Highlights of president’s State of the Union address

The United States must continue its offensive against the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant, President Barack Obama urged in his final State of the Union speech to the Congress on Tuesday. “That’s exactly what we are doing”, Mr. Obama said adding, “But they do not threaten our national existence”. Americans “need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion”, the president said, addressing one of Trump’s applause lines, adding: “This isn’t a matter of political correctness. The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith”. “It will only happen if we fix our politics”. “But it will only happen if we work together”. “I have no doubt a president with the gifts of Lincoln or Roosevelt might have better bridged the divide, and I guarantee I’ll keep trying to be better so long as I hold this office”.

The President said threats came not from evil states, but from failing states. “Our public life withers when only the most extreme voices get attention”. “They use the internet to poison the minds of individuals inside our country; they undermine our allies”, he said.

Obama insisted “America has been through big changes before”, as he took thinly veiled shots at Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and other leading Republican presidential candidates.

“Over-the-top claims that this is World War III just play into their hands”. Later in his speech, he waved off “all the rhetoric you hear about our enemies getting stronger and America getting weaker”.

She also cited “chaotic unrest in many of our cities” and “the most unsafe terrorist threat our nation has seen since September 11”. “Period. Period. It’s not even close”. Elaborating on the four points, Mr. Obama repudiated in very strong words the anti-Muslim rhetoric that dominates the Republican campaign scene, struck the right chord on the question of inequality, strongly defended his foreign policy track record, and sketched out his notion of American internationalism in an unstable world. Seemingly dismissive of conservative economic concerns, the president said, “Food Stamp recipients didn’t cause the financial crisis; recklessness on Wall Street did”. “Immigrants aren’t the reason wages haven’t gone up enough; those decisions are made in the boardrooms”.

“Anyone claiming that America’s economy is in decline is peddling fiction”, the president said after rattling off a list of favorable economic statistics.

Obama also handed over the reins to Vice President Joe Biden as his administration embarks on eradicating cancer.

In a pre-speech interview with NBC’s Matt Lauer, Obama said that if he could go back in time, “I think the most important thing I would say to an earlier version of myself would be to communicate constantly and with confidence to the American people”. The development, which Obama did not mention, prompted criticism from Republicans about Obama’s hard-fought Iran nuclear deal, which the president extolled, arguing that “the world has avoided another war”. The country has managed to create more than 14 million new private sector jobs in the last 70 months; grow its auto and manufacturing industries and cut deficits.