I’ve watched hundreds of speeches by Obama and I didn’t think last night’s was in the upper half for effectiveness. But the American people apparently saw things more positively.
WASHINGTON (CNN) – A new national poll indicates that two-thirds of those who watched President Obama’s address to a joint session of Congress reacted favorably to his speech.
Sixty-eight percent of speech-watchers questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey Tuesday night had a very positive reaction to the president’s address, with 24 percent suggesting they had a somewhat positive response and 8 percent indicating they had a negative reaction.
Considering how full-throated Obama’s call for federal action was, the fact that only eight percent of the audience had a negative reaction is stunning. I think the Republicans will now have to reassess basically everything about their political approach.
This part adds some context, of course, but doesn’t change the basic thrust of your argument:
So the numbers aren’t quite so high as that. But still – that’s pretty great.
Sadly, my experience was different. I was in a bar next to a group of young men making fun on the President. I wanted to say something really biting, but held my tongue.
It’s a shame in a way. I like the Republican’s current political approach and was hoping they’d keep going with it. For the next couple of years maybe.
what makes you think they won’t?
given their history, and that excruciatingly tone deaf response by jindal last night, l’m actually pretty sanguine about the chances of them continuing in the same vein.
once again proving einsteins’ bon mot: “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.
Well, I was trusting Boo who says they will have to. 🙂
if they want to win, mary, if they want to win.
They never have to…
the GOP has found their weapon to win back voters and Congress.
It’s TWITTER.
Really.
OMG. wonder what they twittered on the Jindal attempt.
Good luck Newt, Eric…so bereft you’re.
And don’t forget about their other new secret weapon: Hip-Hop!
…from the same report above:
I’d be curious to find out what the viewership was of the speech, as in 1 million? 12 million? Can’t really compare it to Bush’s State of the Union, or maybe you can, but if Obama can expand that viewership he really is gaining ground on the ears of Mainstreet.
33.6 Million watched on the broadcast networks. No data yet for cable channels. Also note that C-Cpan and PBS are not tracked because they are not commercial networks.
I watched on CSpan
“I’ve watched hundreds of speeches by Obama and I didn’t think last night’s was in the upper half for effectiveness.”
Felt the same way…sort of ‘eh’? And I think my reaction was because I’ve seen him speak live 4 times, and of course tons of times within the context of a campaign where the goal is to whip things up.
But most interesting to me was apparently the dial focus group testing that msnbc and othet networks did, wherein approval from McCain voters was as high as Dem voters. Clearly, Obama has a way of presenting liberal ideas in a very palatable context.
When you talk about effectiveness — Obama has given very few speeches even remotely like this one. You have to already be in office and already have some wind in your legislative sails to even think of giving such a speech. He’s only been in office a few weeks. When you say “effectiveness,” I get the impression you’re judging “effectiveness” according to some standard of pure rhetorical aesthetics. Speech qua speech.
It was a relatively plain, nuts-and-bolts style of deliberative oratory, aiming to convey information and inspire confidence. It was not epideictic (literary) oratory, like Peggy Noonan writes, or Obama himself (sometimes) in campaign mode, the kind of speech that sounds great but has little content. The effectiveness of last night’s speech should be judged by the public response to it — i.e. the polls. I thought they looked pretty damn good. But of course, we’re told that it wasn’t any better than Clinton or Bush with their first speeches. Except that the country was then not in any such dire straits as it is now.
92% seems like a major distortion. Not that it is wrong, but that it reflects only the answers from those who watched. It is doubtful the speech attracted many Republicans at all and surely fewer independents than Dems.
As somebody said, we’ll never know the real number who watched, because some of the media on which many watched it are not tracked. (For example, I myself watched it streamed over the Internet.) However, I suppose it would be possible to do a partisan breakdown of those who definitely did watch it, and a partisan breakdown of those who definitely didn’t watch it, and see how much difference there is between the two. I’m not sure it was a sextreme as you suggest; I bet lots of Republicans watched it and I see littl ereason why independents wouldn’t have watched it. It was a damn important speech. the guy is president of the USA, after all.