If there’s one thing Donald Trump isn’t known for, it’s being unifying. But, that’s exactly the type of reaction he was hoping to get out of his first State of the Union speech. The speech which lasted an hour and thirty minutes on January 30th, was very Trump-like. Which is to say, full of nationalism, “facts”, and lots of talk with little action. Another thing that was palpable in this speech, was all of the things that weren’t being said.

For example, let’s go back to Puerto Rico shall we? At the beginning of the crisis back in September, practically the whole island was left without power, and aid from the United States wasn’t forthcoming. The greatest financial challenge for Puerto Rico was rebuilding their power grid, and now, four months later, parts of Puerto Rico still don’t have electricity. What’s even worse, is that the death toll, originally estimated at 64 increased in the wake of the storm reaching 1052 deaths. Vox News states this succinctly, “The reaction from the White House was one of the ugliest moments of President Trump’s administration this year. When Trump visited Puerto Rico two weeks after the storm, he suggested that Maria wasn’t “a real catastrophe” like Hurricane Katrina. And instead of offering condolences, he reminded Puerto Rico about how much money it was costing the federal government to respond to the crisis.

He then walked around throwing paper towel supplies to hurricane survivors, and spent weeks insulting the mayor of San Juan on Twitter after she accused the federal government of abandoning Puerto Rico.”

However, Trump seems to have forgotten this chapter in his presidency, because even when FEMA pulled out of Puerto Rico, he still said, “To everyone still recovering in Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, everywhere, we are with you, we love you, and we always will pull through together, always.”

On the topic of foreign countries, Trump talked a lot about immigration, or specifically, all that was “wrong” with it in America. He outlines four pillars to his new plan.

1. Offering a path to citizenship to immigrants in the US
2. To fully secure the border
3. End the visa lottery program and replacing it with a merit based program
4. Ending chain migration

Individually, all of these steps sounds secure, however, accomplishing these goals is a lot harder than it looks, mainly because it requires cooperation from both parties. As congressional reporter Nolan D. McCaskill states, “Immigration is a divisive issue that led to a three-day government shutdown this month. What’s more, Democrats have rejected the White House’s immigration framework, with leaders criticizing it as “anti-immigrant” due to its sharp limits to legal immigration. Negotiations have stalled in the Senate, and Trump’s proposal would likely fail in the House, assuming it even saw the floor.”  

Additionally, his plan to secure the border isn’t that realistic considering that building a “great wall” on the aforementioned border would cost nearly 70 billion dollars to build and 150 million more a year to maintain.

Furthermore, he talks about chain migration like it’s a plague upon the country, when in reality it isn’t that much of a problem. Mainly because the largest category of chain migration are spouses and parents of naturalized U.S. citizens because admissions in these categories are unlimited by law. If it these chain migrations were largely illegal, then yes, steps would have to be taken. The way he states it in this address that, “under the current, broken system, a single immigrant can bring in unlimited numbers of distant relatives.” makes it sound like immigrants sponsor all of their distant family when really, on average new immigrants sponsor 3.45 family members for green cards.

Trump then segways from immigration to the crisis of opioid and drug addiction. Each presidency has its own project. For the Obama’s, it was focusing on general welfare, including Michelle Obama’s push for healthier cafeterias. The Trump administration’s focus resides on solving the addiction crisis in America, however so far they’ve been lax on actually confronting this problem. Back in October in 2017, Trump declared the Opioid Crisis a national emergency, but then didn’t request any funds. The 90-day state of emergency ran out on January 23rd, and in actuality, nothing had been done.  Still, Republicans in Congress remain optimistic, as Politico states, “Although congressional appropriators have not committed to new funding, two health committees have held hearings and are in the early stages of considering major legislation this year. HELP Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) has said that he expects Congress to appropriate new money but would not predict when or how much.”

Of course, he couldn’t get through a speech without mentioning his best “frenemies”, Russia and China. He mentioned them when talking about the urgent “need” for an increased defense budget, stating, “Around the world we race rogue regimes, terrorist groups, and rivals like China and Russia that challenge our interest, our economy, and our values. In confronting these horrible dangers, we know that weakness is the surest path to conflict. Unmatched power is the surest means to our true and great defense. For this reason, I am asking Congress to end the dangerous defense sequester and fully fund our great military.”

President Trump’s first defense budget proposal was a whopping $603 billion dollars, which was rejected last year, which is fair consisting that all of the cuts that were needed to make it possible, would slash programs aiding the poor. But Trump is not done fighting for an increased defense budget because as The Washington Post states, “the Trump administration will request a $716 billion budget for defense spending in 2019.” This is a dramatic increase from last year. The article continues with a justification for this, “Pentagon officials said the 2019 budget would focus on modernizing the military’s aging weapons systems and preparing it for a potential conflict with major world powers after a long emphasis on counterterrorism and insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

However, how necessary is this increase in spending? The United States spends more on defense than China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, India, France, the United Kingdom, Japan, and Germany combined. The United States doesn not have to worry about their competency in a fight against other countries, considering that a key component in warfare is aircraft carriers. The United States has an absolute monopoly on super-carriers and few other countries even have them. Business Insider explains, “Aircraft carriers contribute greatly to a country’s overall military strength. These massive vessels allow nations to project force far beyond their borders and across the entire face of the globe. They’re essentially mobile naval and air force bases.”  There are nineteen aircraft carriers still operating in the world. Of these nineteen, ten are American.

President Trump also mentions once again that he was “ending the war on clean coal”, however, nowadays with global warming becoming an ever present issue, is that really something to be proud of? Global sea levels rose 8 inches in the last century, global temperature increased by 2 degrees Fahrenheit, and countries worldwide have experienced extreme weather events the likes of which had never been seen before. The United States has undoubtedly been a contributor to these events, and yet has not joined the global effort to prevent further damage to the Earth.  Solar energy costs less than fossil fuels, but major contributors to global warming are less inclined to use them. America being one of these countries. In 2016, only 1% of US energy came from solar power. Only 15% of total energy came from renewable resources, and 81% from non-renewable sources. In China, 70% of its power comes from coal fired power stations which explains why China is the world’s largest coal consumer. However, China is trying to switch to greener sources of energy. For example, they intend to spend at least 360$ billion to invest in renewable energy for 2020, and have become an essential part of the Paris Climate Agreement. The  United States is the highest contributor to global warming and is holding the world back in ot’s fight against this phenomenon. The war on coal hasn’t ended, but it should end for the United States to focus towards the future, not the past.

That theme, of focusing towards the future, could and should be applied in American policies. We seem to be entrenched in the past, using outdated techniques and sticking to old ideologies, which can become roadblocks on the way of searching for solutions.

“A democracy requires open access to ideas. It requires a willingness to struggle and learn, to question our own suppositions and biases, to open ourselves as citizens, and a nation, to a world of books and thought. If we become a country of superficiality and easy answers based on assumptions and not one steeped in reason and critical learning, we will have lost the foundation of our founding and all that has allowed our nation to grow into our modern United States.”

― Dan Rather, What Unites Us: Reflections on Patriotism