President Barack Obama is hitting the road after his final State of the Union address.
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“We have to reduce the influence of money in our politics, so that a handful of families and hidden interests can’t bankroll our elections”, the president added, prompting Vice President Joe Biden to leap to his feet behind him.
“Anyone claiming that America’s economy is in decline is peddling fiction… Period”, he declared. “It’s not even close”. Claims that US stature in the world is shrinking, he virtually shouted, is “political hot air”.
Trump even dismissed improving unemployment numbers, calling those figures a scam for not counting individuals who have stopped looking for work as unemployed.
Obama’s speech, unlike his earlier State of the Union addresses, drew more scattered applause. We must resist that temptation.
As predicted, GOP candidates blasted the president. America’s destiny, the President said, was imperiled by a political system festering in malice, gridlock and in the grip of the rich and the powerful. “That may work as a TV sound bite, but it doesn’t pass muster on the world stage”.
The moments Obama’s supporters will most remember long after he’s left office have been aspirational: His “red states” and “blue states” speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention; his singing of “Amazing Grace” after the church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina.
But the country Obama has led for the last seven years doesn’t always see it the same way.
“It’s the son who finds the courage to come out as who he is, and the father whose love for that son overrides everything he’s been taught”. His closing remarks, “I believe in change because I believe in you”, generated a standing ovation.
“Right now, too many students in Hawai’i and across the country are leaving college with tens of thousands of dollars in debt, and many are choosing to not go to college at all”, said Senator Schatz.
“How do we give everyone a fair shot at opportunity and security in this new economy?”
“But they do not threaten our national existence”, said the president.
“I’ve been there”, he said with a grin. “Let’s make America the country that cures cancer once and for all”.
Republicans were largely dismissive of the president’s address.
Ryan said in a statement released by his office that after 30 minutes, Obama’s speech “isn’t going so well”.
In addition, Obama seemed to be talking about Texas Sen.
“So it is not surprising that in his last State of the Union Address he touted his naïve and unsafe nuclear deal with Iran despite their military holding American sailors captive. And more and more wealth and income is concentrated at the very top”, he said.
Obama said “one of the few regrets of my presidency” is “that the rancour and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better”.
Obama admitted perhaps a president with the skills of Abraham Lincoln or Franklin D. Roosevelt could have bridged the divide, but said he will not give up during his last 12 months in office.
“What I’m asking for is hard”.
U.S. Rep. Leonard Lance (R-7th Dist.) said changing the tax code could be another issue that Obama and congressional Republicans could work together one. “And it betrays who we are as a country”.
“There is one thing that we hope to hear from the president, and that is a comprehensive plan to defeat ISIS”, House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters, using an acronym for the militant group that has taken over large areas of Syria and Iraq.
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On this topic, Haley offered some support for Obama’s point, as well.
