"Based on a clear premise..." Posted by Heather Hurlburt

There's a larger philosophical point in this State of the Union that I think it's important to take on. 

If you're a realist, you believe that the clear premise behind American foreign policy is, or ought to be, American national interests.  If you're an idealist, you believe that the clear premise behind American foreign policy is, or ought to be, some statement of American shared or national values.

I tend to agree with those who have said that the US is at its best when its leaders combine those two impulses judiciously.  But elections by themselves just don't add up to either a core interest or a core value.  The list of nations he mentions make that point pretty well, as Max notes; a list of other nations who've had elections in recent years -- Pakistan, Egypt, Palestine, Kenya -- makes it too.

There are conservative, libertarian, and even neo-conservative, worldviews that have serious intellectual heft and must be reckoned with, even if one disagrees.  But this is just neocon lite.   

Comments

[Dan Kervick]

I really don't think there is any compelling reason for State of the Union speeches. The President should just deliver his constitutionally mandated report on the state of the union to the Congress, along with the proposed legislative agenda. They can be printed up and distributed, posted on the net and reported out fully in the newspapers. Enough is enough with these annual torture sessions.

I'm a fan of the State of the Union tradition. Presidents can always use the opportunity presented by a guaranteed national television audience and a full session of Congress to get a hearing for what they want to say, and in an entertainment-saturated media environment that's not without value.

It is of considerably less value if the President does not have anything he wants to say. Last night's speech was assembled and delivered only because the President felt under compulsion to do the speech. Virtually all of it was recycled, word for word, from statements the President has made many times before. The most optimistic gloss on the economy, the budget, Afghanistan, and Iraq was declared as reality. No one watching the speech would have learned anything new.

It was basically just a stump speech, pitched to the minority of Americans who still ad