Marco Rubio To Deliver Response To State Of The Union

February 7, 2013

Comments

Republicans have turned to one of their rising stars to deliver the response to next week’s State of the Union address:

Senator Marco Rubio will give the Republicans’ response to the State of the Union address, party leaders announced on Wednesday.

Mr. Rubio, a first-term senator from Florida, will deliver his speech in both English and Spanish, according to a news release from Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, and Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio, after President Obama appears before Congress on Tuesday.

The choice of Mr. Rubio, one of the most prominent Hispanic figures in the Republican Party, comes as the party has vowed to appeal more to Latino voters. Mr. Rubio, a Cuban-American, will address immigration as a way to help the economy, according to a Rubio aide, though the speech will focus more on the Republicans’ “commitment to limited government as the best way to help the middle class,” the news release said.

Rubio is an excellent public speaker so I doubt he’ll have the same problems that Bobby Jindal did in 2009. He may even come across very well. At the same time, though, the response to the State of the Union is always hampered by the fact that it simply doesn’t live up to the grandeur and pageantry of the President’s address. More often than not, it’s either remembered because it didn’t come across well at all, which is what happened to Rubio, or it gets lost in the coverage of the President’s speech.

8 responses to “Marco Rubio To Deliver Response To State Of The Union”

OzarkHillbilly

February 7, 2013 at 9:59 am

It figures that the GOP would give the worst job in national politics to a Hispanic.
C. Clavin

February 7, 2013 at 10:04 am

“…Republicans’ “commitment to limited government…”

What f’ing nonsense.
Actions speak louder than bullshit.
Republicans explode Government and spend massive amounts of money when they are in power.
Maybe if they stopped spewing this crap something could get done.
But if the opposition party is focused on unicorns and leprechauns we are all screwed.
Tsar Nicholas

February 7, 2013 at 10:24 am

Separate but related topic, one already can see how a political tragedy involving Rubio very well could unfold.

He spends the next three-plus years building a name for himself. Giving interviews. Making the rounds on the likes of “This Week” and “Meet the Press.” Building a donor base. Doing the Iowa dance. Retail politics.

Obviously a Rubio-Portman ticket, for example, would have at least a fighting chance. Perhaps even a good chance. Theoretically even a 50/50 chance. Rubio-McDonnell also would be a strong ticket. Rubio-Toomey. Probably a few other combinations too.

But then Rubio will get hit by the ton of bricks of a national GOP primary. And if you thought ’11-’12 was a farce just wait until ’15-’16. Quickly that incipient fiasco will devolve into a shrill pissing match about deportations and amnesties, abortion, evolution, gay marriage, vaccines, euthanasia, etc. Guaranteed. You can bet on it. The demographics of the GOP’s primary selectorate truly are horrific. Rubio, especially, will be caught in the crossfire.

It’s not entirely out of the question that instead of Rubio, an obvious choice if there ever was one, the GOP winds up in ’16 with a nominee so utterly unelectable that despite everything (the malaise economy, horrific unemployment, rampant benefits cuts, etc.) we nevertheless witness another Goldwater-style flameout.
al-Ameda

February 7, 2013 at 11:15 am

according to a Rubio aide, though the speech will focus more on the Republicans’ “commitment to limited government as the best way to help the middle class,”

I believe it’s more accurate this way:

according to a Rubio aide, though the speech will focus more on the Republicans’ “commitment to ~~limited~~ privatizing Social Security and Medicare, and eliminating the Mortgage Tax Interest Deduction as the best way to ~~help~~ thin the middle class takers,”
bk

February 7, 2013 at 3:49 pm

it’s either remembered because it didn’t come across well at all, which is what happened to Rubio

I assume (a) that you meant to say Jindal; and (b) that you proofread your legal documents more closely than you do your posts.
Just nutha’ ig’rant cracker

February 7, 2013 at 9:30 pm

@Tsar Nicholas: Wait a minute! “Rampant benefit cuts” are part of your team’s solution to the problem. This means that, come 2015, you don’t get to use suffering of the people due to cutting benefits as a campaigning point–no matter how much contempt you hold for the residents of “Zombieland.”
domenic stagno

February 9, 2013 at 5:17 pm

Marco Rubio is a trator to American Latino immigrants. He does not in any way represent American latinos.
He comes from a PRIVILEGED group of immigrant families!!! His family walked right into the US
because of currupt American politics that precipitated the Castro led Revolution in Cuba.
Because the American government and it’s big corrupt businesses that totally controlled all of Cuba, lost to Castro and the Revolutionaries, the US declared a vendetta against Castro which still s endures today in 2013.
Instead of negotiating with the Cuban government all these years the US goverment tried in every way to divide Cuba. The corrupt US immigration system gave Cubans a free ride into the US and called them persecuted refugees.
Marco Rubio’s family came with their money and just walked into the US and set up shop.
He does not look at other American Latino immigrants in the same way as he and his family.
Afterall he got his priviloeged status, “to hell with the poor immigrants who came out of desperation from other latin speaking nations who came illegally’ he has no warm place in his heart from them!
Npw that the mainstream Latino American population has spoken and re-elected Obama, the Republican party in a desperate effort, is offering Rubio as their savior. He is no Savior, he ias one of the entrenched good ole boys who speaks the same language as conservative Republicans. yes, we know he is now changing his tune because the Repubilcan party is so ostracized in American life, He is now pretending to be compassionate to illegal immigrants,
Don’t believe him , he is a wolf in sheeps clothing!!! He is in fact an unforgivable Hypocrite and is willing to lie to push the conservative Republican agenda and his own pathetic career!!!
domenic stagno

February 9, 2013 at 5:19 pm

@domenic stagno: