My expectations, hopes, and fears of Trump's first ever State of the Union address.

Hello, people of Minds. And anyone else reading this from anywhere else. Today I figure I will talk about what I expect, hope for, and am nervous about with regards to the upcoming State of the Union address. Two and a half days from now, it is scheduled for January 30th, 2018 at 9 pm. On average, presidents historically took an hour to go from start to finish on the State of the Union.

What I expect

Frankly, I expect him to talk about the issues he has been most active on, which in this president's case is four things. Foreign policy, military defense, immigration, and economics are all the things I predict he will focus on. However, I also expect him to double down on calling gay marriage legalization "settled law" as he did during (or was it shortly before?) his inauguration. The reason I expect him to double down on this is that there have been no changes federally to marriage law anywhere in Trump's presidency.

Meanwhile, in Alabama, the state level is reportedly working towards Marriage Privatization on the state level. Plus, more and more conservative Republicans are in favor of Marriage Privatization, which to me as a Pro-Defense, Pro-Israel & Pro-Federalism Libertarian Partier is a victory because to me, Marriage Privatization seems to me like the only factually correct social or cultural policy in regards to marriage. Basically, I am an atheistic lad who defines marriage as a private contract between genuinely loving and consenting adults. If you don't define marriage that way... okay!

But wait, there's more! I also predict Trump will try to justify his methods for doing things like ending the Mandate to Buy Private Insurance. Frankly, that's one area out of many where I respect the president's intention but despise his method. He is supposed to request legislation from Congress to get rid of the Individual Mandate and not even bother with the notion of executive order, but this has not been his method, and that's a problem to me. And the reason I want the Individual Mandate repealed is that it is costing the Federal Government more money than it can afford. But more relevantly to me, I can figure out on my own whether I need health insurance or if I should just go for Direct Primary Care.

For those who don't know, Direct Primary Care is where patients treat doctors like worthy workers and in return doctors treat patients like valued customers. From the prices for forms of care being double-digit prices like $25 for an x-ray or $35 per month for a minor's DPC subscription. Prices as far as I can tell do not exceed $130 per month for a family of four subscribing to DPC. Flat-out ignoring health insurance because they are fed up with it, patients and doctors alike are ignoring the idea of health insurance and this Direct Primary Care idea is thriving from it. The full scoop on that here. However, I don't expect Trump to even mention or hint at Direct Primary Care because frankly, I am not sure if he has even heard of it. Not to mention, his opinion on healthcare changes all too often, it's very difficult to tell what his politics even are.

What I hope for

While I tend to view foreign policy as the most important public policy issue, I don't expect him to focus on foreign policy. However, I do hope he will speak up about a large handful of foreign policy issues. And most easily I hope he will speak up about clearly defining who America's friends are and who America's enemies are. Not based on him naming countries but rather based on him learning and explaining the criteria of a friend and that of a foe. This way, the American People will hopefully do the research into which countries meet which criteria on their own, independently of any further external input.

But when it comes to foreign countries by name, I really hope the president will call out Saudi Arabia and Iran on their state sponsorships of terrorism. However, I expect him to only call out Iran but not Saudi Arabia, seeing as he practically flip-flopped on American relations to Saudi Arabia. Before the general election of 2016, he was calling them out on their women's rights abuses and their LGBT rights abuses. But after the inauguration, he was doubling down on American government's ignorance of the fact that Saudi Arabia is a fake ally and diplomatically a fake friend.

As far as Israel goes, I really hope he will promise to end America's invasive pattern of dictating to Israel how it interacts with its neighbors. Frankly, just because I view Israel as an island of individualism and free enterprise in a sea of religious fanatic tyranny zones does not mean I support anything the neocon status quo has us doing. In other words my problem with America's current Israel policy is not the taking of sides or which side is taken, instead, my problem is that it has lots of invasive aspects, many of which make our own $21 trillion national debt worse. Some of the aspects of current Israel policy don't even go together! For example, we give free money to both Israel and to their archenemies the Arab League! Why!? That would be like if I gave random gifts to both my best friend forever Jason and to many folks who are known to be severe bullies to him! Sounds rather ultra-stupid, doesn't it!?

What I am nervous about

I hope to humanity that Trump does not name any of the names of the takers of the Change.Org survey that I recently took before doing this blog post. Let me clarify where I stand on my own, and know that you're not always going to agree with me but you are always going to know where I stand. Oh, yeah, I guess I should talk about that survey.

So I was checking my Gmail for any news about my attempt at joining Steemit, and instead, I found this 3-question survey. The first question was about how I feel in general about Trump's job performance. Basically, I say in his first year, he did many things right but most things wrong. I will be doing what those lists for me are in the next blog post I do, but in the meantime, the Second question was about what I disagree with him the most on. And I chose immigration because to me it's an atrocity that the immigration debate is dominated by the two extremes where you're either an open borders Far-Leftie or a sealed borders Far-rightie.

And to me, the proper middle with that is you have the same combo of freedom of movement with simple but stringent checkups that my Irish migrant ancestors had in the 1910's when they came here via Ellis Island. Back then the procedure was two very strict but simple checkups, one medical the other security. Next, a migrant would have to take and pass an American Civics class, and then finally they'd be permitted to apply for citizenship, but not given amnesty. Which brings us back to what I am nervous about the possibility of. I worry that he is going to double down on building a border wall, even though that is something which would raise taxes, raise government spending, and steal land from American human beings who live near the southern border. However, this could be an unneeded fear as I have heard him walk back on some of his migration rhetoric, as explains him expelling the nationalist filth of Steve Bannon.

Conclusions for now

Well, I don't expect the State of the Union address to deviate from the pattern of presidents taking roughly an hour to complete. I also do not expect the mainstream media or most other areas of regular society to react maturely, classily, honestly, or factually to anything he might say right or wrong in the address. I will address anything he says wrong or right in all four of the aforementioned ways of tone & delivery. That's all I got for now, thanks!

~Kyle S. Perkins