The speech

OK, I’m an Obama fan. Discount for that.

But even on a re-reading, this strikes me as a great oration. Looking forward to Obama’s Second Inaugural.





I want to thank every American who participated in this election…

… whether you voted for the very first time or waited in line for a very long time. (By the way, we have to fix that.)

… whether you pounded the pavement or picked up the phone…



























That’s where we need to go.




Tonight you voted for action, not politics as usual.



















Author: Mark Kleiman


33 thoughts on “The speech”

  1. But even on a re-reading, this strikes me as a great oration.

    I hate listening to speeches because so many of them are larded up with BS, not to mention usually being much ado about nothing, but my thought last night was that was the greatest speech I ever heard him give.

    A stemwinder for sure.


    1. I had thought that a stemwinder was a speech that made you look at your pocket watch (wound up by its stem) to see how long this had been going on. But here’s a site that says otherwise (with some comments from folks who had my impression):

      I remember Joey Smallwood, a populist Newfoundland politician of the mid-20th century, saying that it was all right if people looked at their watches during your speech, but it was not a good sign if they took them off and started tapping them.

      Was the President using a teleprompter that was not visible to me from my home TV, or did he have that one from memory? He did have some good points, including some answers to ‘what good is government?’ and ‘why do people do politics anyway?’ that unfortunately need answering these days.

      1. Regarding stemwinder, the OED has this:

        stem-winder n. U.S. (a) a keyless watch; (b) a geared logging locomotive (Webster, 1911); (c) slang a person or thing that is first-rate; also, an enterprising or energetic person; an impassioned talker or public speaker; (d) slang a rousing speech.

  2. I guess this would have been both inappropriate and too much to ask:

    And Iâ€™m so proud of you guys. But I will say that for now one dogâ€™s probably enough. And I promise, I’ll never strap Bo to the roof of Air Force One.

    1. When you run for president and win, you are free to leave it out.

      His god-bothering is less than any recent president, by my memory.

      1. He also sometimes (though sadly not consistently) includes people of no faith when he rhetorically attempts to inclusively embrace people of various faiths. This is, by American standards, fairly radical. If you read his memoir, Obama was raised as an Atheist joined the Black church because he realized that without it he could never make progress in his attempts to lead his community, and his professions of faith, sincere or not, were probably prerequisites for his political career. Polls have frequently shown that more respondents say they would elect a Muslim than an Atheist.

        1. Obama’s rhetorical inclusion of people of no faith might be radical by American standards, but he follows in the footsteps of his Republican predecessor:

          “We will keep a commitment to pluralismâ€”not discriminating for or against Methodists or Mormons or Muslims, or good people of no faith at all.”

          Gov. George W. Bush, July 22, 1999, in one of the first speeches of his presidential campaign, to an audience of inner-city clergy.

        2. I distinctly remember GWB including “people of no faith” in a closing argument in a 2004 debate with Kerry who, by contrast, emphasized his piety, military service, etc. Candidates play against type to expand their coalition.

  3. Um, sorry but I thought it started off well then went south, and went on much too long. No, I am not going to read that thing, the first time was enough.

    And I like the guy too.

    He needs an editor, or three.

    But, I am very very happy he got re-elected. I thought he would, but I was still a little worried.

  4. Great speech, loved the part where he mentions the father sharing the story about his daughter’s fight with leukemia. Looked like he choked up a bit, a solemn moment that he followed with a rising call to action.

    Also, thought it was telling that he took a last walk in front of the crowd after everyone else left the stage. Can’t imagine the relief, and excitement that must have been flowing through him at that moment.

    I watched PBS’s coverage and was surprised to see how critical Mark Shields was of Obama. True Shields looked exhausted by the end of the telecast, but I was shocked to hear him give credit for the Affordable Care Act to Nancy Pelosi. From all the coverage that I saw I really think pundits on both sides missed the importance of this election, although I think the Wall Street Journal editorial today acknowledged (in their own way) how Obamacare is going to make a huge difference, maybe not in itself, but at the very least, a solid step in the direction of Universal Health Care. With Romney and all his day one promises going down in flames, progressives should rejoice in the fact that the ACA will remain in place.

  5. Hey, if Obama is ACA’s father, Pelosi is certainly ACA’s mother, and the analogy is apt, because mother mammals have the much more difficult, bloody task, while the glory so often goes to the father.

  6. Note the line “In the weeks ahead, I also look forward to sitting down with Governor Romney to talk about where we can work together to move this country forward.” This is wishful thinking.

    An interesting characteristic of the American system is that the losing Presidential candidate is immediately irrelevant and the losing party is immediately leaderless. The losing candidate has no official status. I doubt very much that Boehner or Cantor will even give him the time of day.

    In a parliamentary system the leader of the losing party has a job to do. He/she heads the official opposition and often comes with years of government/parliamentary experience.

    1. Not so much. It is at the least my impression that when a party loses in a parliamentary system, that party’s leader is almost always booted from leadership immediately after. They may nominally retain party leadership for a time, but only as a custodian for the person chosen to replace them. There may be some exceptions in modern times where the leader of a defeated party held on to fight the next cycle (I stress “modern times” because I’m aware of a LONG back-and-forth between Disraeli and Gladstone), but those would mostly have been incredibly close losses, or losses that were completely predictable and that contained promising indications of a future resurgence.

      In our own country’s closest analogy to a parliamentary system – the leadership of the House Of Representatives – it was surprising (if, to me, welcome) when Nancy Pelosi managed to retain her party leadership after the 2010 midterms. Had the Dems taken the house, I doubt Boehner would have been treated the same.

      1. I think you’re generally right that parliamentary PMs generally retire as leader (whether jumping or pushed) when their party loses the majority, but there is a relatively modern exception: UK PM Harold Wilson became leader of the opposition when Labour lost the 1970 general election, remaining in that role until he became PM again after the February 1974 election. And indeed, Edward Heath remained as Tory leader after that election, not being forced out until the Conservatives lost a second general election later that year, when he was finally replaced by Margaret Thatcher.

        1. I was aware of the 1970s UK history as counterargument, but less firm on the details, and just decided the UK in the 1970s was a weird mess (see for example Francis Wheen’s book on the subject). I was thinking more of the series of Thatcher dispatching a couple of Labour leaders, and the seemingly pathetic series of Tory leaders Blair saw off.

        2. And it works the other way. It is quite common for the Leader of the opposition to remain in place even though losing an election. There are even cases where after a few cycles the party does win and the leader get elevated to PM.

          1. How many times did Berlusconi lose, hold on as leader of the opposition, and return? A lot depends on how you get to be leader in the first place.

    2. It’s clear enough why Obama did that: Romney now disappears into history’s ash bin, unless he appears at the President’s behest to contribute, uhhh, whatever it is that Rmoney is capable of contributing. We’ll find out if it really is about America or about Romney by whether he responds, and we’ll see how worthless his vulture-capitalist / snake-oil salesman “ideas” are by what he offers in the way of helpful solutions.

  7. IMHO it started and ended as wonderful, there were too many words in the middle.

    I also liked the moment at the beginning when the family walked on stage – wonderful visual – and the youngest daughter reminded dad to look behind him. Great family, and you can’t imagine the callous plutocrat’s family acting that way.

  8. It was a great day for the forces of light, but…

    When has Barack Obama not been capable of rhetoric that can move the soul?

    Talk is cheap. Thinking he can sit down with Mitt Romney and get anywhere we need to go, or should go, is perfectly delusional. As someone put it today, John Kasich might have some promise, however.

    Let’s wait and see what he does with Mandate #2. We, meaning the liberals and progressives and women and Latinos and LGBTs of this country, have saved his ass once again. Repayment will be demanded up front this time. As I hope for change.


      It’s called a sop.
      For non-saps that means: throwing your opponents and the low-info voters a bone.

      As for Mr. Obama not knowing what his opponents are about: Stand that nonsense down…
      That was once very true. But after the debt-ceiling crisis it will never be true again.
      Mr. Obama knows what our opposition/tea-bastards are about.

      We are in fugging war for control of reality. Nothing less.
      And to drink a deep dose of those two realities, I highly recommend a rereading of the Chait piece down below.
      It is a timely refresher on the bullet we dodged last night, and the one we instead, buried in their brains:

      1. PS…

        One of my favorite quotes from the Chait piece:


        The odd thing about the debt-ceiling debacle is that the deal Obama tried to cut with Republicans may have been absurdly generous, but the deal he actually got was pretty favorable. It required the establishment of a bipartisan commission that had to agree to $1.5 trillion worth of reductionsâ€”which, of course, it could not, for the same reason every other bipartisan deficit negotiation failedâ€”or else automatic cuts would take place in 2013. Because Republicans refused to allow higher revenue to make up any part of those cuts, and insisted all the automatic deficit reduction consist of lower spending, Obama made his own demand: that he have a greater say in what kind of spending would suffer cuts. Social Security and Medicare benefits were exempted, though cuts to Medicare providers were not. Programs that benefit the poor were likewise spared, but defense absorbed a huge proportion of the automatic cuts.

        The idea was to turn the Republican coalition against itself. As the clock ticked toward January, doctors, hospitals, andâ€”most especiallyâ€”defense contractors would be confronted with terrifyingly large reductions in their income stream. Voiding those cuts would require convincing Obama to sign a law undoing them, which he would not do unless the replacement plan met his definition of fairness, which meant including higher tax revenue from the rich. This has had precisely its intended effect. Executives and lobbyists have begun to beseech Republicans to accept a budget deal that includes higher revenue along with lower spending. Republican defense hawks like John McCain and Lindsey Graham have signed a letter calling for a â€œbalanced bipartisan deficit reduction package,â€ which is Beltway code for a deal mixing taxes and spending.

        What really lured Republicans into a trap was the timing of the arrangement. The beginning of 2013, when the automatic spending cuts take effect, coincides with the expiration of every penny of the Bush tax cuts. And so, by postponing the fiscal reckoning, Republicans inadvertently scheduled it for the very moment when Obama (should he win reelection) will hold his maximum leverage. Last summer, Obama was pleading with Boehner to give him $800 billion in additional revenue. Come January, heâ€™ll have $5 trillion in higher revenue without doing anything. Since Obamaâ€™s own budget proposes to raise only $1.5 trillion in new revenue and trim entitlement spending, he could then offer Republicans a deal that cuts taxes (by, say, a couple trillion dollars), increases military spending, and reduces entitlement spending. In other words, he could offer a right-wing billâ€”and the end result would be a mix of policies to the left of his own budget, and to the left of the Simpson-Bowles proposal.


  9. There were two things that struck me in that speech. The first – “We want our children to live in an America that isnâ€™t burdened by debt, that isnâ€™t weakened by inequality, that isnâ€™t threatened by the destructive power of a warming planet.” I hope that’s not ordered by decreasing importance. And the second – “And in the coming weeks and months, I am looking forward to reaching out and working with leaders of both parties to meet the challenges we can only solve together. Reducing our deficit. Reforming our tax code. Fixing our immigration system. Freeing ourselves from foreign oil.” This was the closest thing I saw to an agenda for the next term. Together, these two quotes make him come across as quite the deficit hawk. Reforming the tax code sounds an awful lot like the Republican formulation of the revenue side of a grand bargain. And while I like the idea of fixing the immigration system, freeing ourselves from foreign oil sure sounds like a slogan that doesn’t address the destructive power of a warming planet or solve any other real problem. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but if this is a glimpse at his agenda, I don’t find it particularly reassuring, or inspiring.

  10. â€œWe want our children to live in an America that isnâ€™t burdened by debt, that isnâ€™t weakened by inequality, that isnâ€™t threatened by the destructive power of a warming planet.â€

    Not in priority order, in perfect rhetorical order.

    First, get the attention of the people who care most about the national debt, or think they do, and get them nodding their heads. These people are skeptics and won’t even hear this line if something else comes first.

    Second, speak to the broadest part of your base and get them nodding their heads.

    Lastly, bring up the thing that’s critically important but that many of the first two groups are not yet very invested in and take advantage of the fact that their heads are already nodding.

    The order is brilliant.

    1. For the second time, Obama has recognized climate breakdown for what it is. Even better, he left out the tactical “all of the above” energy policy stuff, and camouflaging the energy transition as a matter of green jobs.

      Simultaneously praising and belittling Mitt Romney as George Romney’s son was masterly.

    2. P.S.: Obama’s soft line during hid first term on coal, gas and oil was repaid by a flood of PAC money from fossil fuel billionaires and corporations to unseat him. Obama seems unusually un-vengeful as a politician, but the political calculus now points to cutting the fossil industries down to size and rewarding his green energy supporters more decisively.

    3. P.S.2: One early sign will be if Obama replaces the competent technocrat Steven Chu as Energy Secretary – the kind of man you need if your priorities are energy R&D, the smart grid, fuel economy standards, but not to pilot radical policy change. Bill Clinton?

      It’s true that the Republican House majority will be able to block legislation for the next 2 years, so the play would have to be part of a strategy for the 2014 mid-terms. The Democrats can plausibly count on an improving economy and a successful rollout of Obamacare’s main provisions.

      1. Steven Chu appears to be a competent technocrat but close-up he is more interested in funding the will ‘o wisp of fusion and favorite research projects of the oil companies than real investment in renewables.

  11. The opening to the speech is spectacularly egotistical and bombastic. By electing him Americans have proven their greatness?

    Spare me.

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