CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN?

If the speech seemed frequently strong and inspiring, and seemed like a campaign speech -- in fact, a 2008-style campaign speech -- I'd say it's because President Obama seems to know he has about as much power to get this agenda enacted right now as he did four years ago, when he wasn't president yet. When you're not president, you run through a lot of promises you'd like to deliver on, though you know you may never even get the opportunity. Obama is president, but he's in the same position -- he can't get much done. In his State of the Union addresses in 2010 and 2011, you felt that he didn't quite believe that everything he wanted to do would run into a brick wall; now he seems to know better. So it's as if he was talking tonight about what could be the way a challenger does. Hell, why not? Republicans ran the country four years ago and Republicans run the country now. We still need hope and change.