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« State of the Union: Graphical Cliffs Notes The RantsWelcome to the Asylum. Population: Way Too Many »

State of the Union: There's Nothing to See Here
2006.02.03 (Fri) 23:20

Enough folks have taken issue with what George W. said on Tuesday (or, more to the point, the lack thereof). (If you want read about the content, go check out FucktheStateoftheUnion.com — as usual, the masked Annotated Ranter gets it about right.) For our dime, there is little need to continue repeating statements about the vacuous nature of his words, or the phony partisan spectacle that is the State of the Union these days (on both sides of the paper-thin penny that is our strictly-two-sided political system — a false dichotomy brought to life). So, lacking any real content to address, we find ourselves lamenting how he said the nothing that he said.

Put bluntly, we have seen high school debaters give more rousing, inspired speeches when speaking off the cuff, let alone when reciting a piece they had prepared and perfected with the help of a dedicated staff of paid cronies. A country is in poor shape when it looks to its "First Citizen" and sees a man who struggles to read from a teleprompter.

Now, we're certainly not saying that a person's qualifications to be president should rest solely on his oratory skills. However, a person who possesses the necessary levels of intelligence to act as our president — the Head of our Executive, our Commander in Chief, the person who stands up in front of the world and represents the free people of this country — should be able to read a speech and display at least a modicum of understanding of the words coming out of his mouth. Instead, we saw an idiot in action.

Throughout the speech, we were forced to watch as he paused to mentally scold himself for muddling words. Repeatedly. He split important phrases, rendering them confusing at best, incomprehensible at worst; and he haphazardly spliced together highly disparate ideas. It was almost as if — and we're just spitballing here — he actually had no concept of the ideas and issues behind the words that drooled from his lips. Looking at it from another angle, there was no emotion, no power, and no evidence that he understood the importance of the words scrolling before his eyes. We've seen people deliver speeches by rote — mechanically serving up a stream of words and concepts that they see only as words on a page instead of the ideas and statements behind those words. Can there be any doubt that this is exactly what we saw on Tuesday?

Then, right in the midst of serious moments in his speech, it would become obvious that he had caught sight of one of his good old boys in the audience...because he smiled. He grinned from ear to ear like a knavish fourth grader who sees someone in the auditorium with whom he had toilet-papered the bathroom that morning. The man is speaking about the evils of fanaticism, about the security of our nation...and he smiles that inane fucking smile at his buddy across the room? It was almost painful to see him then recall where he was and feebly attempt to turn serious again. Not to put too fine a point...no, fuck that. Here's the fine point: this is the man who represents our people. We, the people. Is this the kind of idiotic mask of buffoonery and deceit you want plastered over the public face of our country?

And what makes this even worse is that he was coached — no doubt heavily coached. By some of the most "qualified" advisors that money can buy. And this was the result. As ashamed as the Democrats should be for the inane huffing, puffing and eye-rolling that they engaged in throughout the night, the Republicans should be doubly ashamed for putting on the same stupid act in support of this moron.

Look, we personally think that far too much emphasis is placed on the performance skills of politicians these days — the president shouldn't have to be an Oscar-worthy actor (Reagan certainly wasn't). But when a chief executive addresses the nation and the world regarding serious and important matters, we would think he could at least pretend to be...well, serious and important. Better yet, he could actually understand the meaning and the gravity of his statements and not have to pretend at all.

Of course, what is said is, in theory, more important in many ways than how it is said, but given the hollow echo of his silly rhetoric, we just don't think there was any content to discuss. And hell, we're pretty sure that he didn't write any of it anyway — he's just parroting what his Neo-Con buddies feel is best. Frankly, we don't expect content in the State of the Union anymore (which itself is a sad statement about our government, to say the least), but we do expect at least a limited mastery of basic oratory skills. It seems we'll have to lower our expectations yet again.

This is the man who represents the United States of America? Fucking hell, shoot us now.


— • —
[  Filed under: % Bush Watch  % Government & Politics  ]

Comments (1)

Fan-man, 2006.02.04 (Sat) 12:12 [Link] »

I can picture Will Forte and the entire team of Saturday Night Live writers sitting around a writer's staff meeting struggling to find ways to parody the state of the union address. The writers can't find more hilarious words to sub in for the actual speech and Will himself can't possibly make Dubya look like a bigger buffoon.
Somehow, I think they'll find a way. Can't wait for tonight...




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