The state of the State of the Union—LIVE tonight!

5:30

Scout, honey, get yourself dinner, read yourself a nice book and get yourself to bed. We're rushing around like madmen around here. And by "we," I mean your old friend The Murr, who will be live-blogging the speech here at Writing Boots … and Vital Speeches of the Day Editor-in-Chief David Rutherford Murray, who will be live-chatting faster than the speed of his own thoughts over at the State of the Union Live Commentary being put on by the Gotham Ghostwriters Group, on Twitter.

While DRM is scouring the web for previews and insights to lard the Vital Speeches commentary, The Murr is nagging him: Isn't it time to uncork that bottle of red? (Which one? says DRM distractedly. You bought two for this show ….)

5:45

Already on the TweetChatt#SOTU, a hellish mix of good questions, mad predictions, cryptic shit, and worthless hogwash pouring in, at a rate of about one per second. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

Wondering about all the bigfoot journos/heads hypertweeting during speech. Will there be any discernment?

Big winds come from empty caves.

Has anyone noticed that @BarackObama is tweeting A LOT? Maybe he really is trying to reconnect with the American people.

Obama will promise to end Don't Ask, Don't Tell tonite!

Let's see if Obama can keep from sounding bitter tonight.

6:27

As I wrote for Gotham Ghostwriters, the State of the Union is just an inferior communication genre, one that could be improved by shortening it to a 15-minute fireside chat about one crucial subject and telling everybody the rest of it's in the PowerPoint deck at whitehouse.gov. That would confound the Republican response, would it not?

Carville says people think communication advisors fill empty vessels. "Naw," he says, "I empty full vessels." Friends of Obama and friends of progress in America should hope the presidential speechwriters at least emptied some of the details out of this vessel tonight.

7:31

A Twitterer apologetically writes, "k…have to eat…will b back."

Hurry, honey!

7:32

Tweet: "What part of the SOTU speech will be fully genuine? The head swivels between prompter lines."

Americans believe "fully genuine" equals, "pulled out of ass."

Well, good news, my fellow 'mericans. You'll see and hear plenty of that tonight, even if you never leave this blog.

7:51

The only thing more overwhelming than watching these Tweets pour in on #SOTU is watching the twits boor in on CNN. At what point do they stop being pundits and become their own voting bloc?

7:55

Tweet: "I'm feeling nervous for POTUS tonight."

7:57

Somebody—The New York Times or a random Twitterer—says the speech will be 70 minutes. That doesn't bode well for a coherent message.

7:59

Howard Zinn died today. And Michelle Obama is totally rocking that purple dress!

8:09

There used to be another name for the kinds of people who like to spend their time making quips and cracks 140 characters or less: wiseguys. I'm closing the Twitter window—until I start getting bored with the speech and want to know what I think of it.

8:13

"The worst of the storm has passed, but yet the devastation remains." A good line, and true enough. It did feel like a storm last year, and it does feel like aftermath today.

8:15

Who are these "children" who are writing the president to ask why their parents can't pay the mortgage? Argh.

8:17

Why is it that only politicians talk about the American spirit? Meanwhile, Americans talk about how half-assed a country this is.

8:19

Biden should be advised not to smugly nod like that. It's like when John Daly came out in support of Tiger Woods. (Thanks anyway ….)

8:26

"But I realize that for every success story, there are other stories, of
men and women who wake up with the anguish of not knowing where their
next paycheck will come from; who send out resumes week after week and
hear nothing in response." Good. Concrete. More like this!

8:30

Quibbling now, like the rhetoric pundit I am. Still, I'm tired of "people are hurting," from the mouths of every Democratic politician you listen to.

8:35

From the day I took office, I have been told that addressing our
larger challenges is too ambitious – that such efforts would be too
contentious, that our political system is too gridlocked, and that we
should just put things on hold for awhile.

For those who make these claims, I have one simple question:

How long should we wait? How long should America put its future on hold?

You
see, Washington has been telling us to wait for decades, even as the
problems have grown worse. Meanwhile, China's not waiting to revamp its
economy. Germany's not waiting. India's not waiting. These nations
aren't standing still. These nations aren't playing for second place.
They're putting more emphasis on math and science. They're rebuilding
their infrastructure. They are making serious investments in clean
energy because they want those jobs.

8:38

Me (running downstairs to refill the wine glass): "Boy, those Republicans won't clap for baseball, apple pie or Chevrolet."

Cristie: "No, they're all shaking their heads like a bunch of fuckin' pricks."

I bring the bottle upstairs with me.

8:40

I think Arnie Duncan knows how to will himself to quiet, private orgasm. Teach me, Education Secretary!

8:42

The speech is sounding like a list of good and harmless programs. All of Clinton's SOTV speeches sounded like that, and I couldn't listen to those sober, either.

8:44

Come on. When he makes a joke like that one about healthcare not being good politics and smiles like that—has anybody since Reagan ever had anything like that in their bag?

8:46

I'll say it right now, before the pundits go at it—I think the speech is going well, creating a feeling of continuous progress and making us forget the dour predictions of the 521 panelists in the CNN studio.

8:50

Twitter braggadocio: "our TV doesn't have split screen but on laptop am easily watching both #sotu and #australianopen semifinal while tweeting this"

8:55

I think he just rightly got laughed at for the obvious gimmickry of this budget freeze.

9:00

Criticizes "a Washington where every day is Election Day." That's a good, economical line. And the straightforward admonishment of each side of the aisle—I can't remember ever seeing it before.

9:10

This is the liveliest and most politically useful SOTU in memory, and it still leaves me in gobsmacked awe of the speechwriters who have (whatever) it takes to write this kind of stuff day after day, week after week, year after year.

9:16

But each time a CEO rewards himself for failure, or a banker puts
the rest of us at risk for his own selfish gain, people's doubts grow.
Each time lobbyists game the system or politicians tear each other down
instead of lifting this country up, we lose faith. The more that TV
pundits reduce serious debates into silly arguments, and big issues
into sound bites, our citizens turn away.

No wonder there's so much cynicism out there.

No wonder there's so much disappointment.

I
campaigned on the promise of change – change we can believe in, the
slogan went. And right now, I know there are many Americans who aren't
sure if they still believe we can change – or at least, that I can
deliver it.

But remember this—I never suggested that change would be easy, or
that I can do it alone. Democracy in a nation of three hundred million
people can be noisy and messy and complicated. And when you try to do
big things and make big changes, it stirs passions and controversy.
That's just how it is.

That's the acknowledgment that resets the game.

9:22

"We have finished a difficult year. We have come through a difficult
decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We
don't quit. I don't quit. Let's seize this moment—to start anew, to
carry the dream forward, and to strengthen our union once more."

And that's the rhythm.

Rhetorically, the speech was as good and as coherent as the SOTU genre allows.

9:31

Republican Response. Does SportsCenter start at 9:40? Come on, Bob, you can do better than that.

9:32

They found the prettiest Republican woman in Virginia (and the only Japanese guy) and they stuck 'em behind McDonnell and told 'em to nod and clap.

9:34

An empty cab drove up, and Bob McDonnell got out and gave this speech.

9:35

I do love how the Virginians giggle at the mere mention of Facebook and Twitter.

9:40

I haven't seen this many straw men since my last trip through Iowa. However it does beat Jindal's show last year.

9:41

Is it right to say that only Republicans call America "she"?

9:50

Rather than argue with the pundits, I'll sign off tonight and look forward to getting your reaction to any and/or all of my above blather. Thanks to any and all who chose to follow this blog, among so many others. Good night, my friends.

And God, if you're up there, please do bless America.

(And all the other countries.)

[And all the other goofs who live on the other planets, whether or not they organize themselves into countries.]

{And I must say, I really hope they don't, don't you? Time to open that second bottle ….}