Watching with hopeful suspicion
Tonight is gearing up to be an interesting speech by the 43rd (technically) president of the United States. In case you didn’t know, or live in a box, 9pm EST is the State of the Union address.
In a whirlwind of general American anger, distrust and recession, this guy’s speech writers have a lot of work cut out for them. Luckily, the average American is an idiot, and people are so hungry for someone with a positive message he could rattle off Bible verses, and the country would still stand in awe.
So here’s what to look for, and what to be on the look out for:
Earlier today Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs stated: “The president is going to explain why he thinks the American people are angry” Any speech writer or first year psych major can tell you that the basic premise of this is to connect with the audience, and align himself with them. Pretty smart… If it works.
Keep an eye out for the President’s famous “story time” as well. He will almost certainly share the “woe’s of a family that’s had it rough” to further the listener alignment.
Hopefully, after the fluff and verbal shoulder rubbing we’ll get to some real meat.
The expected topics include:
- Increased funding for Education reforms with emphasis on student/teacher performance
- Health care… Again.
- New job legislation (although I doubt there will be any actual details here)
- A freeze on spending (claimed to be domestic spending, but what is the sense in that?)
- And, inevitably we’ll hear “government reform” again. But this has yet to be defined in my opinion.
So there you have it. Tune in tonight and we’ll see just how accurate my predictions are. Here’s a spoiler, change the words above and read with conviction. There’s your speech…