This year's State of the Union speech was particularly important for President Obama as it is an election year, and he was bound to portray the state of the country as improving. He opened the speech talking mainly about political things like the end of the Iraq War and the death of Osama bin Ladden before talking about the military as a bridge to talking about national unity and what the country previously accomplished before neatly segueing into talking about policies. The first policy related things Obama brought up regarded the deficit and Wall Street regulations, both of which would be recurring themes through the speech. He also mentioned throughout that he wanted manufacturing and clean energy to be major economic focuses and talked about related goals like providing job training and discouraging outsourcong. All of his policy talk was punctuated with political things like both parties coming together to get legislature through in a timely manner and equal opportunity.
What bothered me about the speech was its lack of depth, but details of so many issues can't be discussed in only an hour. I was left wondering if such plans were possible and could survive Congress, and, if they do, how effectively they can be executed. A specific detail that bothered me was what Obama said the Iraq War money would now be headed: half to infrastucture and half to paying off debt. Since the government is sustaining heavily on borrowed money, doesn't that mean that the government would just be borrowing half the cost of the war less per year? And that the rate of debt increase only slows, not reverses?
I would also like to note how this speech seemed to be partly a rebuttal to any negative predictions the Republican candidates were saying about policies made durring the Obama administration, as Obama kept saying positive predictions about the future and stressed any accomplishments in the present.
Two Things
2 hours ago
4 comments:
I would agree that this speech seemed to be a rebuttal against Republican accusations regarding the successes and failures of his policies. It definitely was more positive and optimistic that Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels' response on behalf of the GOP, who attacked Obama and blamed him for worsening the economic situation. Both speeches were somewhat extreme, as Obama's painted perhaps too optimistic an image of the near future, while Daniels said “So 2012 is a year of true opportunity, maybe our last, to restore an America of hope and upward mobility, and greater equality." (http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-mitch-daniels-blasts-obama-for-trickledown-government-20120124,0,5082360.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+latimes%2Fmostviewed+%28L.A.+Times+-+Most+Viewed+Stories%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher)
However, much of their extremity most likely stems from the fact that this is a critical point of the 2012 campaign, and both parties are seeking majorities throughout the government. This speech seemed to be more of a speech emphasizing and accentuating Obama's achievements, which makes since during a campaign season, even though the general election campaign has not officially begun.
I liked how President Obama used the army working together as an example that the government should follow, and I liked that he tied the end of his speech back to that point. As always, the President used strong speech techniques such as repeating important phrases.
I agree that Obama did not go into enough depth about many of the issues he raised. How would one determine the effectiveness of a teacher? I do not think test scores are a good indicator of a teacher's ability to teach and make an impact.
I agree that the speech left me wondering about how all of this could happen because yes, he showed many good opportunities to turn things around for the better but never actually went into depth which is understandable given his time restraint. I would like to point out that, leaving people wondering could be one of his techniques. If people want to see if this can and will happen, elect him again. It was interesting to see his subtle (or not so subtle) campaigning through his speech. Another thing that bothered me was that he seemed to diverge all the action to the Congress or his Administration or the States to take action. I can't help but be disappointed about the lengthy process there is to get things going.
It was indeed fun to catch all the moments when Obama's speech briefly and subtly countered allegations made by the GOP candidates. The most memorable one for me was when the President was discussing job growth and straightened out some facts, probably for Romney who has repeatedly asserted that two million jobs have been lost during Obama's term. I also feel like Obama made a few jabs at George W. Bush even, when he spoke about the Iraq War and inheriting a broken economy in 2009.
I'm glad Nicola brought up the point regarding Obama's speech techniques; he certainly did employ repetition of phrases such as "Send me this bill . . .," extremely similar to his last State of the Union address. I also liked the "hourglass" structure of his speech, in how he both commenced and ended it by mentioning our troops and drawing that connection to an ideal functioning of government. However, as Mr. Silton brought up in class yesterday, Obama did have political ulterior motives for discoursing about policy proposals that were not backed by sufficient elaboration. I too was left with questions as to how exactly those plans would be implemented, if approved.
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