Happy Valentine's Day

++Without dwelling on it, President Obama basically hit it out of the park with his State of the Union address. "They deserve a vote" lit up the House and provided the emotion high point of the speech. It was strange to see the Tan Man not give the 101-year old black woman who waited for hours to vote a standing ovation. The substantive ovation was the bipartisan standing ovation on comprehensive immigration reform. Of the initiatives by the President ,expect action of that, some movement on gun regulation, and not a lot on reforming the electoral system. 

++The pivot to the economy was the biggest surprise for me. President Obama started the speech with his form of geekiness by talking up alternative energy sources, new manufacturing centers and his fixing the infrastructure. Some of this we have seen before. His pitch for strengthening the now debilitated middle class was his form of the Fair Deal. The pseudo-progressive rhetoric pleased the Democrats in the Chamber but alienated the GOP. The speech was framed before and after by pundits on the whole debt question, which Obama artfully handled but not to the austerity hawks pleasure.

++It was sort of a hoot to see him refer to John McCain on climate change and Mitt Romney about raising the federal minimum wage, one idea which got blasted by Republicans afterward. Whether President Obama can do anything about climate change is an open question. He promises Executive actions to curb carbon emissions and noted progress in this area because of fuel economy in cars.

++The most subdued piece of the speech was foreign affairs. It should be noted this is the first State of the Union address in over 10 years that omitted the word "Iraq". The President promised bringing troops home from Afghanistan and leaving a residual force to train the Afghan army and provide anti-terrorist actions. He also had one line about Israel and mentioned his commitment to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. But the main thrust of foreign policy, while understated, was his pivot to the Pacific and his commitment to negotiate an Asian FreeMarket deal and cope with North Korea, which has now exploded a smaller nuclear device. The nod to Western Europe was the promise to begin negotiating a free market deal with the European Union.

++In all, President Obama unapologetically laid out an aggressive second-term agenda. Like his first term, with the exception of health care reform, the positive accomplishments will be in the small, incremental changes he makes. Much of the first part of the speech escaped his audience and sounded mundane. But parsing it out, these little things add up and are complimentary. Overall, I thought he did much better than I had expected. The State of the Union usually gets dull and drones on.

++Marco Rubio did not equip himself well. His great YouTube moment of gulping Poland Springs water lit up Twitterland. In fact, that was perhaps his high point. Otherwise,he was Romney lite and answered a State of the Union President Obama never gave. Rubio failed to convey a single idea for governing, which is precisely the GOP's problem. His boast of living in a working class neighborhood in West Miami was debunked yesterday when it was revealed he was selling his home for $675,000. The Miami papers poured it on about how he wracked up $1 million in debt and got rich through his political friends. It was not an auspicious opening for his 2016 campaign. He only had a slightly better presentation than Bobby Jindal who brought on hoots of derision for his answer to the State of the Union. The one big clunker was when Rubio advocated a 4% growth rate of the economy as the cure for our problems. Problem--it happened only rarely in post-WWII America.

++Rand Paul gave one of the more honest, stripped down answers for the Tea Party. He channeled his inner Ayn Rand when he urged that sequestration did not go far enough and that we should cut $4 trillion from the government. His bright spot was his endorsement of comprehensive immigration reform. Otherwise, you saw the raw libertarian wing of the GOP.

++Today on Valentine's Day, not to be outdone is Wayne La Pierre to deliver the State of the Union response for the NRA, which gets more bizarre everyday. Today, he published an op-ed urging Americans to buy more guns because of hurricanes,drug gangs, criminals, terrorists and all sorts of natural disasters. The man is losing it.

++Naturally, as we know from the history of this Administration, over 60% back the President's various proposals, focus groups,even Frank Luntz' on Fox News,viewed the President's speech favorably. The viewers did believe him that the economy was improving. But we all know that means little given the obstructionism of the Congress.

++The President took the economic part of his message down to North Carolina yesterday and will eventually take his gun part to Chicago. He plans to stay on the road selling his plan. Unfortunately,this failed during the first administration with his Jobs Plan, which would have eased anxiety in the country.

++But the last two days have brought us down to earth. The GOP has filibustered Chuck Hagel, the first presidential nominee for the cabinet ever filibustered. Jack Lew, who has real problems with his Cayman Islands investments, is being grilled on Benghazi, the Republican fixation. Lindsey Graham and others are trying to out a hold on Jack Brennen's nomination to the CIA over Benghazi, the Drone policy and other things--but not the torture policy under Bush.

++Both Mitch McConnell and John Boehner have said the sequestration will go ahead. The House GOP are trying to wiggle out of the defense cuts through loopholes and other maneuvers. The COB has projected that this might trigger a recession. To whose benefit, it is not clear. In the 2014 elections, early betting has the Democrats keeping the Senate and the Republicans keeping the house but losing a few more seats. Is the whole exercise to bring back the GOP policies of the past? Will the country have forgotten by 2016? That looks like the bet right now.