What People Are Saying About Biden's SOTU Address

President Biden delivered his third and possibly final State of the Union address Thursday night—and the fired-up president may have dispelled some concerns about his age. Supporters praised the president as feisty and combative, while detractors slammed the address as overly partisan—but not as low-energy.

• Tim Dickinson, Rolling Stone: Biden "entered the evening with a long list of thorny topics to navigate, and he did so with unexpected vigor and agility," Dickinson wrotes. His "energetic performance foiled detractors who were hoping for a demented man's addled gaffe-fest."

• Garrett Haake, NBC News: "The Biden campaign should consider having the president travel with a bunch of booing House Republicans when he goes out on the campaign trail. He seems energized by playing the heel, WWE-style."
• Jonathan Lemire, Politico: "Biden delivered a vigorous and rapid speech for 67 minutes at high volume. He had some stumbles but also delighted his staff with the way he jostled with Republicans. He painted himself as an experienced, steady hand, even if he was getting long in the tooth."
• Doug Schoen, Fox News: Biden's "fiery, combative, and extremely partisan speech" answered the question of whether he's able to run for re-election, "but only for those Democratic and Democratic-leaning independents who are inclined to vote for the incumbent president," Schoen writes. "For the rest of the electorate, the speech was decidedly unremarkable as the 80-minute performance was an argumentative and divisive list of partisan proposals and accomplishments."

• Peter Baker, New York Times: "This was not Old Man Joe," Baker writes. "This was Forceful Joe. This was Angry Joe. This was Loud Joe. This was Game-On Joe." Biden delivered "one of the most confrontational speeches that any president has offered from the House rostrum, met by equally fractious heckling from his Republican opponents," writes Baker, who has covered 23 State of the Union addresses.
• Wall Street Journal editorial board: "His address was one long, divisive pep rally for Democrats," the board writes. "Most such speeches make at least an attempt at reaching across the aisle, if only as a gesture. This one had none, not even on the issue of aid to Ukraine where he most needs Republican support."
• David Von Drehle, Washington Post: For people who wanted to know what Biden plans to do about a "world in flux," this was a "mediocre" speech, and "as an overture to the general election, Biden's speech was stunningly aggressive," Von Drehle writes. But: "Job one for Team Biden was to put an end to murmurs in the Democratic Party about somehow pushing the old man out of the car. The State of the Union—for decades an event in search of a purpose—managed that."

(More State of the Union address stories.)