PunditGuy

James Taranto says it best…

Why God Gave Us the ‘Mute’ Button

We watched last night’s speech with a mostly right-leaning group of friends, and over their objections we kept the TV on for the Democratic response, for we were really curious as to what Barack Obama was going to say. But as it turned out, the Democrats apparently couldn’t get Obama and instead had to go with the B team of Nancy Reid and Harry Pelosi.

Reid grew up in Searchlight, Nevada, yadda yadda yadda: That’s about all we took away from their speeches, which were soon drowned out by the sound of conversation. Eventually we relented and turned the sound off. We would have read the speeches this morning, but apparently the Dems didn’t think them worth publicizing; we couldn’t find them anywhere on the Democratic National Committee Web site (which does, however, have the eagerly anticipated Terry McAuliffe response, though they don’t know how to spell his name).

Reid and Pelosi do not, to say the least, present an attractive face to America. As our friend Rich Miniter observed, Reid looked like a doctor who refuses to administer painkillers. As for Pelosi–who is known mostly for being more charming than Barbara Boxer–she stiffly stared at the camera with a deer-in-the-headlights look.

We have to wonder what the point is of this tradition of responding to the State of the Union. We don’t mean to pick only on the Democrats; recall the Republican response to the 1995 State of the Union. Even though in 1995 the GOP mattered a lot more than the Dems do today, chances are you remember nothing about their response–and that’s the point: These things are never memorable, and they serve only to make the opposition party look insignificant. If the Dems are smart, they’ll skip the response in 2006.

He’s dead on.

Leave it to the Democrats to criticize a speech that hasn’t even been given yet. Oh, and do they offer any alternatives? Any new plans? Any changes?

Nope.

Update: Pelosi? Whiner. Reid? Whiner. Kerry? Yep, Whiner. Rangel? Oh yeah, BIG Whiner. Watt? Black Caucus Whiner. And Emanuel? Clintonista Whiner.

Nothing less than a miracle.

I won’t be live blogging the State of the Union Address. It airs at 2 AM here in London.

More: Wizbang has the roundup.

Via AP, Castro calls Bush “Deranged”.

In his first public remarks since the United States dubbed Cuba an outpost of tyranny, Fidel Castro called President Bush “deranged” and belittled recent improvements in relations between Cuba and Europe.

In a televised address late Tuesday, Castro maintained his trademark go-it-alone attitude, saying his communist-run island is a paradise that is doing fine without the help of the United States or Europe.

Cuba “doesn’t need the United States. It doesn’t need Europe,” he said. “What a wonderful thing to be able to say, that (Cuba) doesn’t need any assistance — it’s learned to live without it.”

And have you seen Cuba lately? Buildings falling apart, raw sewage in the streets, a non-existent healthcare system…the list is too long. Yeah, learned to live without it, right.

That’s why Cuban people drown in the Ocean between Cuba and Florida. That’s why Cuban people try to stow away on flights to the US and end up freezing to death in the wheel well of the plane. They’ve learned to live without the dream of freedom.

Who’s deranged?

Back from a full day of meetings in Oxford, England and now I’m stuck with no time left to blog. Oh well, business first, blogging second. I’ll check in tomorrow. In the meantime, here’s a cool video to watch.

Hillary collapsed today during a speech. OK, maybe collapse is a strong word. Rumor has it she swayed a bit, after getting a drink of water or something, then just stopped and left. Hopefully, someone was rolling video…

In the meantime, here’s video of Clinton leaving the site of the speech “post-collapse”.

One week down. I’m still in London on business, so blogging will be sporadic for yet another week. A few observations though…

– The traffic at Abbey Road on Saturday’s is a bit too heavy to get the perfect “Beatles” walk picture.
– If you’re into public debating, head to Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park. Today though, there was a little too much “America is Evil” talk going around.
– The Original London Tour is worth it, even from inside the doubledecker bus. The weather in January is not really kind to the upper deck, which is without a roof.
– The British Museum has a great exhibit going right now.
– If you’re from the US, it’s incredibly expensive to visit the UK.

“No one in the United States should try to overhype this election. This election is a sort of demarcation point, and what really counts now is the effort to have a legitimate political reconciliation, and it’s going to take a massive diplomatic effort and a much more significant outreach to the international community than this administration has been willing to engage in.  Absent that, we will not be successful in Iraq.”

– John Kerry, on NBC’s Meet The Press, January 30, 2005