President Obama delivered the 2014 State of the Union address on January 28th. He discussed several key issues including healthcare, education, foreign policy, veterans affairs, retirement savings, and energy. Specifically, he highlighted the success of the Affordable Care Act in providing coverage to over 9 million Americans, proposed increasing funding for education with a focus on critical thinking skills, and outlined plans to promote domestic energy production and ensure veterans receive medical care.

1. Brooke Scarbro
2 February 2014
First Year Seminar
Harold Blanco
State of the Union Address
The State of the Union Address was presented by Barack Obama on January 28, 2014.
He brought up many different topics that are on the minds of the American people. He discussed
health care and how it aided a single mother in Arizona who had a pre-existing condition.
Normally without the Affordable Care Act she would not have been able to receive the insurance
and instead would have had to file for bankruptcy. Over 9 million are signed up for government
health care. He also spoke on increasing the funding for education and how they are placing
more emphasis on critical thinking rather than filling in test bubbles. Also that businesses could
partner up with community colleges so that they could train workers for a particular job. The
ending of the Iraq war was another hot topic and also about how the troops were coming home
from Afghanistan. Once they returned home, he wanted to make sure that the veterans would
receive medical health care for physical and psychological care. He also talked about using
diplomacy and sanctions to keep Syria from gaining chemical weapons and Iran from attaining
atomic weapons. The MyRA was mentioned as a way to save for retirement. He has started to
promote the use of natural gas for our energy because this has caused us to slowly wean off of
foreign energy. Through this hour long address, President Obama discussed many important
issues and presented ideas he thought were best to help resolve or better our country.