By Stephen Macaulay
“Jefferson suggested it was a waste of time.” —The American Presidency Project
I’m with Jefferson. It is a waste of time. Especially now, as there is a war in Europe that requires the absolute attention of political figures across the globe.
Yes, there must be a message to Congress. As Article II, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution states, “He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of the state of the union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.”
Putting aside the pronoun, nowhere does it say that this must be done live and on television. Nowhere does it say that it must be a speech. He can send a memo. He could tweet it.
He could simply say: “I need to be spending this time talking with world leaders who are actually doing something besides pissing and moaning about some personal, artificial grievances. I’ll get back to you once this is over.”
Let’s face it: outside of people who read such outlets as The Hustings, there are very few people who care about the State of the Union. Even Trump’s 2020 State of the Union had a viewership that declined 20% from the year before. There were 33.7-million views, according to Variety, and I would be willing to bet that there were far more than 33.7-million people who were annoyed that their prime-time viewing was interrupted.
For those people who do read things like The Hustings, is there any possibility that there will be something said that they’re not already aware of?
What’s more, the whole thing has turned into a urination Olympics, before, during and after the speech.
And to what end?
Do we really need to see more politicians showing off?
It is no longer something where there is someone talking to other people. It has become a political sideshow where people are talking at others or past others.
Rhetoric replaces substance.
The content of most of these speeches is “I’m a great guy. I have done great things. I will do more great things. Isn’t that great?”
Then the “counter” speeches are: “He is a jackass. He has done jackass like things and plans to do more of them. Isn’t that what a jackass would do?”
And then there are gigabytes of memory (the contemporary analogue for “barrels of ink”) spent breaking that all down.
To what end?
Today’s headlines are all about what Biden did or didn’t say. About gaffes. About people sleeping or people who didn’t stand and applaud.
It is all a show. And not a very good one.
People are dying in Ukraine, a democracy, right now because of an autocrat who is making a land-grab.
Every bit of attention and energy in Washington and other national capitols needs to be on that.