Visual source:
Newseum
Look at the headlines and let's talk about whither the Occupy movement. But... but... they have no concrete demands!
WaPo:
President Obama warned the nation Tuesday that the decades-old promise of a secure and rising middle class is under threat because of growing disparities between the rich and everyone else in America.
Andrew Rosenthal/NY Times:
“In 2008,” he said, “the house of cards collapsed. We learned that mortgages had been sold to people who couldn’t afford or understand them. Banks made huge bets and bonuses with other people’s money. Regulators had looked the other way, or didn’t have the authority to stop the bad behavior.”
“It was wrong,” the president said. “It was irresponsible. And it plunged our economy into a crisis that put millions out of work, saddled us with more debt and left innocent, hard-working Americans holding the bag.”
It was startling, frankly. I haven’t seen the president this combative since before his inauguration.
William A. Galston:
Throughout his speech, Obama invoked the principles of fairness, collective action, and common purpose. Conspicuously absent was the theme on which the Republican Party rests its case—namely, individual liberty—a contrast that prefigures a 2012 general election waged over clashing partisan orientations as well as competing accounts of the president’s record.
Dana Milbank:
Gingrich himself remains so unpopular that his own chances of beating Obama seem dim: His 29 percent favorability rating is about where it was before he was dumped as speaker by his House colleagues in 1998. But by making Romney as unpopular as he is, he has made Obama look good by comparison.
Gingrich has long regarded himself as a “transformational figure” in world history, and now he’s about to prove it: For the second time in his career, he is about to reelect a Democratic president.
National Journal:
Today's United Technologies/National Journal Congressional Connection Poll showed Democrats with an 11-point lead over Republicans in a generic ballot question asked to registered voters. When asked if they would "rather see the Republicans keep control" of the House or see "the Democrats win enough seats to take over control of the House," 48 percent chose the Democrats, and 37 percent chose the GOP.
Stan Greenberg (GQR) on focus group in CO during SOTU:
Nate Silver on the Mitch Daniels response:
Josh Marshall:
The speech Mitch Daniels is giving is certainly better than what we’re hearing on the primary trail. That said, it’s for a very different audience — the American middle, as opposed to Republican primary voters. Daniel is also an impressive figure in his own way. I mean that. But, My God, not in a running for president kind of way. The idea that Daniels would be seen now by many Republican as a White Knight who could save them from Newt and Mitt is a testament to how weak they see the current field.
EJ Dionne:
I’ll have more to say about the politics of this speech in my column tomorrow. But it would be a lovely change of pace in Washington if Republicans would take a look at ideas that Obama proposed that they would surely enact in some form if a president of their own party had proposed them in a State of the Union speech.
One of the best parts of the speech was exposing the GOP for the obstructionists they are.