The State of the Union, 2010

It was too short. It was too long. It was a masterwork. It was a stumble. It was too hot. It was too cold. It was too partisan. It was too conciliatory. It had something for everyone. It had something that everyone could object to.

The hot topic in the blogosphere this morning is President Obama’s State of the Union message after a year in office, given last night, and I may as well add my two cents to the commentary. Rather than launch into a detailed dissection of the speech, I’ll briefly consider just two questions: a) what did President Obama accomplish last night? b) did he do what he needed to?

Last night President Obama gave a State of the Union message that could well have been given in 2006 or 2000 or 1994. If, indeed, we are in the most serious economic downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930’s, shouldn’t the State of the Union reflect that? Last night’s address was more a lecture than a speech and it maintained the temperate tone which has been characteristic of of President Obama and which I continue to appreciate. It was also the laundry list of proposals we’ve come to expect from State of the Union messages, many of which will never be heard of again.

Compare the speech with the speeches given at the end of the first year of their presidencies by presidents who found the country in economic straits similar to or even worse than those in which President Obama finds the country today.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt:

Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, Senators, and Representatives in Congress, I come before you at the opening of the regular session of the Seventy-third Congress not to make requests for special or detailed items of legislation; I come, rather, to counsel with you, who, like myself, have been selected to carry out a mandate of the whole people in or order that without partisanship you and I may cooperate to continue the restoration of our national well-being and, equally important, to build on the ruins of the past a new structure designed better to meet the present problems of modern civilization.

Such a structure includes not only the relations of industry and agriculture and finance to each other but also the effect which all of these three have on our individual citizens and on the whole people as a nation.

Now that we are definitely in the process of recovery, lines have been rightly drawn between those to whom this recovery means a return to old methods — and the number of these people is small — and those for whom recovery means a reform of many of our ways of thinking, and therefore, of may of our social and economic arrangements.

Civilization cannot go back; civilization must not stand still. We have undertaken new methods. It is our task to perfect, to improve, to alter when necessary, but in all cases to go forward. To consolidate what we are doing, to make our economic and social structure capable of dealing with modern life, is the joint task of the legislative, the judicial, and the executive branches of the National Government.

and take note of this:

Disorder is not an American habit. Self-help and self-control are the essence of the American tradition – not of necessity the form of that tradition, but its spirit. The program itself comes from the American people.

The emphasis is mine. It’s an excellent speech, strong both in rhetoric and substance, that calls not just for a change in policies but for a change of heart.

Ronald Reagan:

Seldom have the stakes been higher for America. What we do and say here will make all the difference to autoworkers in Detroit, lumberjacks in the Northwest, steelworkers in Steubenville who are in the unemployment lines; to black teenagers in Newark and Chicago; to hard-pressed farmers and small businessmen; and to millions of everyday Americans who harbor the simple wish of a safe and financially secure future for their children. To understand the state of the Union, we must look not only at where we are and where we’re going but where we’ve been. The situation at this time last year was truly ominous.

The last decade has seen a series of recessions. There was a recession in 1970, in 1974, and again in the spring of 1980. Each time, unemployment increased and inflation soon turned up again. We coined the word “stagflation” to describe this.

Government’s response to these recessions was to pump up the money supply and increase spending. In the last 6 months of 1980, as an example, the money supply increased at the fastest rate in postwar history–13 percent. Inflation remained in double digits, and government spending increased at an annual rate of 17 percent. Interest rates reached a staggering 21.5 percent. There were 8 million unemployed.

Late in 1981 we sank into the present recession, largely because continued high interest rates hurt the auto industry and construction. And there was a drop in productivity, and the already high unemployment increased.

This time, however, things are different. We have an economic program in place, completely different from the artificial quick fixes of the past. It calls for a reduction of the rate of increase in government spending, and already that rate has been cut nearly in half. But reduced spending the first and smallest phase of a 3-year tax rate reduction designed to stimulate the economy and create jobs. Already interest rates are down to 15 3/4 percent, but they must still go lower. Inflation is down from 12.4 percent to 8.9, and for the month of December it was running at an annualized rate of 5.2 percent. If we had not acted as we did, things would be far worse for all Americans than they are today. Inflation, taxes, and interest rates would all be higher.

Rhetorically, this speech was enormously strong, particularly in the center section. “Together”, repeated at the beginning of seven successive sentences, is an example of the device known as anaphora and it is used effectively in this speech to convey a sense of common commitment.

That’s a feature shared by both the Roosevelt and Reagan speeches, the emphasis on common effort, purpose, and values, and something I found lacking in last night’s address. Last night’s address in contrast continued President Obama’s undue emphasis on “I”.

In my view what President Obama succeeded doing last night is what we’ve seen from him several times in the recent past. He has doubled down. He has signaled that he will neither move to the center nor will he shore up his support with his base.

However, I don’t believe that President Obama accomplished what he needed to do last night. Clearly, he did not rally the troops. In the Washington Post Harold Meyerson observed:

Thematically, President Obama’s State of the Union address Wednesday night was a bit of a jumbled pudding, with left, right and centrist ideas all packed together. Tonally, however, it was a masterpiece.

That’s support but not a ringing endorsement, a common theme among President Obama’s supporters. From the blogosphere:

Oliver Willis’s “Well, that speech was better than I thought it would be” is, again, not a ringing endorsement. It echoes the “it’s better than nothing” battlecry of those who support the healthcare reform bill making its way through the Congress. As much a sigh of relief as support.

Matthew Yglesias

As for Obama, I thought it was just great. A reminder that Obama is fantastic at delivering formal speeches and has a fantastic speechwriting stuff. The past twelve months are a reminder that giving fantastic setpiece speeches has limits as a political strategy. You drop out of speech mode into the realm of cold, hard vote-counting and I don’t think anything’s really changed in that regard.

Kevin Drum:

I’m not really much of a SOTU connoisseur, and I was focused almost completely on healthcare in this one. On that front, I’d give Obama a B-.

Jonathan Chait:

President Obama’s speeches have always been notable for both their exquisite prose and their unusually high intellectual level. Tonight’s speech, while probably as effective as such speeches can be, was neither.

The dropoff between rhetoric penned by Obama and that by his staff, always noticeable, was especially so tonight. When he declared, “health care experts who know our system best consider this approach a vast improvement over the status quo,” I wondered if his budget freeze had already claimed the entire White House speechwriting staff.

By my reckoning President Obama devoted more time in the SOTU message to healthcare reform than any other single issue and said, essentially, nothing new. The message appeared to be “pass the bill because it’s the bill that’s being discussed”, ignoring other, sounder approaches, e.g. Wyden-Bennett. Did he convince anyone, shore up any flagging spirits, gain any new Congressional votes? I don’t think so. Is the advice to leave it to the experts reassuring or is it the equivalent of “don’t trouble your pretty little heads”?

Equally clearly, the address didn’t enlist any support from President Obama’s opponents. I won’t bother linking to reactions from the Right Blogosphere. There are lots of them here. Some are pretty scathing.

Did President Obama boost his support from independents and centrists? We’ll need to look at the overnights and responses in the coming days.

I think not. President Obama’s current problem is not that he hasn’t gotten his message out. Lord knows he’s gotten his message out. The problem is not merely one of style or communicating more clearly. It’s the substance that needs fine-tuning.

11 comments… add one
  • It was too short. It was too long. It was a masterwork. It was a stumble. It was too hot. It was too cold. It was too partisan. It was too conciliatory. It had something for everyone. It had something that everyone could object to.

    In other words it was nothing. So glad I did not listen to it.

    It was also the laundry list of proposals we’ve come to expect from State of the Union messages, many of which will never be heard of again.

    In other words, same old pablum we always get. Change we can believe in I guess.

    In FDR’s speech you can see that he really is an American fascist as you’ve pointed out. Especially that second to last paragraph, reminds me very much of the passage by Mussolini quoted by Hayek in the Road to Serfdom ,

    We were the first to assert that the more complicated the forms assumed by civilization, the more restricted the freedom of the individual must become.–page 91 The Road to Serfdom

    Roosevelt was a bit more circumspect, but it is clear from that second to last paragraph, and the whole speech, that Roosevelt saw a vastly larger role for the government. When the government expands in both size and scope individual freedoms tend to decrease.

    By my reckoning President Obama devoted more time in the SOTU message to healthcare reform than any other single issue and said, essentially, nothing new.

    OMG, really….what a shock.

    It’s the substance that needs fine-tuning.

    How can you fine tune nothing? Well okay I guess it isn’t nothing, its just the same old crap we usually get. Look at all the assessments you’ve posted. They all same the same thing: “Obama gave us what we normally get….meh….”

    That crap has been so fine tuned its like eathing a plate full of white rice.

  • Drew Link

    No time for more than a quick hit, as detailed discussion would require so much typing.

    My overall reaction, as I listened on the radio coming back from OHare was: “immature.”

  • Michael Reynolds Link

    I think our deepest problems are generational. It’s whiny, self-pitying, narcissistic boomers and grasping, self-righteous, entitled members of the greatest generation competing to see who can screw the country into the ground faster.

    Ancient fossils of both generations still fighting yesterday’s battles, still cringing at the prospect of a new Great Depression, still looking for Nazis or Communists, or seeing the world through the absurd prism of some hippies vs. squares cultural conflict.

    Obama’s a president for new generation, but that new generation isn’t driving the bus just yet and quite frankly they have other things on their minds than politics. They’re neither pro-government nor anti-government, they’re non-government. They’re creating a sort of parallel reality, a networked, non-hierarchical world view that sees government as an intermittently interesting but non-essential creature.

    Call it compassionate libertarianism, maybe. Less eco-nut than the boomers, practical, skeptical of anything institutional, tolerant to the point of utter indifference on gender and abortion and all those formerly hot button issues, confident and amused. I get the feeling they don’t just see the world differently than our generation with its clear dichotomies, they see a different world entirely, one in which our battles and passions seem absurd. In fact, if I were to predict a long-term governmental trend from this, I’d guess it’s heading toward a non-national worldview, a sort of global laissez-faire.

    Obama has the tone right for the new generation, but he’s still stuck playing the game with the dinosaurs. The dinosaurs can’t stand his refusal to play their dinosaur game according to their rules of rage, passion, intransigence, competition and hubris. His diffidence leaves him at a disadvantage in the dinosaur games, but that diffidence, humility, informality and confidence is emblematic of the new kids.

    A conundrum.

  • Andy Link

    Michael,

    That’s a very interesting comment, though I think President Obama is very much cut from the boomer mold even though he was born on the backside of the boomer wave.

  • Call it compassionate libertarianism, maybe. Less eco-nut than the boomers, practical, skeptical of anything institutional, tolerant to the point of utter indifference on gender and abortion and all those formerly hot button issues, confident and amused.

    Hmmm, I agree with this. For example on gay marriage, I really don’t give a damn. So…you’re gay. Okay. And you want to marry that dude over there. Good luck. Really don’t give a crap, got my own things going on, but best of luck to you two hope is works out. Want to holds in public…don’t care. Want to kiss goodbye in public like a more traditional couple…don’t care. Want to run around in nothing but chaps and a leather thong and you weigh 275 pounds and you aren’t a body builder….just let me know so I can leave, nothing personal, but if it was a woman, I’d leave as well. I really don’t care.

    I get the feeling they don’t just see the world differently than our generation with its clear dichotomies, they see a different world entirely, one in which our battles and passions seem absurd. In fact, if I were to predict a long-term governmental trend from this, I’d guess it’s heading toward a non-national worldview, a sort of global laissez-faire.

    I hope so…I’m hoping for Arnold Kling’s bleeding heart libertarianism. Unfortunately the original article appears to have disappeared. You can get the flavor of it here,

    http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2006/03/bleedingheart_l.html#

    One of the things Kling said in his original Tech Central Station artice was that currently many progressives see government’s role as reducing misery and redistributing income. Kling’s view (and mine as well) is that while that may have been the intention initially now government tends to redistribute missery and reduce incomes.

    So in a sense, Michael’s larger point is one I can agree with as well. We probably argue so much because we are starting from very different world views.

  • steve Link

    Steve- If you look back at this, would like your comments on the Eggers piece linked below. I think they offer a path for a mature kind of libertarianism that would have a chance of getting candidates elected.

    http://reason.com/archives/2010/01/13/five-reasons-why-libertarians/print

    Steve

  • clay barham Link

    Even Pavlov’s dogs knew that a slap on the nose discourages the conduct that led to the slap, but the Federal Government and the State of Oregon cannot understand that. They claim they want to encourage new job formation, knowing that small business, innovative entrepreneurs, are the ones to create new opportunities, yet they slap the potential start-up business people in the pocketbook. Government discourages that which they claim to want to encourage. Does that mean they want small business to shrink and look to government-managed larger businesses to do the hiring? There is no innovation in a bureaucratic corporation which is proven in any mercantilist system. The Democrats, who, today, follow Rousseau and Marx, as demonstrated by Obama’s State of the Union speech, want to manage the entire nation. See claysamerica.com.

  • Michael Reynolds Link

    Steve V:

    You’re an economics guy. I’m a fiction guy. Very different perspectives. Numbers vs. Characters. Data vs. Motives.

  • He sounds overworked and overtired, i voted for him, and i am really disappointed, where was the fresh energy devoted to new ideas! Thankgoodness for the Mass election, a wake-up call he has yet to digest. At least we get some money shoved this way, for a fast new train. Thats cool. Soak the rich and send the money over to Ca!!

  • The bleeding-heart libertarianism article is here:
    http://www.techcentralstation.com/article.aspx?id=092903A

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