"In presidential election years, his screaming bloviations on stage make the exercise of gathering the candidates together seem futile. In power, when he divorces facts from policymaking and relies instead on myth and grift to guide his decisions, he renders useless and impotent vast fields of expertise."
"The constitution mandates that the president provide periodic updates to Congress on the condition of the country. But nowhere does the constitution call for the kind of in-person, televised address that has become an annual staple of the presidency in the era of mass media."
"A rambling, nearly two-hour address that was heavy on falsehoods, ad libs, and digressions that sometimes seemed like bids to kill time and remarkably light on policy substance. Throughout the speech, Trump seemed tired. He had difficulty reading from his teleprompter; he gripped the podium with a tightness bordering on desperation."
Trump's approach to governance and public communication reveals the dysfunction of long-established political traditions. His State of the Union address exemplified this through a nearly two-hour speech lacking substantive policy proposals while emphasizing falsehoods, ad-libbed remarks, and personal grievances. The president appeared physically fatigued, struggling with teleprompter reading and displaying visible strain. His typical themes centered on immigrant criminality, opponent dishonesty, and personal resentments rather than concrete policy solutions. The speech contradicted itself on crucial issues and misrepresented facts. This performance raises questions about the continued relevance of constitutional mandates for presidential addresses and whether traditional institutions retain meaning when divorced from factual governance and policy substance.
#presidential-politics #state-of-the-union #political-discourse #fact-vs-fiction #democratic-institutions
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]