Shake­speare’s Sis­ter offers a short­er ver­sion:

Good evening…landmark day in the his­to­ry of liberty…democracy at the heart of the Mid­dle East…I know many Amer­i­cans have ques­tions about the cost and direc­tion of this war (but I’m not going to answer them—quick, over there, look at the spark­ly freedom!)…weapons of mass destruction…mass graves…global ter­ror­ist movement…perpetual war against America…9/11…(do they look scared again yet, Dick?)…stay the course…fight them over there…only two options before our country—victory or defeat…we remem­ber the words of the Christ­mas car­ol, writ­ten dur­ing the Civ­il War: “God is not dead, nor [does] He sleep; the Wrong shall fail, the Right pre­vail, with peace on Earth, good-will to men.”

Echid­ne’s ver­sion is even shorter: 

I’m the Merkin prez­dent. I went to war in Iraq on wrong grounds and it’s a mess but if you’re not for me you’re for the ter­ror­ists. Those who crit­i­cize me are to blame if the Iraqi exper­i­ment fails.

No men­tion of his ille­gal spy­ing on peo­ple like you and me. I did­n’t both­er lis­ten­ing because I knew he would just say the same things he’s been say­ing for weeks, and that has been the same emp­ty pablum we’ve been get­ting since before we invaded.

I used to make it my prac­tice not to miss a pres­i­den­tial address, and now I can bare­ly be both­ered to lis­ten to the State of the Union.

I want a Pres­i­dent who address­es me with this sort of hon­esty and forthrightness:

I am cer­tain that my fel­low Amer­i­cans expect that on my induc­tion into the Pres­i­den­cy I will address them with a can­dor and a deci­sion which the present sit­u­a­tion of our Nation impels. This is pre­em­i­nent­ly the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and bold­ly. Nor need we shrink from hon­est­ly fac­ing con­di­tions in our coun­try today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will pros­per. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself – name­less, unrea­son­ing, unjus­ti­fied ter­ror which par­a­lyzes need­ed efforts to con­vert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our nation­al life a lead­er­ship of frank­ness and vig­or has met with that under­stand­ing and sup­port of the peo­ple them­selves which is essen­tial to vic­to­ry. I am con­vinced that you will again give that sup­port to lead­er­ship in these crit­i­cal days.

There are prob­lems fac­ing us today, and we don’t need pablum, we need straight talk and real solu­tions. Roo­sevelt had pro­grams in place 100 days after he promised action. I’ve been wait­ing for two and a half years for George Bush to do some­thing. All I have to show for it is 31,000 dead Iraqis, 2155 dead Amer­i­can sol­diers, 201 dead sol­diers from oth­er coun­tries, and my phone calls and emails on a hard dri­ve at Ft. Meade.

“Tell Me Why You Like Roo­sevelt” by Blind Williams Con­nie from the album Philadel­phia Street Singer (1950, 2:49).