State of the Union

President Barack Obama will give his second State of the Union address. Tuesday, Jan. 25 the president will look back at the past but more importantly he will look on to the future. The president will discuss several issues including the economy, health care reform and the war.

The economy is in a very poor state even though we are in recovery. Unemployment is a big issue in the United States as a result of companies making cutbacks to save money. The United States as a whole has been in a great amount of debt. The economy has forced gas prices to skyrocket, hitting all time highs. Much like Acting Governor, Early Ray Tomblin, Obama will discuss the unemployment issue and more than likely promise more job creation. When the economy dropped, people had to borrow more money for their houses. To keep their homes people had to pay more money than what their houses were worth, leading to more foreclosures. The solution Obama will come up with for the economic problems will be job creation and more work on social security issues. The president may also introduce a more concrete plan for the budget deficit. The drastic economic decline has created the major deficits we have seen for the past few years.

President Obama will discuss his successes and a major example of this is the Health Care reform. Last year health care was a big topic of interest. At the time of his speech last year, the reform had not yet been passed so he will definitely talk about how health care has helped others and how they will continue to work toward making it better for the people.  He also passed the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell bill. The bill has been a major topic of issue this past year. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tellended a ban on gays serving openly in the military field.  It has yet to be officially implemented but  is still a big success for the president.

Although the economy and health care is very important, I think the war will be the topic of the night. In last year’s State of the Union Obama promised all the troops would be out of Iraq by August yet this has still not happened. The president will make a lot of the same promises about the war because it is one of the United States biggest issues at the moment. He will also discuss the war in Afghanistan and possibly make promises to end the war. In last year’s State of the Union his major discussion was about the war and nothing has changed since then. I think a lot of this year’s discussion will be a repeat of last year. Although he did bring troops out of Iraq, he stationed them in other destinations, which I think could possibly happen again. He will probably mention the shooting in Arkansas and discuss gun control, tied in with the subject of war.

His speech has the potential to be like several presidents because of the shape of the economy but I think it will be most like John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.

With the closeness in age I think Obama’s speech may be similar to John F. Kennedy’s speech in 1961. Kennedy said a lot about making peace with the world and with the war I think Obama will hope for the same goal. They are among the younger presidents and Obama will continue to want a name for himself so this speech will be very important to his career, as it was for Kennedy.

During the time of Nixon’s speech was also the time of the Vietnam War. In Nixon’s 1970 State of the Union address he discussed bringing the troops out of Vietnam, but it took much longer than expected much like what is happening with Obama right now.  Nixon’s speech was dedicated to the war because it was of major concern to the people of the United States. Obama and Nixon share the same issues, therefore Obama may share some of his goals in the State of the Union address.

With the new majority of Republicans in the house and being a Democratic president, his speech will resemble Bill Clinton’s with some of the same ideas and hopes. When Clinton first came into office, there was a high majority of Republicans.  Clinton had the same challenges as Obama and may use Clinton’s uplifting and strong tone for his speech. The Republicans are trying to repeal the health care reform and Obama will have to keep his position and rise above it, much like Clinton did during his term as president.

Although the President has a lot to discuss and his speech is very time limited, he will prove his points well. Obama is very well spoken and we will see this during the State of the Union.