Live Bloggers on the prowl:
Glenn Reynolds - with link to speech text.
And for those who wish to participate:
Open thread comments on Wizbang
UPDATE: Perceptive comments on Vodkapundit:
7:50pm "The victory of freedom in Iraq..." will help bring victory in the GWOT. Why is that such a difficult thing for some people to see?
7:57pm Nope, nothing on that yet. Instead, no "artificial timetable." And to that I say: Good. Telling the bad guys when you'll leave tells them just how long they need to keep their heads down.
UPDATE: And one or two from the Instapundit, with instant punditry:
"THE ONLY FORCE POWERFUL ENOUGH TO STOP THE RISE OF TYRANNY AND TERROR, and to replace hatred with hope, is the force of human freedom. Our enemies know this, and this is why the terrorist Zarqawi recently declared war on what he called 'the evil principle of democracy.' . . . The advance of freedom will lead to peace."
Gotcher "root causes" approach right here! "Exit strategy," too!
He's spelling out the Bush Doctrine more clearly than he's done before.
NICE JOB. The inaugural was OK. This, on the other hand, was actually good, making it Bush's best speech ever, I think. He seems much more comfortable and relaxed, probably because of the Iraqi elections going so well. I think we're just figuring out just how much the Administration's plans turned on that. He bet on the Iraqi people, and he won.
UPDATE: Impression? Nice, concise, and sets the field for the upcoming policy debates. A nice feature in the bit on Social Security involved citing Democrats who have proposed some of the things he's considering as reform, like John Breaux, Danial Patrick Moynihan, and Bill Clinton.
And another nice gambit was the subtle challenge to Saudi Arabia and Egypt to begin their own more democratic reforms. Whether that begins to occur is certainly open for debate. But mentioning it in the State of the Union takes cojones.
UPDATE: And now Nancy Pelosi is calling for troop withdrawal. I guess she didn't get the chance to read this.
UPDATE: Wizbang has a roundup of reactions also.
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