A Follow Up Column: How I did in Predicting the Topics in the State of the Union Address

             I was partially successful in predicting President Obama would cover cyber security and faster Internet, free community college, terrorism, and foreign relations with Russia and the Ukraine in his state of the union address. These topics were not as major as I thought. My prediction of North Korea being included in the foreign relations was not included with Russia and the Ukraine. I should have considered including economic growth, new taxes, foreign relations with Cuba, ISIS and a more in-depth prediction on education.

            The president tended to spend a bit more time on the topics I had not considered than my predicted ones. This is probably because he had discussed cyber security and free community college and the others more in detail prior to the address.

The president covered a bit more time on terrorism than any of my predicted topics. He said that the nation stands united with others around the world that have been targeted by terrorists and would continue to hunt them down and dismantle their networks. He then went on to discuss on how to deal with ISIS, calling on Congress to united and pass a resolution to use force against the terrorist organization of ISIS.

            The president spent a few minutes on foreign relations with Russian and the Ukraine, saying that the nation stands strong with our allies and ready to resolve. He then went into discussing relations with Cuba. This I should have considered as a prediction as now Cuban immigrants can send more money back to their families and tourists can travel there without a passport, and has the goal to completely shut down Guantanamo Bay as it costs the nation $3 million a prison to house them.

He also was basic on cyber security urging Congress to pass legislation “to better to better meet the evolving threat of cyber attacks, combat identity theft, and protect our children's information."

            Overall the president spent the most time covering economic growth and broke it down into subcategories such as job growth and changes, gas prices, energy and oil dependency, educational score increase. Nearly 700,000 veterans and military spouses got new jobs; the president proposed increase in minimum wage, child care reform with a new tax cut up to $3,000 a year a child, paid sick leave, and more benefits to better the middle class and economy. The president also reviewed how the nation has become less dependent on foreign oil and energy, resulting in lower gas prices, and that the nation had the highest math and reading scores on record for young students.

            Upon reviewing the state of the union address and my notes, I should have conducted more research into what topics would be covered in the address. This would have enabled me to make more detailed predictions as to what topics would be covered and what ones would either be minor or major. Also, I should have made more observations in the changing “world” around me, such as the decreasing gas prices and non-passport travels to Cuba to aid in my predictions. Yet, the fact that the president did not comment on the nation’s relationship with North Korea did strike me as odd because they have been blamed for the recent online hacks to Sony Picture’s site and email system. There was no mention of if anything will be done to investigate or rectify the attacks, etc. I was sure the president would have mentioned more than what he did on cyber security and foreign relations. Next time, however, I will be completely successful, not partially.

Grade: 80/100