we go. I'm exhausted from work, but I have Dunkin' Donuts coffee. (Because I don't speak Fritalian.) And the crowd's filing in, so we should be close. (It's also 1952, so the clock tells me it's close, too.) All of this is fancy talk for I'm sleepy, and might not be totally coherent. But, then again, neither will the President, if recent form holds.

Hors d'oeuvres? In Baraboo, Wis., students have been banned from chanting U-S-A at sporting events? Why? Because it is now a coded message! "You suck ass" cannot be said, much less chanted repeatedly, at a high school, you see. Oh, kids. (Wait! Is it too late to pass a note to the Dems in the House?)

2000 (8 o'clock, don't you know). Game time! Laura looks nice. She always does. And the Supremes come in. Four of them, anyway.

2004. Apparently, instructions from the top: no funny stuff from the Dems tonight. We'll see. It'll be too bad if there isn't a joke or two.

2006. The word on the speech is that Iraq is getting shuffled back in the speech, for obvious reasons. People tuning in might be bent about this, to the point of throwing stuff at the TV in anger. But he's the President, and you're not. So there. Still--how exactly is he going to handle it? It'll be delicious, for sure.

2008. By the way, gang: comment box is open. If I run out of ideas, you are more than welcome to throw down. And... George W. Bush? Come on down!

2011. Nancy Pelosi reax shots. That'll be good. And he's getting to the stairs now.

2013. Nice clam clap from Steven Breyer. And nice applause for Nancy.

2015. Wait, what happened to Norwood?

2016. Not leave problems for the next generation. Ha! Cross the aisle? We'll see about that.

2018. It seems impossible to point out, from either side, that manufacturing jobs are being lost, thousands upon thousands, every month. Unemployment going down is nice, but what kind of jobs are being created?

2019. C-SPAN joke. Dorky.

2020. Why does John McCain always look like he has something up his sleeve? Because he does. Ted Kennedy looking pensive. Or sleepy. I'm with you, pal.

2022. Flexibility in education. Somewhere, teacher union bosses are gnashing teeth. Lukewarmish response from the Dems, but they pick up on the health care note.

2024. Tax deductability of health care insurance? Why do I think this is a big shell game? I get health care from work. Do I get to deduct for money I do not pay out of my own pocket? And for the uninsured? I need more on this one.

2026. Affordable care grants to the states? State legislators are licking their chops at that honey pot.

2027. Junk lawsuits. Speaking as a lawyer: bastard. Pat Leahy looks bemused.

2029. Temporary worker plan--still quite unpopular with the hard right folks, of course. But he may gets some help from the Dems on this one.

2030. Energy policy now. Which means ethanol. The Iowa caucuses have nothing at all to do with that, of course. Chuck Grassley looks like he is going to have a birthday party in his pants.

2032. 20% reduction in gas through CAFE standards? The Big Three are gonna love that. But he doesn't say the word Alaska in this speech. And good for him--he cops to global warming. That didn't take him too long.

2034. Judges should be confirmed, now. Yeah, George, that'll be the day.

2035. Here we go--terrorism.

2038. Greatest hits so far from the President. Nothing new, yet.

2041. Transitional government in 2005. More purple fingers. Then: blowback--including a giveaway in Afghanistan.

2045. "Let us find our resolve," he says. "New plan," he says. Rehash of a couple of weeks ago, pretty much.

2047. Looks like he's building an out--if the Iraqis don't come through, we can split.

2048. New recruits for terrorism? Well, you've done a good enough job of that. And if you split now, you forget 9-11. Nicely done. Jackass.

2052. Volunteer civilian service corps? What ever happened to FreedomCorps anyway?

2054. Big talk on Darfur. And also the great evil that is Minsk. (Which, admittedly, is old-school Russia. Unlike Russia, which is also, well... OK. They're old-school Russia too.)

2055. Speaking of Darfur: no mention of New Orleans tonight, thus far (and probably not at all). Maybe all of the talk in the run-up to the game on Sunday had everybody Katrinaed out.

2056. Mutumbo! Give me a finger-wag, man.

2058. Children's videos in basement. And working with John Walsh, too. That's a pairing you don't hear about a lot.

2100. And Lynne Cheney's a hero too! No, wait... he's wrapping up.

2102. And the state of the union is strong! Yes! We get it at the end. It was as he had to explain it first, so as not to get laughed out of the room.

Postamble. Nothing on Katrina, like I said. Side-stepped stem cells, too--and that one lost him the Senate, all things considered. Other than that, well, it was better than expected. Iran wasn't amped out of all proportion, but maybe he was just setting the table on that one. The Lebanon talk might be a check our Union's collective ass might be unable to cash. Health care and education? Jury's out. The budget's going to be a fight for the next few months, so you can't take too much out of this speech. In the end, though: he didn't fall flat on his face.

Pre-Webbamble. So the Democratic response is up next. Does he kick it up a notch? Should be interesting.

2115. Everyone come to Jamestown! Woo! And New Orleans! Yes!

2116. Dude has an impressive forehead, btw.

2118. Guy's talking like a normal person, it seems. Except when he extrapolates Andy Jackson to Wall Street.

2120. Show and tell! Worked for Ross Perot, right?

2122. Coming in for withdrawal. Well done, in the way he did it.

2124. "If not, we will show him the way." Kicked some butt there.

G'night. Well, that was mildly interesting. I'm beat. Time to zonk out to the soothing tones of... Chris Matthews? OK. Sleep not coming for a while. But I'm out for now. Later.

Liveblog Special -- The Bush Iraq (Wrong) Address

Preamble: The intrepid folks at Wonkette, fake name and all, got their mitts on the White House's press release / talking points, released this afternoon. And, boy, are we set up for a mindfuck tonight, ladies and gentlemen! Here are some of the key points of the plan, per that release:

The New Way Forward In Iraq

The President’s New Iraq Strategy Is Rooted In Six Fundamental Elements:

1. Let the Iraqis lead;
2. Help Iraqis protect the population;
3. Isolate extremists;
4. Create space for political progress;
5. Diversify political and economic efforts; and
6. Situate the strategy in a regional approach.

Bush GW: 0-5; 2 K, BB. I mean, it sure is a "regional approach," isn't it? Beyond that? The Iraqis can't even get a hanging in without there being sectarian bullshit, we've been helping the Iraqis protect the population to wondrous effect over the last few years, extremists are rolling, and Iraqi pols can't go more than fifty yards before they get shot at. I mean, wow.

And the details are filled with never-gonna-happens. For example:

Work with additional Coalition help to regain control of the capital and protect the Iraqi population.

"OK. Everybody left in the Coalition--hey, Poland, where you going? C'mon, sit down for a sec. Right. We need more people to go into Baghdad. We promise you won't get shot at. Much. Any takers? Anybody? Not all at once."

And then there are these equally fanciful doozies:

Increase efforts to support tribes willing to help Iraqis fight Al Qaeda in Anbar.

Yeah. This worked really well in Afghanistan. (Or, I should say, would have, if we had kept the pressure on things there and not let the Taliban recover.) Even money that any said tribes become turncoats within a year.

Key Elements Of The New Approach: Political

[snip]

All Iraqi leaders support reconciliation.

Moderate coalition emerges as strong base of support for unity government.

Oh for Pete's sake. "All Iraqi leaders support reconciliation?" The Shiites are running the show, the Kurds are running their own show, and the Sunnis are running for cover. If you can see a moderate coalition running Iraq with any kind of coherence and competence, then you should quit your job and take over for the horoscope columnists (who sucked on today's predictions--they said bad day, I got a raise).

---

So what can we gather from this? Tonight is going to be a shell game--but Bush is probably going to suck at it so hard that the American people will know where the ball is at all times.

Post-preamble: Rich Lowry over at the National Review comes in with this wish, inter alia:

He should have some pretty strong words for Iran and Syria.

OK. He's on crack. If Iran and Syria start something, what in God's name could we do at this point? Any sane conservatives out there? Oddly enough, one of the far-righties, Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), turned today. Per Andrew Sullivan:

I do not believe that sending more troops to Iraq is the answer. Iraq requires a political rather than a military solution. In the last two days, I have met with Prime Minister Maliki, with two deputy presidents and the president of the Kurdish region. I came away from these meetings convinced that the United States should not increase its involvement until Sunnis and Shi'a are more willing to cooperate with each other instead of shooting at each other.

Well then.

Well that was unexpected: Per MSNBC (TV, no link sadly, and thus no direct quote), the President will say that any mistakes that were made rest with him. That's interesting. The heads analyzing on the fly are supposing that the GOPers that abandoned the President (including Brownback, Collins, Coleman, and perhaps others) pushed his hand.

Kickoff is in a minute: are we going to get body / actual language that says "chastened," or "I hear you," or "screw you all?" Kick back and relax, guys.

2001 (CST): Katie Couric says that this is "his most important speech ever." Three words: bring back Schieffer.

2004: The President is talking about stuff that could happen. Sorry--it's happening now. And now a 9-11 / Iraq reference. Great.

2006: It's not just Baghdad and environs. We've lost a couple of outer provinces too. But anyway. He's now dictating policy to the Iraqi government. And saying the Iraqi goverment is going to do this--he apparently has faith in them. Uh-huh.

2010: Americans will have the green light to go into the hood, and Iraqis will cover us. What about this says "what the hell are you thinking?" And gaining trust from the people of Baghdad turns on (a) what part of town you're in, and (b) which brand of Islam you subscribe to. I don't know about this.

2012: Training of Iraqi troops is just about the only thing that makes sense at this point, if we are going to stick around. Other than that: a washout so far.

2013: Now he gets to Anbar province, where "we are protecting the local population." Not that it shows or anything. 4,000 more troops for this? And that would defeat al-Qaeda in Anbar?

2015: Rich Lowry called it -- Iran and Syria are getting it now. They might stick out their tongue at that one, but give it no further thought.

2016: Getting Arab states to help us? That seems like a gimmick play to me--wonderful if it comes through, but really dicey in the execution. Boise State got the miracle this year; could we get a second one here?

2018: "Democracy fighting for its life." And "bloody and violent" year ahead--a hedge, that. Oh: "no surrender on a battleship." They were talking about this pre-game, how this militates against that whole "mission accomplished" thing.

2019: "Phased withdrawal" equals total disaster. As opposed to moderately-bad disaster, which is what we have now, I guess. Scrutiny is welcome, he says. Lieberman gets a mention--that wasn't an accident, I figure.

2021: "Talented civilians." Does that sound like a bunch of contractors? Pass.

2022: Softlight now on the troops, so it looks like he's winding up.

2023: "The author of liberty." Which is to say the Big Fella, who is getting tired of this shit, just as we are.

Postamble: Same old shit, really. We waited since the election for this turn around, and we got just about what we expected--not much, in the end.

Post-postamble: The Iranians hold a lot of keys here, don't they? If they push, they can make things even worse than they are now. They can't do it openly, but they can cause a lot of trouble just under the surface.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) is on now, calling it what Bush wouldn't: a civil war, based on "fourteen centuries" of conflict. Time for Iraqis to "stand and defend their own nation." Can they do it? Maybe not. Can we? It shows, doesn't it?

Well, that's it. I need a drink, and there's nothing useful in the fridge. Night, all.