Obama's State of the Union.

1. I found that the reptilian brain was not activated by Obama, but rather by the people doing the editing and cuts. The only time it activated is when we did quick cuts to audience members. My limbic brain however was active the whole time, and I found that the people behind Obama became a sort of weathervane to tell me how I should be reacting to the speech. When the I saw people smiling, I would catch myself smiling alongside them. The emotions felt in the audience were transferred over to me. Neocortically, I was thinking about what he said the entire time he was talking.

2. I noticed first off the obvious Aesthetic and Personal shifts that this video exemplified. This is a video that is broadcasted over the airwaves, but also is put up in its entirety on youtube, both for sharing between all sorts of platforms, and for people to comment upon and view at their leisure. This perfectly exemplifies the two shifts. It also shows an epistemological shift, as this material would previously be only available through text, in the form of transcripts of the speech. Now people can view the entire thing online as it happened, making the message all the more powerful.
3. There is certainly alot of stock being put into production techniques. After every major point that Obama makes, they do reaction shots of the audience. They vary who they show alot, but they are used consistently throughout the address. This is used to transfer desired emotion from the audience to the viewer, which brings up emotional transfer, which was greatly present here in my experience.
Ownership is obviously an issue here, as the government will only really show things from the speech that it wants seen, which is not hard since it controlled the content and creation of the speech video.
4.
a. Symbols- Obama has an American flag lapel pin prominently displayed.
b. Group Dynamics- During the speech, he uses "we" wherever possible.
c. Plain Folks- Obama tells references and tells stories of individual families and people.
d. Repetition- @10:00 "We cut taxes...."
e. Inverted Warm Fuzzies- He talks about the hardships of families and children, creating a sort of opposite effect of warm fuzzies.
f. Straw Man- @19:39 "I've been told..."

Thesis: America has been hurt by the financial collapse and all that comes with it, but we have been through worse, and we will endure.

Facts: 50% of College students never finish.
We cut taxes for 95% of Americans
Families who make under $250,000 yearly will not have raised taxes.
1.5m jobs will be created next year.