Quantifying the President's Speech

Doug Mills/The New York Times

Our friends at speechwars.com have put together a really fun tool to help you mine their database of the full text of all State of the Union Addresses (even though this wasn’t technically such an address) as well as inaugurals. It’s a fun way of tracking which issues have occupied the minds of our leaders. The brains behind Speech Wars, Ben Reis, just sent me his lightning analysis of last night’s speech:
— Obama is the first president in history to use the words “bailouts,” “laundry,” “drapes,” “cyber,” “messes,” and “pandemic” in a State of the Union address.
— Obama used the word “crisis” 11 times — more than twice as much as any other president. Hoover used it only four times in 1932 during the Great Depression.
— Obama said “layoffs,” “invest,” and “entrepreneurs” more than any other president.
— Obama is only the second president to use the words “ferret,” “biofuels,” and “hybrids.”