SUCH A STATE: Joe Biden was energetic, forceful, confrontative, and combatively partisan in his State of the Union speech last night, a performance designed to show the doubters that at 81 he’s fit for a second term in the White House.

  He led off speaking about threats to freedom and democracy saying, “Not since President Lincoln and the Civil war have freedom and democracy been under assault at home as they are today” and that, “What makes our moment rare is that freedom and democracy are under attack both at home and overseas.

  He spoke about the threat posed by Russia, Reproductive rights, the danger to democracy posed by the January 6^th insurrection, and 13 times he referred to his “predecessor,” at one moment saying, “Here’s the simple truth. You can’t love your country only when you win.”

  The President said, “I will not demonize immigrants saying they are poisoning the blood of the country.”

  Speaking of Republican efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act known as “Obamacare,” he said, “We stopped you 50 times before and we will stop you again!” 

  With the justices present, he spoke of the Supreme Court decision overturning the right to abortion and said the country is about to see the “electoral power” of women.

  Biden spoke of his experience and success dealing with domestic and world problems. Confronting concerns about his age with a joke he said, “I know it may not look like it, but I’ve been around for a while.”

  “My fellow Americans, the issue facing our nation isn’t how old we are, it’s how old are our ideas,” Biden said. “Hate, anger, revenge, retribution are the oldest of ideas. But you can’t lead America with ancient ideas that only take us back. To lead America, the land of possibilities, you need a vision for the future and what can and should be done.”

  At times, Republican members of Congress heckled and booed the President. Notable among them was Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Greene, who wore a red MAGA hat. The father of a Marine killed in Afghanistan started shouting and was arrested. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who sat through the speech without applauding or barely giving a nod of approval, later called the speech “vitriolic.”

  Donald Trump provided running commentary on his Truth Social website and said to Fox News that Biden “was angry, mentally disturbed, and misrepresenting a lot of the facts concerning almost every subject he discussed.” 

  Today, representatives of the administration are fanning out across the country on a 22 state tour to promote the image of the Biden administration.

FACING EAST: Sweden formally joined NATO yesterday becoming the 32^nd country facing Russia’s aggressive Vladimir Putin. Finland, which joined last year, and now Sweden are new additions to the alliance motivated by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and greater territorial aspirations.

  US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, “Swedes realized something very profound: that if Putin was willing to try to erase one neighbor from the map, then he might well not stop there.”

WHEELS DOWN: A tire fell off a United Airlines flight taking off yesterday from San Francisco International Airport, crushing several cars in an employee parking lot and adding to concerns about how well commercial airliners are screwed together. The plane with 250 people on board was headed to Japan but diverted to Los Angeles International.

  The pilot on an American Airlines flight was recorded asking, “Do you guys know where that tire went?” 

  The United plane was a Boeing 777-200 with six tires on each of its two main landing gear struts. It is designed to land safely with missing or damaged tires. 

THE SPIN RACK: After weeks of indirect negotiations with Israel, representatives of Hamas have left Cairo without a cease fire and hostage release deal. President Biden had been hoping to announce such a deal in last night’s State of the Union address. — Three escaped inmates from the eastern Caribbean island of Grenada have been charged with the murders of an American couple whose sailboat they hijacked. Authorities say they believe the three boarded the catamaran owned by Ralph Henry and Kathy Brandel and threw the couple overboard before sailing to St. Vincent. — Former White House physician under Donald Trump, Dr. Ronny Jackson, who still refers to himself as a retired admiral, was busted down to captain after a Pentagon investigation in which he was found to have acted inappropriately while at the White House. He’s now a second term member of Congress. The Pentagon Report found that Jackson berated subordinates “made sexual and denigrating statements” about a female subordinate, drank alcohol inappropriately with subordinates, and used thesleep drug Ambien while on duty. — An anonymous donor has given Yellowstone National Park $40 million to build affordable housing for the park’s staff. More than 3,000 people work in the park during peak season and there isn’t enough housing for them.

BELOW THE FOLD:   A, B, C, or D?  Please answer how the SAT college admission test is changing.

  The SAT is eliminating the need for a No. 2 pencil and going fully digital while shaving 46 minutes off the three-hour test. The new digital exam will be at least as smart as the kids who take it. In both reading and math, the test questions will become more difficult for students who do well early in the exam.

  The SAT and ACT exams have been falling out of favor for college admissions. The number of college applicants submitting scores for those tests plummeted from 76 percent in the 2019-2020 to 45 percent this year.

   Test Question: Which colleges have re-instated the SAT as a requirement for admission?

A: Yale

B. Dartmouth

C: Brown

D: All of the above