If you've seen one State of the Union Address you've seen them all. The visuals anyway. A pronouncement. The camera pans. One side grumpy, one side happy. My personal impression after watching years and years worth of these is that it's been most typical for The Chief Executive to throw bones to the opposition about 30% of the time, while feeding the faithful the other 70%. Call it "bipartisanism".
Typically red meat for the base has been rationed, I've thought. Try to get in and out of the House Chamber without any open fist fights breaking out. Or something.
Tonight, seemingly not so much.
To me, President Obama has been the best of his presidency only lately. True, it's been only incremental, but it's been building. In fact (and I don't often lean this way), it strikes me that the dude has a master plan for the remainder of his term, and that he has brilliantly mapped out a route that will take the nation as far in the left direction of the political spectrum as it has ever moved in my life time. (Or maybe he's only harnessing the forces that come from recognizing that most of us have already made that move, but isn't that really the same thing.)
Only a coincidence that the Prez caps the string of indignities that he's steadily unleashed on "the new Congressional Majority" with "tax increases on the 1%"? That he is going to now, in front of the nation, give Boehner and McConnell a big old thumb in the eye by opening up a fight that he has no chance to win? But, really, a fight that there is no way that they can do anything but lose? Fight him on this (and it will start in all it's glory when the camera shows the vile response from inside the Chamber), and we win. Don't fight him on this, and we win.
"Fight me on this and you lose", but "don't fight me on this and me and mine kick your butts in two years". The constant stream of this has been so amazing, so fast paced, and so powerful over the recent months that, it seems to me, the cumulative effect of it still has not been widely recognized. It's not only capital gains tax increases and inheritance tax increases (master strokes given what these represent to those in attendance tonight). It's not only warming relations with Cuba (and, consequently most of the rest of The Americas, by the way). It's not only immigration status adjustment for so many folks in our families and neighborhoods. It's not only making major progress on establising "climate peace" with China. It's opening up community college education, it's putting the evil eye on Keystone, it's announcing that Indian tribes, and not only states, can adopt sane policies on pot, it's working on getting better pay and benefits for working people, and, probably most importantly, he's injected the unpredictability of promising more of the same, without even pretending that he's yet telegraphed all of his moves. I mean, vetoing the Homeland Security budget bill, and having the Republicans throw our borders wide open by shutting HS down? What kind of fun and games would that be?
If you're a Tea Party hack, where do you go in the face of all of this? Well, gratefully, we all already know the answer to this. First you get stupid. And then you double down on stupid (how many times?). And then Obama builds up political strength on the left Veto after Veto.
And let's say that you are on the left, or at least on "the Democratic side", and end up trying to run in 2016, what does all of this mean to you? It's still speculative, because we sure seem to be only in the early stages of what looks to be a long term, planned out effort from someone who could easily enough have decided to take the easy route, to shelter under the label of "Lame Duck". On the other hand "The Obama Plan" sure seems to be to move the base to the left, while engendering the greatest possible awakening of interest in politics in the greatest possible number of potential Democratic Party voters.
Can this work? It seems to me the correct question is there any way that it could fail? I mean, we don't even have to do anything, really, but watch the fun and be there down the road when the time comes. The guy is doing so much of the hard work for us, and I sincerely believe that this is an effort that we (and by "we" I mean his Democratic replacement in Office as well) are going to owe him a true debt of gratitude for.