When was the last non-State of the Union presidential address that featured a Democratic response? Bush tried to portray his policy as bridging the partisan divide:

Americans want our country to be safe, and our troops to begin coming home from Iraq. Yet those of us who believe success in Iraq is essential to our security, and those who believe we should bring our troops home, have been at odds. Now, because of the measure of success we are seeing in Iraq, we can begin seeing troops come home.

The way forward I have described tonight makes it possible, for the first time in years, for people who have been on opposite sides of this difficult debate to come together.

The response totally undermined this message. Was that a smart move on the Dems’ part? I guess we’ll have to see what, if anything, this does to the polls.

P.S. Full text of Bush’s speech here.