The press introduced the Obama presidency in 2008 as a unique moment in American history, and they’re hailing his exit in the same spirit.
Many journalists predicted this week that Tuesday’s State of the Union would be a historic and meaningful event, suggesting in multiple reports that it is likely the president’s major address before a joint meeting of Congress.
Anchors at network and cable television have also been careful to introduce news segments on Tuesday’s State of the Union address by stressing that it is “the last” one of Obama’s presidency, according to data collected by TV Eyes.
The press’ handling of Tuesday’s speech differs slightly from previous years, when coverage of the annual event merited little more than yawns and skepticism. There’s a certain amount of that same media treatment for President Obama’s 2016 address, to be sure, but coverage has also been tempered with rhetoric underscoring the historic nature of what some consider his farewell address to Congress.
In online journalism, for example, there has been no small amount of teary eyed retrospectives recalling some of Obama’s previous State of the Union moments.
“Yes, it’s true that there’s not a lot of excitement to be found at the president’s annual State of the Union address,” Politico reported Tuesday.
“But it’s also true that there’s always a little something special at each address that is remembered long after the president has delivered his missive,” it added, promising to take the reader on “a look at President Barack Obama’s past addresses and some of the memories that have endured.”
CNN said elsewhere of the address that Obama would try one last time to, “sell optimism to nervous nation.”
The New York Times, for its part, hyped the speech by speculating Obama may “set aside convention” by ignoring the usual list of goals and accomplishments and issue instead, “a grander call to arms on the major challenges facing the nation.”
However, despite some of the cheerier, excited reports, and suggestions that, unlike years past, the 2016 State of the Union address could actually be worth watching, the press still published a good deal of cynicism directed at the annual event.
“As a question of taste, the State of the Union is indefensible,” National Review’s Kevin Williamson wrote this week. “Somebody should kill this hideous and depraved dog-and-pony show. If not the next Republican president, then the speaker of the House, who has it within his power to simply decline to proffer an invitation to address Congress.”
“It would be a small and mainly symbolic — which is not to say insignificant — move toward restoring the proper balance in our government,” he added.
Network analyst and author Jeff Greenfield echoed these sentiments, writing in a Politico op-ed this week that the entire ordeal had become a “pointless tradition,” and a “lame, hugely irrelevant piece of political theater.”
