"A group of young political junkies gathered in Lower Manhattan Monday evening to watch as the president delivered his final State of the Union address. As NY1’s Lily Jamali reports, they were living proof that birds of a feather don’t always flock together.
A group of young professional New Yorkers took in President George W. Bush’s final State of the Union address Monday night, and like the audience at the speech itself, the party was bi-partisan.
“The way I see is it’s like a group of Red Sox fans came to a Yankee bar to watch the game,” said Living Liberally executive director Justin Krebs. “We’re not all gonna be on the same side on this one, but were all gonna enjoy the experience together.”
“It was actually really exciting to watch the State of the Union with people,” said Sandra Coudert.
While she had fun, Coudert says she didn’t like what she saw.
“I’ve never really felt such a contentious State of the Union. It’s been years. It was appallingly partisan,” said the registered Democrat.
What the liberals in the crowd called “partisan,” Republicans seemed to like.
“I thought it was pretty good,” said Republican Chris Matthews. “I thought the beginning was much more powerful, a little forceful on his plans for the coming year, but I thought it sort of dwindled from there.”
Regardless of their beliefs, the idea was to get people who don’t always agree to at least talk.
“We tend to sit with our own crowd or flock to watch these kind of speeches. We kind of thought, why don’t we just get everybody together to kind of see what the other guy’s about, see what their perspective is about, offer our own perspective and kind of challenge our own,” said Jason Page of Generation Engage.
But no matter what their political stance, among the spectators there seemed to be an eagerness to look ahead.
Reporter: Are you a fan of [Bush]?
Matthews: In the early years, yes. But as the years have gone by, less and less so.
“I appreciated tonight’s speech. I appreciated George W. at least talking about how he’d like to bring the troops home and having an initiative towards that. But I’m looking forward to a change as well,” said Democrat Margaret Mockbee.
