The State Of The Union Analysis: Gloom And Doom

President Trump's State Of The Union speech-- little in the way of policy but lots of politics.

Transcript

Speaker 2 0:00

welcome to another episode of Inside Golden State Politics. I'm Bill Bosky, former city editor and for the Los Angeles Times. And with me is our producer director, Nancy Bki.

Speaker 0:14

And I'm Sherry. Be political analyst and self-styled media Maven. Coming to you from waiting in a long line to collect by Trump tariff refund. I expect to be here for quite a while. So over to you, bill.

Speaker 2 0:37

Well, we're going to talk about the State of the Union speech. And Sherry, you were telling me that you've done some research on how this originated, this odd custom.

Speaker 0:52

Right, right. I mean, before we dive in to Trump's State of the Union address, let me just give you a quick history of what the State of the Union address is supposed to be, what it was, when it began, and why, and what it has turned into today. And, and this is something we're gonna wanna talk about. And is it still relevant? But before we get to that question, let me take you back to the US Constitution. The State of the Union address comes straight from Article two of the US Constitution. it was there at the beginning, as it were, and it requires the president to quote. From time to time, give to the Congress information of the State of the Union End quote. That's all it says about the State of the Union. It does not specify how the President must deliver that information. It doesn't say how often that information list be given, and it doesn't say. Whether that information must be given in the form of an in-person speech. Oh, did somebody go very wrong about the in-person speech? And I'll tell you who it was. George Washington and John Adams did speak to Congress directly in person. It was Jefferson. Who decided to switch it to a written message, which was sent to Congress and read by a clerk. He didn't wanna look like or sound like a king, giving the speech from the throne. And that's the way it started. it was handled that way. For over a century. Then in 1913, president Woodrow Wilson revived the impersonal delivery apparently because he decided, and he's not, he wasn't stupid about this. I have to say. It was more effective as a way to rally support for his agenda. And then that's at the pattern for the modern. State of the Union address. One more change. LBA moved the speech to primetime to the evening so that he could capture the primetime audience. It sounds like something he would think about, doesn't it? And then came the technology Communication Revolution Radio television. The internet and it just blew open. a national mass media political extracation. It came from being constitutionally required to being a show, if you will. what it's supposed to do. Well, here's what. People, this is what's been done until basically this year. The modern presidents have used the speech to report on, well, the state of the union, the national conditions to outline the president's legislative upcoming legislative agenda and more and more to shape public opinion and to demonstrate. Leadership on a national stage way. The State of the Union today, as I said, is both constitutionally required and politically mandated, if you will. It's a political performance, so at this point you've taken it from where it was to where it is now, and I'm gonna ask you, bill. How did Trump do with his State of the Union address?

Speaker 2 5:10

Well, I wanna say that the, state of the Union speech is a overhyped, waste of time.

Speaker 5:17

Who

Speaker 2 5:18

ho, which always, which always concludes with the president, saying in one way or another the state of the Union is good, or in the case of strong, the case of Trump, the State of the Union is. So big that people are saying, Stu, could you make it worse? It's too good. what did I think of the speech? I thought that it was noteworthy for two points that he skimmed over. I'm listening to his speech and I'm just saying, what about those. Two huge aircraft carriers for Iran, accompanied by several destroyers, accompanied by, fleets of airplanes. what about that, sir? What does that mean? What do you mean a great speech, sir? It's a great speech and you're to be commended, but why didn't you mention that? All those things that may well be taking us into a war, a war that he will not have mentioned in his phony state of the union speech. Wait a minute though. This thing he did is really noteworthy.

Speaker 6:31

Wait,

Speaker 2 6:32

wait. Was his reference in the middle of the speech to the Somalis? And before

Speaker 6:37

you

Speaker 2 6:37

go into that, said.

Speaker 6:42

Before you get into that second point, I need to say that I disagree with you really almost totally on. I hear you saying you didn't pay attention to Iran. What we did, but what he did, I think was to position us. To see to accept a possible war in Iran. He painted a very negative, a very frightening picture of Iran. Then I would assume he'd hope that we would accept the battleships and the aircraft carriers that are straight.

Speaker 2 7:22

No battle, no battleships. Just two aircraft carriers.

Speaker 7:26

No, there are battleships.

Speaker 2 7:29

Well, there are some,

Speaker 7:30

but anyway, that's not what we argue about. What we are arguing about is, I love to argue he didn't pay enough attention and I say he had a, he had one goal and that was to present enough fear about Iran without telling us exactly why he might wanna go to war with Iran, to go to war with Iran.

Speaker 2 7:58

I think that, much more impressive to me than anything that he said about Iran was the huge amount of military hardware steaming in that direction. And, you know, we just did, finish a short war with, Venezuela. and it was war. So that's war. We just, we just finished with our Israeli allies, a battle, against, Hamas. we are being taken into. Wars. He's taking us into these wars and he, he loves them. They make him feel good. He's the commander in chief., He's the general. He never was. He is and

Speaker 8:43

never will be.

Speaker 2 8:45

And never will be. And I think it's frightening that he is leading us. Here's where I disagree with you. I think it's frightening that he is. Leading us, into, a war with a nation of 90,000 million people, Iran, with a well-trained army, and a fanatical, will to fight, that's where he is taking us without a word from Congress. Of course, don't, don't get me started on Congress having,

Speaker 9:17

we don't have enough time.

Speaker 2 9:19

Wanting to say anything about anything, but without a word from Congress, without a word of debate, without any discussion. Here we go. Anchors away. There goes. Those two beautiful big carriers.

Speaker 9:35

We will see whether that it comes to that. I guess, and you know, you, I don't disagree with you that it's scary. Oh, no, not at all. What I'm saying is that what he was doing in this particular speech. Yeah. I don't think he's ready to, to tell us exactly what's happened there. It's up to us to find out, but what he wants to do is. To prepare us for a reason, quote unquote, to go to war with Iran, and he made a hard start toward that. In his discussion is of Iran as the greatest terrorist in the world, as a country that killed over 70,000 of its own people. All of that was in. The State of the Union address, but now talk to me about the Somalis.

Speaker 2 10:32

The Somalis, you know, came to this country, as immigrants, like so many people have, and, they settled in Minnesota area., A large number of settled there. They are, hardworking, immigrant people. But what Trump does is he takes immigrants and brown-skinned immigrants, either either Mexican, central Americans or Somalis, and he villainize them. That was his MO when he first. ran for president and it remains his mo today, especially when he is in trouble and certainly he is in trouble now if the polls have any value, whether they do or not is subject for another podcast, but if the polls have any value, he is in. Trouble now. And what he is doing is, using the Somalis, as,

Speaker 11:38

among others.

Speaker 2 11:39

Among others, as, as a diversion. He's got two villains that are perfect for him. Two, two, members of Congress who are Somali and, who made a terrible mistake. last the other night at State of the Union of yelling, defying. And, and he replied that, they must be crazy. And, went on to his, really, disgusting.

Speaker 12:08

Is that

Speaker 2 12:09

what a president does? He, he said, of Omar and Rashida, the bulging, bloodshot eyes of crazy people.

12:22

Who

Speaker 2 12:22

said that? Send them both. Send them both back to from where they came. that's pretty rough stuff, I think.

Speaker 12:33

Well, yeah. I will tell you one thing though that you said it is, extremely true because what I heard you say is what I believe, which is that much of the speech was basically a replay of his greatest campaign hits. From his earlier campaigns, it sounded more like a rally speech, and I do believe that the speech was basically, in many ways, red, red meat for the base, but it sounded much more like a rally speech than the, state of the Union addressed by the president of the United States. it was embarrassing. At its best. It was just repulsive. At its worse. that kind of ad hominin, attack has no place and it hasn't been at a place in any previous state of the Union address that I have observed in by now. It's quite a few.

Speaker 2 13:35

You know, he, for whatever value the institution of the, State of the Union has he dragged it down farther and farther and made it, less and less, of any value.

Speaker 13:49

it ain't no State of the Union address no more. I mean, if you listen to what it was supposed to do and what it has turned into, it's very clear that I'm not at all sure. As a State of the Union address, that particular tradition is relevant anymore. It's just, I mean, it's ugly these days. It doesn't bring us together, it doesn't unify the country. He gave us very little indication as to what and how he was gonna accomplish, what he wants to accomplish going on. and I have to say that in going through what he has accomplished, he made a lot of it up. You know, this is not what you do, what you should do, I mean.

Speaker 2 14:41

what'd he make up?

Speaker 14:44

Oh, percentages and numbers and how we have the best economy and everybody respects us. And, even beef, the price of beef is going down. Well, it's going down a little bit. So what I mean, it's not that and produce after produce, he began to discuss Yeah, they're, the prices aren't going down. They aren't going down. It's interesting, how many of the people. Who are watching that speech or even gonna think about going and checking it out. A few, written press and, television anchors and reporters have done some fact checking, whatever, whoever was a fact checker last night has got to be sleeping in this morning because it was really tough and there were really a lot of. Fake news involved in the President's speech.

Speaker 2 15:46

What does it tell you, about, the, Republican campaign, for the rest of the year? I thought the stuff about the Somalis, for example, was a, a very good tip off. he's, he's going to, take the racist route, you know, to, to, to try to win election another term.

Speaker 16:08

What it told me was that, the Republicans are scared of the lower enthusiasm. For their candidates. The polls are showing in comparison to Democratic enthusiasm about voting. What it told me was that they are banking on that base coming out, and I'm not sure that's enough right now because his base is dwindling almost dramatically and. I got the impression that there are particularly Republican candidates, congressional and Senate candidates, and particularly congressional, conservative Republican candidates who are very nervous about that because the base and the soft maga, or not even MAGA, republicans have a lot of issues that they don't agree on. It is true that, that the polls indicate that Republicans do support immigration reform, but by and large, they're not all that happy with the way it's being carried out. They

Speaker 2 17:23

were not happy with, the way Americans were shot down on the streets of,

Speaker 17:27

by the way, The name of the two Americans who were shot down in Minnesota weren't even mentioned.

Speaker 2 17:37

Oh, is that right,

Speaker 17:39

Uhhuh? I didn't hear it, did you?

Speaker 2 17:41

Now that you mentioned that No,, I should have noticed that that's a,

Speaker 17:45

you know, he whipped, he whipped Minnesota around for fraud. The Somalis, whatever, but no attention at all was paid to, the deaths that had been made by members of the, of ICE and other law enforcement agencies. I, this campaign mill, I mean, it's what, what I keep screaming about is how manipulative, Not unpolitical, but unprecedented. Again, given what this speech was supposed to do. I mean, did you see a single person of color who was spotlighted, who won a medal? I mean, he, he tossed out medals like Oprah tossed out under the seat gifts like tea chains, if you will. I thought that was glaring.

Speaker 2 18:44

No. No, he didn't. I don't know if he could have done it gracefully, nor did he mention what is driving his administration crazy right now. The Epstein affair.

Speaker 19:02

You bet. Well, I don't think there's any way he could have done it gracefully. He, it was obviously, a decision, a firm decision on the part of the president and his operation to stay as far away from that as possible, even to the point where the Secretary of Commerce, who is. Seen has been seen as lying about his relationship with Epstein to a point. Sat there right in there, in front of him, in the audience what Epstein files?

Speaker 2 19:36

With all these things hanging in the Epstein files, the, racism of his speech, All of that, it took the punch away from it. It was distracting. It didn't do what, I don't know what they wanted him to, do or accomplish, but it didn't really do much and it certainly did not set a, pathway. For the Republicans, in the next few months, I mean, where are they going? What are they gonna do for candidates? on and

Speaker 20:12

on. Well, you know what I think that, the Republicans were looking to the President to do was to say things that would raise the president's. Approval numbers, even on issues that were his strong issues in the two campaigns that he won. He's underwater very badly underwater, and the midterm elections are at least a referendum on the president and how far the president has gone and is loved, in the first two years. His term, and I think there is some nervousness on the part of the Republicans, and I think that if not Maga. The kind of fractured Republican party, the maga, the non-ag, the independence, which are going to be very important in this election. And he's right, Trump is just right between them. And the conservatives who are not MAGA are worried that if they don't go along with him, that they will be primaried by. A MAGA conservative and the MAGA conservatives are worried that he's gonna move too close to the center to gain or reach, I guess, reconstruct the Trump Coalition. I would wanna be where, incumbent, defending a swing district is who is Republican in a swing district right now. But it all this, you know what this was supposed to have done for the Republicans this time was to restart their engine, the momentum to inch up the approval ratings for the guy who's heads the party for the guy who promised all these things that have not really been delivered by the guy who's just been mean and nasty. Which is lovely for some people and terribly excruciating for others, it's, you know,

Speaker 2 22:37

I was,

Speaker 22:38

I just wanna scream

Speaker 2 22:40

before you do, you know, as, as this speech got well into the two hour mark and all that, I could not help. Watching, the Vice President, oh, as he listened there was two people there, there was the speaker who is such a, you know, he's such a tool of Trump. I mean, and it is embarrassing. And he comes from Louisiana and God, you think of l Louisiana's great fighting, great food, fun. Vibrant and all of that. And here's this, person who has none of those things. And next to him was the vice president, vice president of Mass. He had a look on him through the whole speech of like, what is this guy himself doing

Speaker 23:38

I said, maybe he was just picturing himself doing it.

Speaker 2 23:42

It was a look of, bewilderment. I, I may be the only person who noticed it,'cause, nobody commented on it, but, A look of bewilderment, bewilderment and dismay,

Speaker 23:54

dismay. I just thought this giggling. I thought they were both giggling. Whether or not they believed in what they were giggling over. I just think they. Believe they were being responsive to the boss is what I believed. you know, oh, let's laugh at this. Although it's really not that funny and I don't think they had any idea how it was coming across on the tube. And it was coming across a little bit snarky, I thought.

Speaker 2 24:26

They were there, were smirks involved in their reaction as well as giggles. Well, if I had been Trump, I would've, afterwards, I would've said to somebody, Hey, what's with those two guys? They were not enjoying my speech.

Speaker 24:44

Oh, see, I think just the opposite. They were trying to project the message that they were enjoying. His joking and his observations, and we love you, boss. That's what I thought.

Speaker 2 25:03

It's an unfortunate, position she was placed in, but, the governor who gave the reply, did a very nice job. What do you think of how she

Speaker 25:14

did Abigail Span Berger? I was very impressed with her. I mean, what I saw, I think it was a brilliant idea to position her with a live audience in the house of Burgesses in Virginia, in Williamsburg. Good message of history there. People were there able to react. To what she was saying. I'll admit she was no, Mario Rubio, remember his response to the State of the Union address where he slid across the stage to get a bottle of water and slid back again. She was articulate. I think she was credible. I think her speech. Could have been written and most likely was written even before his speech was given, because she really did seem to be able to answer some of his, shall we say, misstatements? She focused it on the people out there beyond the TV cameras, and it was not focused on Abigail. Berger as, I guess Trump really. He, he really didn't share the spotlight with his fellow Republicans more than I've ever seen before. But still, it was mainly about what Trump did as opposed to what the President and even just the Republicans in Congress did. it was, and boy, I loved the pin that she wore. I won it the. The American flag. Beautiful gold and jeweled American flag pin. I thought that was pretty cool and it was a larger American flag than I have ever seen any male speechmaker wear, so I like that too. Which reminds me, I wanna talk about the fact that, the mayor and the US men's. Hockey team got all this coverage, but the women's hockey team did a good job of saying no. I think

Speaker 2 27:36

I did too. I mean the, the idea of the, US male hockey team, being props for, for Trump, was, a little offensive, of course he or his, cohorts, would not mention the women's hockey team because they don't believe women should be playing hockey or should be in the Olympics. The use of all the props, was, phony. I'm saying this, you know, he was honoring some really heroic people.

Speaker 28:09

Yeah, he was.

Speaker 2 28:11

People he gave medals to. They were really heroic and, Proud to, that, that they were, in the service in those difficult situations. As a senior I was very glad to see the three of the honorees were a hundred years old thinking, Hmm, I've got some time to go.

Speaker 28:33

go do a helicopter over Vietnam.

Speaker 2 28:35

But the use of them as props had a really a, a game show. type of Trump thing. It looked phony.

Speaker 28:45

Well, he spent, he spent far more time on that than he did about, than he did on policy. Nowhere did I see any indication of where the money was gonna come from for all of these programs that he threw out. I think one of the reasons that his speech was almost two hours long and broke his own record for the longest speech, although it wasn't technically a, a. State of the Union address it. It was his first addressed as president, and that's not officially a state of the union. But I mean, that speech could have been given with more zeal, could have been given faster and could have been shortened quite a bit by not having, I didn't even count the number of, guests who were introduced. And it again, I don't think George Washington had anybody in the audience that he had get up and get awarded a medal. No, that is not what the state of the Union was supposed to be.

Speaker 2 29:50

Well, it was what he wanted it to be. And of

Speaker 29:54

course,

Speaker 2 29:55

like the Trump Kennedy

Speaker 29:56

Center

Speaker 2 29:58

watching, watching it and

Speaker 30:00

the ballroom

Speaker 2 30:03

watching it and thinking of everything that's happened, that's what he wanted to have. And that's the midterm election campaigns right there. We saw it. Absolutely. It's not going to change. he liked it. They laboriously put it together. Steven Miller, our favorite villain, was involved in the speech writing. it, so, hey, that's gonna be it. Enjoy it or hate it, but that's what we're gonna be dealing with. For a few years,

Speaker 30:36

apparently he's going out on the road, the president is going out on the road and what he pitches out on the road will have come from what he did in the State of the Union address. And there's no getting around that. That is exactly right. And it'll be an interesting debate. it will, the framework he delivered last night. Attract more people than the framework that the Democrats and the only one I, well, affordability, whatever that means. and yuck on Trump. Which one will voters be drawn to? I don't know. I dunno. It all depends on the economy, obviously. It all depends on. I guess things that are out of control of the president and his people. It, it depends on how Americans feel about their country and right now they ain't feeling so good. And I have to say, I don't see how his rhetoric, he's proposals move. The majority of Americans, I don't see how they move anybody and may not even move the MAGA people, the staunch MAGA people.'cause they're the ones that are going to be hurt dramatically by all of the cuts and programs administration is proposing.

Speaker 2 32:13

And I think that'll go down as the, Real failure of this, so-called State of the Union speech, his real failure to come to grip with the, issues that are really bothering, Americans as Bamberger did in her, in her reply exactly. Very, very, Kitchen oriented. I mean, it's like with Trump,. All the things. He ignored it. It's like FDR giving his inaugural in 1933 and not mentioning the depression,

Speaker 32:54

depression bra boy Ky that does it. That's the nut graph right there. And it and it, and it is. It is totally true. Could you ever picture. Donald Trump getting up there as Bill Clinton did and saying, I feel your pain. He wouldn't know. He wouldn't care. It's his pain that is paramount to him.

Speaker 2 33:23

That's

Speaker 33:23

right. To Trump.

Speaker 2 33:25

Well, Sherry, let's, let's, Come back at'em.

Speaker 33:28

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2 33:28

Next week. Here we go.

Speaker 33:31

We haven't even dug in yet, bill. Well, everybody cheers.

Speaker 2 33:36

Cheers to y'all. Bye-bye