get up.

a moment of clarity.

words.

"...What came as more of a surprise was the President’s over-all tone, which clearly reflected his recent successes in doing an end run around Congress on immigration policy, reaching a deal on climate change with China, reversing U.S. policy toward Cuba, and seeing his approval ratings rise on the back of good economic news. From the beginning, his language was much more celebratory than in his previous State of the Union speeches. “We are fifteen years into this new century,” he said. “It has been, and still is, a hard time for many. But tonight, we turn the page.” There followed a litany of indicators showing that things are going right in the Union: a growing economy, shrinking deficits, a falling unemployment rate, millions fewer people without health insurance, an end to the combat mission in Afghanistan. “America, for all that we have endured, for all the grit and hard work required to come back, for all the tasks that lie ahead, know this: the shadow of crisis has passed, and the State of the Union is strong,” he said.

The President wasn’t merely upbeat. He was self-assured, glib, and, at times, bordering on bumptious. “

...In fact, he now seems quite comfortable with embracing partisanship and economic populism. Until the end of the speech, when Obama circa 2004 put in a cameo appearance, he had provided a welcome glance of the Obama whom many Democrats believed they had elected in 2008: progressive, impassioned, and persuasive. “Where was this economic Obama in 2009?” the documentary filmmaker Alex Gibney asked on Twitter. That’s a question that historians will certainly ponder. Last night, though, the President showed up and staged a successful occupation of Capitol Hill."

THE NEW YORKER: Obama Occupies Capitol Hill