Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

"Since Obama took office in January 2009, there have been seven separate cases of disturbed white men committing political murders after becoming hopped up on guns, right-wing media and anti-government and anti-Obama blather. And this doesn't even include Loughner's attack or other incidents where the gunman was intent on killing but didn't succeed.

"Compare this with the lack of political violence during the Bush era, when passions were equally inflamed. This stark contrast demands an explanation for why there have been so many political murder sprees in less than two years. The answer can be found within the strain of reactionary politics that dominates the American Right. The Right thrives on mobilizing group resentment, and the range of its targets over the last 50 years is astonishing: gays and lesbians, African Americans, Latinos, feminists, welfare recipients, reproductive-rights activists, Muslims, undocumented immigrants, government officials, criminals, liberals, antiwar activists, organized labor."

-- Arun Gupta, 2011-01-12

So I stayed up and listened to the State of the Union address. And I kept thinking, "Wow, how do you rebut this?" (Also: as a performer or speaker, I never ever want to have to go on after Obama. And every so often, "Oooh, tactically brilliant line there.") I noticed that for a lot of the speech, he sounded like a progressive. Cool. (Since the start of the 2008 election season, I've considered Obama a moderate conservative, which is probably why I seem to feel less disappointment than a lot of other people about the ways he's acted like rather less of a liberal than folks had hoped for.)

Okay, so I just listened to the mainstream-Republican response, and was reminded how one rebuts a speech like that: (1) lie, (2a) pretend he said different things than he actually said (2b) ignore the parts where he pre-emptively addressed the points you want to bring up in opposition to other things he did say, (3) lean hard on the "government is the problem" meme (which requires more of 2b), (4) repeat bad-government bumper sticker slogans, (5) ignore or intentionally forget history (including some very, very recent history).

(E.g. -- Obama: We need to reduce spending! GOP response: Unlike Obama, we understand that was need to reduce spending! Uh, what?)

Oy vey. The response wasn't all lies, but it started off with a few, and then went into "I hope you weren't actually listening to what Obama said or you'll notice how screwed up this respose is" type of spin.

So: first impressions of Obama's speech ...

Do I believe everything Obama will do every thing he said he'll do? No. Would I agree with it if I did believe it? Well, most of it, yeah (certainly not all). Do I think he meant most or all of it? Yes, I think he did, except for a few bits that may have been tactical "let's see you argue with me for agreeing with you" pitches to the Republicans ... and I think he made a lot of sense, and -- unless American Exceptionalism raises your hackles -- was basically right about the big-picture stuff, if perhaps a bit optimistic.

I'm going to need to listen to it again and/or go find a transcript (which should be easy), and go over it more critically and analytically, but my first impression is that if the Republicans could manage to bring themselves to cooperate in the vision Obama outlined tonight, Really Good Things would happen for the United States of America. OTOH, he's still hung up on that whole kumbaya bipartisanship thing that the Republicans seem rather unwilling to join in on, being, y'know, proper politicians and all.

Do I even want to listen to Bachman's Tea-Party Republican response, or does the prime rule of reading news articles on the web (never read the comments!) apply there?