I sympathize with all of the rage against State of the Union Addresses around here. But, just for the record (and as I said over at the New York Times the other day), the thing is never, ever, going away. It’s too useful (or at least too tempting) a megaphone for the president — any president. In an evermore balkanized media climate the ability to grab all of those eyeballs and get everybody talking, even for a moment, about what the president says is too rich an asset for any president or party to walk away from. Sure, some president might deliver a written one again — from a sick bed. But the SOTU itself is going to be here for as long as the Republic endures. So I hope it’s around for a very long time.