POTUS SOTU's NOTICE
February 7, 2023 5:35 PM   Subscribe

In about half an hour, President Joe Biden will be making his second State of the Union address -- the first before a divided Congress, and widely seen as a soft-launch for his 2024 re-election campaign. Watch on YouTube (PBS), or check out Politico's cheat sheet for an advance transcript, background, and analysis. More: NYT: Biden’s State of the Union Prep: No Acronyms and Tricks to Conquer a Stutter - Politico: Biden’s 2022 State of the Union report card: Where he delivered — and fell flat - FiveThirtyEight: In Defense Of The Mostly Pointless State Of The Union - AP: U2′s Bono, family of Tyre Nichols’ among Jill Biden’s guests - State of the Union 2023: Who is the designated survivor? (unannounced at press time!) - Republican response: newly-elected Arkansas governor (and former Trump press secretary) Sarah Huckabee Sanders - Rep. Delia Ramirez to give progressive's response - Don't forget MeFi Chat for live reactions!
posted by Rhaomi (68 comments total) 11 users marked this as a favorite
 


George Santos being named the Designated Survivor is the only reality I will accept at this point.
posted by delfin at 6:06 PM on February 7, 2023 [9 favorites]


Santos should have invited his mother to represent 9/11 first responders.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 6:09 PM on February 7, 2023 [18 favorites]


Thank you thank you thank you.
posted by y2karl at 6:11 PM on February 7, 2023 [1 favorite]


Black '1870' pins to be worn by Congress members for State of the Union have deep significance
As President Biden approaches the lectern for Tuesday’s State of the Union speech to address the country’s top issues before Congress, members of the Congressional Black Caucus and other Democrats will be making a bold statement of their own — albeit a silent one.

Many of them will be wearing black pins with the number “1870” on them, which marks the year of the first known police killing of an unarmed and free Black person that occurred in the United States. The pins are a call for action on reforming the institution of policing that has killed thousands of Black people in the 153 years since.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:16 PM on February 7, 2023 [31 favorites]




Shame on us for disrespecting George Santos, who taught Helen Keller how to read and write, discovered penicillin, and stuck his second vault on an injured leg to bring the “Magnificent Seven” women’s gymnastics team to Olympic gold in 1996.

I keep reading that “Sanders” will deliver the rebuttal, and my brain writes a bunch of fanfic before I remember it’s not that Sanders.
posted by armeowda at 6:26 PM on February 7, 2023 [24 favorites]


Oy, that camera pan to Fetterman when Biden started talking about the fear Americans have of experiencing an unexpected medical crisis.....christ, they won't give that guy a break.
posted by coffeecat at 6:31 PM on February 7, 2023 [8 favorites]


Rhaomi: Labor Secretary Marty Walsh is the “designated survivor”...

Boston's own! I hope he's in an Irish bar in Southie drinking Sam Adams on an open tab and playing darts for money, and blithely ignoring all the GOP posturing.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:33 PM on February 7, 2023 [14 favorites]


Marty Walsh, rumor has it, is also leaving the administration soon to be the executive director of the NHL Player's association.
posted by dismas at 6:35 PM on February 7, 2023 [3 favorites]


Walsh is on his way out, anyway.

Biden Labor Secretary Marty Walsh to become head of NHL players union
Labor Secretary Marty Walsh will leave his post in the Biden administration to become head of the NHL players’ union, sources confirmed to NBC News on Tuesday.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:36 PM on February 7, 2023 [1 favorite]


jinx
posted by dismas at 6:38 PM on February 7, 2023 [2 favorites]


Let's see how much more money he wants to give the police this time!
posted by Gadarene at 6:42 PM on February 7, 2023 [4 favorites]


Love to see productive healthy debate return to the House floor.
posted by Rhaomi at 6:43 PM on February 7, 2023


Wild bit of political judo to get Repubs to cheer against cutting entitlements.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:44 PM on February 7, 2023 [22 favorites]


Twice, Greene just called Biden a liar. Twice!
posted by dobbs at 6:48 PM on February 7, 2023


Is Bernie the only one wearing a mask? (Admittedly, I don't remember how this compares to last year)
posted by coffeecat at 6:58 PM on February 7, 2023 [8 favorites]


It's a weirdly call and response SOTU
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:05 PM on February 7, 2023 [2 favorites]


Inviting a heroic guest named Brandon and then not saying The Thing, you sly dog you.
posted by Rhaomi at 7:06 PM on February 7, 2023 [14 favorites]


Remember when a single one of these chucklefucks saying "you lie!" was a showstopping national scandal?
posted by Rhaomi at 7:14 PM on February 7, 2023 [28 favorites]


The way I recall the whole sequence: news establishments gasped like perturbed parliamentarians and scoffed about it for maybe a week, and then the outburst was a nothingburger.

I wish it was something. Mayhaps Trump wouldn’t have been elected as a consequence.
posted by JoeXIII007 at 7:27 PM on February 7, 2023 [1 favorite]


I don't think I've ever seen anyone clap as begrudgingly as McCarthy did for people not being murdered by the police.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 7:27 PM on February 7, 2023 [13 favorites]


I want to see an annotated version of this speech.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:30 PM on February 7, 2023


Joe does not rush to leave a room.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:38 PM on February 7, 2023 [6 favorites]


ChurchHatesTucker: "I want to see an annotated version of this speech."

Politico is updating their transcript with notes and analysis
posted by Rhaomi at 7:38 PM on February 7, 2023 [7 favorites]


And he's out.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:43 PM on February 7, 2023


S. H. Sanders gives the "response." Mostly culture war stuff.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:51 PM on February 7, 2023 [3 favorites]


She has a weird story about going to Iraq and a soldier (who addressed her a Sarah) giving her the patch off his uniform. All that was missing was the tears in his eyes.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:04 PM on February 7, 2023 [10 favorites]


Meanwhile: Pa. Democrats win 3 Allegheny County special elections -- and control of the state House - Democratic Underground
While votes were still being counted late Tuesday night, initial returns showed all three Democrats enjoying commanding leads that would be almost impossible for Republicans to overcome — in one case by more than 85 percentage points.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:18 PM on February 7, 2023 [29 favorites]


CNN instant poll of speech watchers:

34% positive response
38% somewhat positive
28% negative

The combined 72% overall positive response is marginally lower than previous addresses from Biden, Trump, Obama, and Bush
posted by Rhaomi at 8:36 PM on February 7, 2023 [2 favorites]


I know all the CNN commentators (except the Republican guy) were just so enthusiastic about the fire Biden demonstrated and his sharpness. Yes, but they completely ignored how he stumbled over words, missed saying people's names (or mispronounced them), and slurred things together. I know he suffers from stuttering and that has to be taken into account during any of his speeches, but honestly, I thought he came off poorly and somewhat feebly.
posted by sardonyx at 8:47 PM on February 7, 2023 [1 favorite]


More! Some good old fashioned persuasion at work:

71% say Biden's policies move the country in the right direction (up from 52% before the speech)
29% say wrong direction

66% say his economic policies specifically are the right direction (up from 50% before the speech)
34% say wrong direction
posted by Rhaomi at 8:49 PM on February 7, 2023 [8 favorites]


Common enthusiasm for reform of dark patterns and privacy stuff was surprising. We'll see if it persists when it comes time to actually legislate.
posted by snuffleupagus at 9:26 PM on February 7, 2023 [8 favorites]


Cool! Do I have healthcare yet?

Oh. Alright, maybe next year then.
posted by 7segment at 9:37 PM on February 7, 2023 [15 favorites]


are we at war with balloons yet?
posted by clavdivs at 9:59 PM on February 7, 2023 [8 favorites]


I know he suffers from stuttering and that has to be taken into account during any of his speeches, but honestly, I thought he came off poorly and somewhat feebly.

I was expecting a lot more flubs, so I had the exact opposite reaction. He did a lot stronger than what I thought he was capable of. Very easy breezy as far as State of the Union speeches go, and confident. It makes sense that it got good reviews.

Seconding what ChurchHatesTucker said above, making the republicans stand up and clap for not cutting social security was a thing of beauty.

I also appreciated the pause-and-no-sell reaction to the first "you lie" tantrum. I could almost hear him think "Anyways..." and continue the speech.
posted by ishmael at 10:23 PM on February 7, 2023 [14 favorites]


The war with balloons is a personal war not needing tax dollars siphoned from our pockets.

All Americans, North and South alike, are reaching for their pincushions for pins purchased without the aid or approval of their neighbors, ready to fend off the inflated ministrations of the Mao-denying usurpers.
posted by skyscraper at 10:29 PM on February 7, 2023 [6 favorites]


I experienced a brief bit of grim enjoyment as I watched the grudgingly-elected Speaker of the House be congratulated by a man he intends to destroy over the next two years.

Also some schadenfruede at watching McCarthy visibly shush his fellow adults in the Republican Party. More than once.
posted by JDC8 at 10:33 PM on February 7, 2023 [7 favorites]


making the republicans stand up and clap for not cutting social security was a thing of beauty

Republicans will count on the public forgetting, and the public will forget once the market starts climbing back up and people get greedy. Repubs already tried grooming MSNBC viewers, of all people, on the idea of privatizing Social Security.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:35 PM on February 7, 2023 [4 favorites]


Also, my local PBS stream had technical issues and cut out during Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech.

As an antidote, here is Jonathan Capeheart on PBS sharing his reaction to her speech. I am in complete agreement with Capeheart, and I think he's done an excellent job of carrying on the legacy of the late Mark Shields.
posted by JDC8 at 10:47 PM on February 7, 2023 [3 favorites]


Republicans will count on the public forgetting, and the public will forget once the market starts climbing back up and people get greedy. Repubs already tried grooming MSNBC viewers, of all people, on the idea of privatizing Social Security.

Too true. Though I wouldn't be mad if a campaign were to use clips of republicans getting up to clap against them.
posted by ishmael at 10:48 PM on February 7, 2023 [2 favorites]


Also, my local PBS stream had technical issues and cut out during Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech.

I cut out during Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech because of my low tolerance for hateful gibberish.

The President did stumble over a few words, but he did a better job of managing his disability than I do on a lot of days, and I think he was still able to make himself understood OK.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 11:20 PM on February 7, 2023 [13 favorites]


watched the grudgingly-elected Speaker of the House be congratulated by a man he intends to destroy over the next two years.

It's always been this way.

"AND NOW, FRIENDS AND COUNTRYMEN, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?..."She has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart.
She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama the European world, will be contests of inveterate power, and emerging right....But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.

She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.

She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example....The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force....

She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit....

[America’s] glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind. She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is, Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her Declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice."

-John Quincy Adams. Speech to the U.S. House of Representatives on Foreign Policy, July 4, 1821.
posted by clavdivs at 11:46 PM on February 7, 2023 [5 favorites]


The bit with MTG's "Liar!" is really interesting for what goes on rhetorically—it's kind of a complicated set-up on both sides. Both WaPo and Politico note that he overstated in making one Rick Scott into "some republicans [who] want Medicaid (?) and Social Security to sunset. I am not saying that it is a majority." He responds to MTG with "Anybody who doubts it, contact my office and I will give you a copy of the proposal," and after more booing, he first indicates what the point of contention is: "That means if Congress doesn't keep the programs they way they are, those programs will go away." But as the WaPo analysis indicates, that's pretty clearly under dispute—Scott says his proposal is for new laws regarding the programs, not the programs themselves.

(But one might see how it would be an easy rhetorical move for Republicans to make from sunsetting new laws to sunsetting the programs: yes, that's a nice little bit of set-up on Scott's part, and so complex as to necessitate the necessary foreshortening of the argument on Biden's part.)

In fact, I think that's pretty clearly Biden already aware of some need to qualify it in his next sentence, right? "I don't think it is a majority of you, I don't even think it is significant. I am politely not naming them, but it is being proposed by some of you." So he backs off, after he performatively got what he wanted out of MTG. I think the statement was bait for her, or for someone at least. He clearly knows from past precedent that Boebert or MTG or whatever would-be Joe Wilson would do something of the sort, so he gave them the opportunity to do so over Medicare and Social Security, and then he gets the Democrats to cheer by changing the subject.

That's what it looks like to me, at least: "Folks, the idea is that we are not going to be moved into being threatened to default on the debt if we do not respond." He then treats it like the cheers he just got were about something everybody does already agree upon: in other words, he shifts the goal posts to a related-but-distinct topic, and then shifts them back. "So folks, as we all apparently agree, Social Security and Medicare off the books now, right?" And then he gets the Republicans to cheer for Medicare and Social Security by walking back his exaggeration of Rick Scott's proposal—doing a nice job, in the process, of rhetorically isolating Rick Scott from his colleagues.

If it's as calculated (OK, calculatedly artless-seeming; cf. rhetorical sprezzatura) as it looks, I'd say that right there is a master class in rhetorical misdirection in the Ciceronian mode.

* Disclaimer: I'm an academic, and I tend to overthink things.
posted by vitia at 12:34 AM on February 8, 2023 [27 favorites]


BBC here in London is reporting this as Biden with fire in his belly, very much up for the fight and effectively a confirmation that he'll run again in 2024. I haven't had a chance to see the speech myself yet, but do those who have think that's an accurate take? I'd love to think it is, but I've been hurt before.
posted by Paul Slade at 3:02 AM on February 8, 2023


During Biden's rhetorical two-step, watch VP Harris behind him - it's probably projection on my part, but she seems simultaneously awed and proud and gleeful at what he pulls off. Her eyes _shine_
posted by From Bklyn at 5:06 AM on February 8, 2023 [5 favorites]


Republicans will count on the public forgetting, and the public will forget once the market starts climbing back up and people get greedy. Repubs already tried grooming MSNBC viewers, of all people, on the idea of privatizing Social Security.

Republicans are counting on the so-called "liberal media" forgetting, and they are not far wrong in doing so. Even as above, the debate becomes "We are not proposing eliminating the program called "Social Security;" we are just proposing laws so that the program exists but no longer carries out its core function so you can't say we're trying to 'destroy' it, so there." And the media goes right along with it.
posted by Gelatin at 5:30 AM on February 8, 2023 [10 favorites]


I can't believe the mics and cameras are still on Biden. He's telling stories and jokes with former Supreme Court justices right now. (Twitter thread from HuffPo reporter reminding us that Biden is, at his core, one of the all-time great retail politicians)
posted by Etrigan at 6:47 AM on February 8, 2023 [6 favorites]


Both WaPo and Politico note that he overstated in making one Rick Scott into "some republicans [who] want Medicaid (?) and Social Security to sunset.

WaPo & Politico are full of shit. Scott may be the only Republican Senator willing to publicly declare right at this very moment his intentions to gut the social safety programs, but the right has been slavering to gut them for decades - arguably ever since they started, and if they can't kill them at the very least allow their financial Masters of The Universe buddies to get their hot little hands on all that sweet cash. Hell, Bush II tried to make privatizing Social Security a core platform of his second term.
posted by soundguy99 at 7:05 AM on February 8, 2023 [38 favorites]


Dagnabbit, I needed this last night. I thought it was a good speech. He was punchy and he seemed like he was having fun. Harris looked proud, supportive and delighted at different times. I thought the intro gave Republicans too much credit but that’s a very Biden move.

I understand the idea that he was trying to goad Republicans into saying they would not cut Medicaid but I wouldn’t trust them to keep their word.

All in all, I thought it was a strong speech. Sure, he tripped over some words but i think most people would after speaking for that long. He seemed confident and commanding while the GOP seemed like a crowd of rude hecklers.
posted by kat518 at 7:20 AM on February 8, 2023 [5 favorites]


Listening to this on the radio while driving, I was thinking did I just hear what I thought I did? It gives me some hope that Biden was able to play the Republicans before they even had an idea what was going it. It sounded masterful, and yes, the pundits thought so too - except NYT and Politico with their usual fake objectivity. Their corporate backers will be upset they may have to pay more taxes.Of course, the R fascists protested so loudly. They can't have the truth out in the open like that and neither apparently can much of the media.
posted by blue shadows at 7:29 AM on February 8, 2023 [5 favorites]


Remember, the Republicans have Frank Luntz, who is evil but good at his job. They focus group their messages to hellandgone. They will talk in public about social security reform because "eliminating Social Security" is a nonstarter, and so is "Social Secuirty privatization" (fortunately or otherwise, the market always seems to tank just as they try to get that ball rolling again, reminding people of the inherent risk).

And yes, so-called "elite political journalists" that pretend not to be aware that Republicans have opposed Medicare and Social Security since their inception, and that Republicans can be trusted to argue in good faith on the subject, are worse than incompetent; they're complicit.
posted by Gelatin at 7:34 AM on February 8, 2023 [7 favorites]


I agree with the general idea of what you are saying, vitia, that Biden set a rhetorical trap.

But as others have pointed out above, conservatives have been angling to dismantle Social Security since its inception.

The notion that it is only Rick Scott is extremely disingenuous framing by the Washington Post and Politico.

And recently, there have been a number of conservative pundits testing the waters with think pieces and interviews, like the Joy Reid interview with Byron Donalds that They sucked his brains out! linked above.
posted by ishmael at 7:48 AM on February 8, 2023 [2 favorites]


on preview, what Gelatin and soundguy99 said.
posted by ishmael at 7:55 AM on February 8, 2023 [2 favorites]


I don’t know if I can gift link this but I thought the NYT did a fairer job contextualizing the thing about Republicans wanting to sunset Medicare and Social Security.

TL; DR - “It is true that a couple of Republicans have previously suggested allowing those entitlement programs to sunset as mandatory spending, instead bringing them up for regular renewal. But Republicans have recently distanced themselves from such efforts. Speaker Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California, has said that cuts to Social Security and Medicare are “off the table” in talks over raising the debt ceiling, which Congress must vote to do in the coming month or risk a default on the government’s bills. Likewise, President Donald J. Trump has warned Republicans to leave the programs alone in the negotiations.”
posted by kat518 at 7:57 AM on February 8, 2023


Oh, for crying out loud. Republicans were "distancing themselves" from extremist rhetoric on abortion, too, claiming they only wanted to "return it to the states." That pretense lasted about two seconds after the Dobbs decision.

The NYT might point out that Republicans are aware that these positions are explosively unpopular, but that's all the more reason to be skeptical when Republicans "distance themselves" from positions they've advocated for decades.
posted by Gelatin at 8:07 AM on February 8, 2023 [26 favorites]


Speaker Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California, has said that cuts to Social Security and Medicare are “off the table” in talks over raising the debt ceiling, which Congress must vote to do in the coming month or risk a default on the government’s bills.

If you don't touch Social Security, Medicare, or the Pentagon, you'd need to cut around 75% of the current federal budget to fit under the current debt ceiling. McCarthy knows this. He's counting on it. It is the only thing that wakes him up in the morning.
posted by Etrigan at 8:17 AM on February 8, 2023 [2 favorites]


giving her the patch off his uniform

This definitely did not happen. This is some George Santos level shit.
posted by corb at 8:31 AM on February 8, 2023 [8 favorites]


Bear in mind, though, that that 75% would bite into spending that is popular with his constituents, such as farm and oil subsidies, for example.

For that matter, why are we even pretending that Republicans are sincerely interested in spending reduction? They have been skating on a wholly unearned reputation as "fiscal conservatives" -- code for "we prefer to cut taxes and spending, but when pressed we will do the former and not the latter," for decades. (Thank you very much again, so-called "liberal media," for lazily parroting the myth.)

The Republicans has a trifecta during TFG's first term, and the did pass a tax cut for the rich but precious little else. Republicans know that many spending cuts are unpopular and that you can't get there by eliminating "waste, fraud, and abuse" no matter what McCarthy says. They know that any spending cuts they propose now has no hope of passing the Senate, let alone Biden's veto pen, which is why they're making noise about it now, rather than back when they actually could have implemented what they claim they want.
posted by Gelatin at 8:33 AM on February 8, 2023 [8 favorites]


To be quite honest, I really don't care if the Trumpoids sit quietly, hoot and holler, applaud with vigor or throw tomatoes at Biden during these speeches. Okay, if they found reason to applaud I would be a bit concerned, but otherwise...

...Because no rhetorical trap, no turn of phrase, no performative outrage means anything to them or to their followers. As a simple example:

@MeidasTouch: On the left, Republican Senator Mike Lee feigns outrage during the State of the Union when President Biden suggests that some Republicans want to cut Social Security and Medicare.

On the right, Mike Lee says he wants to get rid of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.


They don't care about consistency, promises, public statements, logic or integrity because they do not have to care. If somehow given a viable opportunity to gut Social Security and Medicare like a fish, they will vote en masse to do so without hesitation. Some will disguise it as "reform," some will speak of unconstitutionality, some will shake their heads sadly and declare that they did not want to go there but the Democrats' recklessness FORCED them into this stand for fiscal sanity, some will preen for the cameras and declare ideological victory. They have learned the lesson, as personified most flagrantly by Jim Jordan, that all you have to do is reach a certain decibel level and your base will take anything you say on faith.

The tune may change from time to time. The dance steps never waver.
posted by delfin at 9:07 AM on February 8, 2023 [23 favorites]


There should be no "But" beginning your statement, Ishmael. You're not disagreeing with me: you're presenting a straw man. I had nothing to say in my comment about anyone's intent over Medicare and Social Security, but apparently framing it without the proper performative outrage set off the Metafilter need-to-mansplain-progressive-politics klaxon. As my parenthetical aside indicates, I'm well aware of the various maneuvers around what's going on. I'm amused that my attempt to restrict my comment to what was actually said in the SOTU alerted folks that I needed to be corrected about the facts of how evil all Republicans are and have always been. So much for that master class in Ciceronian rhetoric.
posted by vitia at 11:54 AM on February 8, 2023 [1 favorite]


Repubs want to destroy Social Security and Medicare, but to do so, they need the public on board. So they keep floating one or another repackaging of that idea, hoping something sticks.

It's like when they tried to undo ACA/Romneycare/Obamacare: the right finally luntzed on "repeal and replace" as their catchphrase, except that they didn't do the work on the "replace" part, so their efforts in the legislature and courts ultimately failed.

With privatization of Social Security, Republicans have friends in the financial sector waiting in the wings, ready to capitalize. It would be the largest transfer of public wealth to private hands in human history.

The trick is figuring out how to do it without the public caring, or better to convince them of the necessity of it, or tapping into the average American's greediness, or making some adjustments over time that slowly bleed the programs to death by a thousand papercuts. Or some mix of those, or other tactics, as long as it enriches Republican donors.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:00 PM on February 8, 2023 [4 favorites]


So much for that master class in Ciceronian rhetoric.

I mean, I guess you are reading it correctly and charitably, but Biden's weakness has been pointed out many times since he's been sworn in, in that he (possibly?) actually feels like he's swaying Republican Legislative hearts and minds by reaching across the aisle, and there's little proof of that.

That he does it again during his SOTU speech is not much of a surprise, and other than a measured bit of applause, the idea that's it's going to accomplish anything beyond is what is being argued. Or basically, why is he watering down every Democratic proposal to cajole to Republicans?
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:03 PM on February 8, 2023


I think Biden understands the optical value of making bipartisan gestures. A lot of the public still thinks bipartisanship is important.

But other things he's said in recent years have made it pretty clear, IMO, that he came to understand during his time as VP that the kind of bipartisanship that used to sometimes exist DC is gone now, with very few exceptions.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 12:11 PM on February 8, 2023 [4 favorites]


vitia,

Hm, maybe I misunderstood what you were saying. I was reacting to this bit:

Both WaPo and Politico note that he overstated in making one Rick Scott into "some republicans [who] want Medicaid (?) and Social Security to sunset.

And my point was that statement was a false premise. It wasn't just Rick Scott, as was framed by the Washington Post and Politico. Multiple conservative pundits have recently put out messaging to discredit Social Security.
posted by ishmael at 12:17 PM on February 8, 2023 [4 favorites]


Including Pence, who just a few days ago proposed leaving it in place for the olds, but giving the money so far collected back to the young’s so they could invest it themselves. Thus ending it entirely while placating the generation that voted Republican. Fortunately, he’s unelectable.
posted by zenzenobia at 9:00 AM on February 9, 2023 [4 favorites]


The tune may change from time to time. The dance steps never waver.

To the right, ever to the right,
Never to the left, forever to the right.

posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:21 PM on February 9, 2023 [1 favorite]




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