And so he shall, Nancy Pelosi. So he shall.

Actually, he’ll end up doing it in the East Room at a podium in front of a group of aides and admirers. An hour-long speech from the Oval Office would be depressing and claustrophobic. An hour-long speech in a big room in front of an audience that’s interrupting frequently with raucous applause is more digestible.

Her reasoning here has to do with security. There’d be a security risk in having the president and Congress together in the same chamber while federal workers are furloughed, she says, without the full complement of security that normally attends to this event. But c’mon. They could bring back every agent they’d need to staff the SOTU and Pelosi would still find a reason not to hold the event. Homeland Security told Fox News today, in fact, that they’re ready for the SOTU, shutdown or no shutdown. Here’s what I wrote on Friday: