The numbers for the State of the Union is coming in, and its not rosy.
The early reports state that some 33.3 million people watched Obama give his speech. That number is the lowest since 2000 and Bill Clinton. Of course viewership of the speech has been going downhill anyways in an overall trend, and even Obama is not immune.
In Obama’s first year only drew 52.3 million, a low number for, what was then, a popular President.
The simple fact for these numbers is the State of the Union address has outlived its usefulness. In this day of constant news, internet, blogs, twitter and more the speech no longer has the same function as it did fifty years ago.
Back then people only had their local newspapers and word of mouth. News traveled slower and so on one night the President could address the entire nation to share his vision for the upcoming year.
Today, we hear about it constantly on three 24 hour news networks, hundreds of news sites, and thousands of blogs. You can always find some argument on twitter going on.
Even reactions to the speech are not longer as excitable. In fact some are even calling for the end of the SotU address, as I am.
Its an outdated speech that really needs to be retired again. In fact its only within the past 100 years that it became the standard to give a speech to Congress. Before it was a speech the President gave a written note to Congress.
Today’s speech is no longer what it was, and is more of a happy applause time than anything worthwhile. In today’s world, we no longer need a day for the President to address the country (he already does that enough on his own).
It time to retire the SotU.