Joe Biden steps up a groove

The Democrats in Congress must have sighed with relief. Joe Biden was positively upbeat and bouncy. You could mostly hear what he was saying and when he got heckled he handled it. The annual State of the Union address is always a big challenge for the encumbent president but especially for Biden because he speaks so quietly and has a habit of saying something slightly skewed or plain wrong. His speech wasn't perfect but he sounded like a president ought to sound and he bashed Trump as often as he could although, bizarrely, he didn't actually mention him by name but referred to him as his predecessor. We had all the democracy versus dictatorship stuff and a wonderful reminder to the assembled elected that Trump had recently called on Putin to do what he liked to Nato nations who didn't pay their way. This, Biden said censoriously, was "unacceptable". So it was a good night for the president and a demonstration to Democratic doubters that he wasn't yet an old git dying for a cup of hot cocoa and bedroom slippers. The Biden/Trump battle is going to be a helluva slanging match.