State of the Presidency

If there was ever a good time for President Obama to make one of his lauded grand-slam speeches, it was last week. Obama’s hallmark health-care reform suffered a disheartening blow with the January 19th election of Republican Scott Brown to the Senate, thereby ruining the Democrats’ filibuster-proof majority. Coupling the election with a lack of progress on many of the other issues that comprised a major part of Obama’s campaign, a chorus of pundits, politicians, and voters immediately declared Obama’s agenda dead or, at least, majorly stunted. When he had the nation’s attention during the annual State of the Union, Obama had one goal to fulfill: convincing America that the remainder of his term holds a possibility for the actualization of health-care reform and other initiatives. And, as a rebuttal of Republicans’ and pundits’ claims, Obama’s State of the Union address was indeed effective.

There is no question that, since the 2008 elections, Democrats have suffered many setbacks. In particular, anger at the continually increasing rate of unemployment, now at 9.7 percent, in addition to the size of the deficit and the level of government spending, has led the national discourse to adopt a more populist, anti-government tone. Republicans have been quick to point fingers at the Democrats as the cause of these problems and the source of the nation’s anger. Obama responded to their claims with an appropriately combative tone in order to show that he is listening closely to the Americans’ concerns and will not ignore public sentiment, but also to insist that the Democrats do not deserve all of the blame for the current problems afflicting Americans.

In addition to his tenor and language, the substantive components of Obama’s speech merit praise. Many voters believe that Obama’s administration has been devoting too much attention to health-care reform at the expense of the economy. To address this concern, he wisely spent a significant amount of time focusing on the economy, the middle class, and the middle of the country. By doing so, Obama indicated that his priorities undoubtedly include job creation, education, and a more open government.

In addition, Obama followed through on a campaign promise by making a clear commitment to seek the repeal of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” the law banning open homosexuality in the military. While in the past Obama hedged his bets on this divisive issue by using unclear language and varying his opinion based on his audience, such a public announcement indicates his seriousness about tackling the issue openly. Presenting a plan when he had the full attention of the media and the country as a whole was a transparent and direct way for Obama to debut his renewed commitment to equality for homosexuals in the military. Although Obama could have used the State of the Union to speak abstractly, he chose to announce specific policy initiatives—a very wise decision for a president trying to convince people that he is still capable of inspiring reform.

Obama’s astute speech proved that, even given the failures of the past weeks, the Democrats have no reason to run for the hills—contrarily, they must work harder than ever to accomplish significant reform. After all, the Democrats still have a 59-seat majority in the Senate, a majority in the House, and control of the White House. As Obama’s first State of the Union address indicated, he is an able politician, and his party has no reason to abandon its entire agenda at this point in time.