The Night It Seemed All Was Right With the Country

 What we witnessed last night during a COVID diminished joint session of Congress was a President delivering a Presidential address. The change in style, form, and content was jarringly different from what we have suffered through the last four years.

The bombast, the accusations, the ego driven nonsense, and the see through lies were all gone. When Joe Biden stood at the podium, backed for the first time in American history by a female speaker and Vice President, all seemed right with the country once again. 

Biden isn't a natural orator like Obama and certainly not on a par speaking wise with Jack Kennedy, but let's face it, Don Trump is a fairly easy act to follow. The stutter caught up with him two, or three times, but it never threw him off track. You could see him pause after those brief moments, gather himself, then carry on calmly with the tone of an elder statesman, rather than that of a carnival barker whipped up in a meth induced frenzy.

He explained what his administration had accomplished in its first 100 days without excessive hyperbole and outlined what he wanted to do sans apocalyptic bluster and grotesque oversell. In short, Mr. Biden spoke to us individually and the nation as a whole with dignity and humility. 

The reaction on the right bordered on stunned confusion. Ted Cruz, late of Cancun, seemed at times to be nodding off to sleep. At others, usually during the numerous rounds of applause, he glanced to his left, apparently shocked by the level of enthusiasm the President was generating. 

Mitch McConnell, the deposed king of the Senate. sat defensively. He steadfastly refused to applaud, even when Biden spoke about lowering child poverty by 50% and reducing the prices of prescription drugs for all Americans, including his own hard pressed constituents. He seemed made of stone, or salt, depending on your theological viewpoint.

Lauren Boebert, the mad Congresswoman from Colorado was much the same, although she managed to shake her head in disagreement when Biden touched on the epidemic of gun violence in America. In her defense she may have been depressed by the recently released video of the NRA's Wayne LaPierre's botched elephant hunt in Botswana. Not by the killing, of course, but by how it showed LaPierre is such a poor marksman that after three close range shots it was the guide who finally had to dispatch the poor beast.

This morning former Trump aide, Stephen Miller called Joe Biden's address, "lifeless." If by lifeless he meant the President didn't personally degrade political opponents by calling them derisive names, or otherwise make any statements the GOP could latch onto as outrageous, he was correct. Biden, among other things, didn't comment on the past election at all, or the insanity continuing in Arizona concerning the outcome in November. He even refused to tilt his head back, while thrusting out his chin like Miller's old boss had. It is a pose Donald Trump stole from the late, unlamented, Benito Mussolini. 

Trump himself made a call to Fox News, apparently because no one else will talk to him, whining about Biden not acknowledging his accomplishments. Yes, you can say many things about the former guy, but you'll never be able to deny he considers himself the most victimized man on the face of the planet.

A post speech national poll taken by CBS showed that 85% of the people who watched it approved of what Joe Biden said. That is a staggering number although in the past it has been proven most people watching a Presidential address are from his party. Still, a Reuters/IPSOS poll reveals Biden's approval rating 100 days in is at 55%, while 38% disapprove of the job he is doing. 

Finally, the really good news is there is a distinct feeling the Trump tsunami is ebbing, rolling back onto itself. Indeed, what republicans haven't seemed to grasp is the nation as a whole is tired of management by chaos and whim--that improv government doesn't work nearly as well as improv comedy.

Whatever the case, last night, Joe Biden proved he is the man America needs and, at least for the moment, the one it wants.

sic vita est

4-29-21