He Wore His American Flag Pin

I was out this evening and came home to an inbox full of righteous denunciations of the President's speech. Maybe because they were so vociferous, I was prepared for worse, but I didn't think it was too bad given the fact that he opposed the Iraq War.
It's being attacked as a rhetorical flop. Fair enough, in that I doubt the speech will shift a single vote in November; but forgive me, those who are only just noticing the sophomoric tendencies of the White House speech shop are woefully behind the curve.
As for substance, I agree with Bill Kristol.  It was basically inoffensive (though it got off to a rough start and he could have been more gracious to Bush, barely managing to utter one positive sentence), and I was pleased by his commitment to "defeat" al Qaeda and break the Taliban's momentum in Afghanistan. He's still calling for leaving earlier than I think we can, but for the first time he said the troop draw-down would be dictated by conditions on the ground, not necessarily a date certain. And his tribute to our troops and what they've achieved in Iraq was pretty good, considering.

Update: Julie Ponzi and Peter Robinson think the speech was disgraceful.
I reserve the right to revise and extend my remarks after studying the text, but first impression was that it's one of his better speeches, actually. He may have been cold but he wasn't smug, and I didn't feel like I wanted to spank him like a spoiled child, which hasn't happened since before the Democratic convention.

Jonah Goldberg found the speech positively offensive, and for reasons I can't disagree with (Mr. W's with Goldberg --he says Obama's praise of Bush was really a way of calling himself a patriot); but it's late and I can't muster surprise, and my takeaway is the major concession to "conditions on the ground" in Afghanistan. (Jennifer Rubin's with Goldberg, and she links to Krauthammer, who is too. I agree with all of them, but think they were asking the wrong guy. They want a presidential speech reflecting a good policy. Kristol & I know we ain't gonna get that, so we're pleased it wasn't worse).

Anyway: Bush wins again! It was kind of like a G-8 summit.