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| --Tech & Moderator Notes |
| Obama to provide the pomp, Ryan to explain our circumstances |
| 2011-01-25 |
| Tonight the President of the United States of America will stride into a joint session of Congress to thunderous, bipartisan applause and take to the lofty dais from which he will deliver an address filled with goals, inspiration, conviction and occasional poetry to a waiting nation. Then there’s the other guy. Giving the response to the State of the Union address is an unenviable task. The pageantry of the presidency gives way to the comparatively modest and lonely address of a member of the opposition party. The State of the Union is all grandeur and “Hail to the Chief,” and the SOTU response is a sad trombone. But, alas, someone has to do it, and in recent years, the national parties have seen fit to push their rising stars into the slot. This year is no different, as Republican Rep. Paul Ryan, a symbol of number-crunching confidence and youth from the competitive purple state of Wisconsin, will give the response. But as those who’ve gone before Ryan prove, following the president is a task fraught with pitfalls. In 2006, it was newly elected Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine responding to George W. Bush for the Democrats. He was the embodiment of a red state painted blue, the face of Democratic promise. Unfortunately, no one checked the face of promise for facial ticks, and Tim Kaine’s “wandering eyebrow” became the most memorable part of his address — a wayward chestnut caterpillar trying to exit stage left as Kaine spoke from the governor’s mansion in Richmond. More at the link |
| Posted by:Beavis |