I have worked with, known, and continue to admire many lovely, talented speechwriters. In general, I have nothing against speechwriters. But some of them really need to get a little more outside-the-Beltway perspective. Their tone-deafness makes their boss look bad. The New York Times spotlights White House scribes toiling away on the State of the Union address:

Most Americans think of President Bush as the commander in chief. His speechwriters have another name for him: the editor in chief.

“He always wants it to be logical and straightforward,” William McGurn, the chief White House speechwriter, said in a hurried telephone interview on Friday, just four days before the State of the Union address. “That’s his big obsession. I always say I’ve been edited by Bill Buckley at the National Review, Bob Bartley at The Wall Street Journal. And the president is the strictest editor, the most line by line.”

Mr. McGurn, a former Journal editorial writer, and his team of about a half-dozen writers and researchers have had more than their usual exposure to presidential editing this winter. The address on Tuesday comes 13 days after Mr. Bush’s prime-time speech on his new strategy in Iraq, one that even some Republicans have criticized as uninspiring, a rhetorical dud.

For the people who get paid to put words in the president’s mouth, the pressure is on.

Okay, so it’s a high-pressure job. But come on:

For his part, Mr. McGurn is a bit tired after a month of 12-hour days and 6:45 a.m. phone calls, and in need of a decent meal. In one eight-day stretch after Christmas, he and fellow writers ate breakfast, lunch and dinner every day in the White House mess, except when it was closed, as it was for dinner on New Year’s Day.

“We went to Fuddruckers,” said the man who puts words in the president’s mouth. “It was, like, 8 o’clock. Nothing else was open.”

Like, boo-freakin’-hoo. Being forced to eat burgers at 8pm is not a sacrifice. It’s a luxury.

This is a hard day at the office (via NYT last Thursday – can’t get the image out of my head):

The caption reads: “A marine awakened others for guard duty in a house in Ramadi. With temperatures dropping to the 30s, the Americans and Iraqis clustered for warmth…”

Something to remember when you’re warm and cozy downing fries and beer inside Fuddrucker’s at 8pm.

The White House is in search of inspiring rhetoric as the clock ticks and national support for the war effort wanes. I would recommend that President Bush dispense with the usual, inane State of the Union laundry lists worked up by his tired Beltway speechwriting crew and just read 2LT Mark Daily’s last MySpace post to the nation instead.

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