During last night’s State of the Union address, President Bush again “forcefully defended his unpopular decision to send more U.S. troops to Iraq.” At one point, President Bush claimed that redeploying from Iraq would produce a “nightmare scenario” in the Middle East, and that to “allow that to happen would be to ignore the lessons of September the 11th and invite tragedy.”

While House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and much of the rest of the audience stayed seated, Vice President Dick Cheney gave the rhetoric a standing ovation.

Watch it:

A photo close-up: Read more

Mike Tomasky balance a ticket nicely if the nominee is Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. I did another half-assed video saying it’s a bad idea!

As you’ll see, no hoodie. I only have the one and I can’t wear it everyday, so if you want more hoods you’ll need to get me that Christmas present you meant to send back in December.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has approved a nonbinding measure opposing President Bush’s Iraq plan, stating escalation is “not in the national interest of the United States.”

The junior senator from Massachusetts says he won’t run for president. I know that everyone, myself included, has sort of treated Kerry’s 2008 aspirations as a bit absurd and under the circumstances it’s probably better that he spare himself the humiliation. That said, it seems to me that there’s no reason whatsoever to believe that Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barack Obama, or Mark Warner would actually do a better job of being president and at least a some reason to think Kerry (who, after all, has dramatically more experience in governing) would be better than any of them.

Obviously, though, very little about our presidential nomination process is designed to generate nominees who are likely to make good presidents.

(Our guest blogger, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), is a member of the Finance Committee and author of Positively American: Winning Back the Middle-Class Majority One Family at a Time)

In his speech last night we heard the President talking the bipartisan talk, but the substance of the speech shows he has yet to walk the bipartisan walk. Just about every one of the President’s proposals falls within the narrow ideological contours that the voters rejected in 2006. He has learned very little.

There’s certainly a lot to criticize in the President’s speech and in his record, but I don’t think that’s the only thing we should be focusing on. We must get beyond the President’s disingenuousness and failures. In 2008, we must have our own sharp, clear and progressive plan if we are going to prevail.

That’s what I hope my new book Positively American: Winning Back the Middle-Class Majority One Family at a Time will do. The first part of the book describes some war stories — my improbable Senate election in 1998 and the next to impossible take-over of the Senate this past fall — and includes colorful anecdotes to describe where, as a country, our political process stands. A lot of it boils down a to large group of American voters who are too often ignored by too many of us: the middle-class.

President Bush won the 2004 election with eight words that spoke to this group: War in Iraq. Cut Taxes. No gay marriage. Each was connected to a larger, deeply held value that the conservative movement had been developing — and advocating — for a generation.

In the lead-up to 2008, progressives must develop our own eight words. Read more

ThinkProgress is keeping track of where every member of Congress stands on escalation. Using media reports, press releases, and submissions from hundreds of readers, we’ve compiled an interactive tally showing every member’s position. We just updated the tally: 462 members are now on the record.

But we still need your help. Dozens of officials have either said nothing publicly about escalation or are explicitly refusing to state their position. Call your members of Congress now and ask their position, then email their response to:

without additional tax cuts for businesses, MSNBC reports. The House approved a stand-alone increase in the minimum wage on Jan. 10.