So President Obama's 2012 State of the Union is over now and everybody's analyzing the details of what he said (including our NTU Foundation, where researchers are working on figuring out exactly how much his proposals would cost for taxpayers). For someone who claims to be laser-focused on economic growth and job creation, we couldn't help but notice that he left a few things out that SHOULD have been in the speech. For example...
The Keystone XL pipeline
The President conveniently neglected to mention that his Administration just last week denied a permit to build the Keystone XL pipeline, a project to safely deliver Canadian energy resources to the American market. Construction of Keystone XL could have generated as many as 20,000 jobs while bringing much-needed energy to a hungry domestic market that has faced obstacle after obstacle from this Administration. We've been calling for its approval since last summer, but unfortunately for taxpayers and consumers, the President ignored those calls and put the kibosh on the project.
Unlocking valuable spectrum
Cost-free to taxpayers, beneficial in reducing our staggering deficit, and absolutely vital to the continued growth and innovation of technology and the internet. What no-brainer policy am I talking about? Competitive spectrum auctions. Did the President talk about it last night? Of course not! There have been rumblings from both sides of Capitol Hill and both sides of the aisle about spectrum for some time, but some Presidential leadership could work wonders in ushering a win-win policy to completion.
Allowing businesses to...you know, conduct their business
This one's sort of a personal pet-peeve, but of course the President failed to mention the meddling in which his Administration has engaged/will engage in private business operations. Things like the AT&T - T-Mobile merger (which NTU supported) that his Justice Department and FCC squashed last month. Or the ongoing FTC antitrust investigation into Google, a company which charges its users exactly $0 to access its search engine and other services. Or the ongoing process of the Express Scripts - Medco Health Solutions merger. Keeping the federal government out of the way, by and large, is the best way to foster economic growth, but this Administration has time and again shown a tendency towards populist intervention that is unhelpful to say the least.
An energy strategy not centered on subsidies
The President did talk about energy last night, and some of it was commendable. He talked about opening up some more areas under federal control to energy exploration, though I'll await further details before judging. But most of what he said focues on how we should be showering even MORE subsidies on energy technologies that are to the liking of Barack Obama (namely: solar, wind, anything vaguely "green" or "renewable"). And of course he did it while taking swipes at the "Big Evil Oil Companies" he so frequently derides. Funny side note: the biggest of the oil companies that are the focus on Obama's vitriol was just passed as the most valuable company in the U.S. by Apple. The wife of the late Steve Jobs sat beside the First Lady during the speech and got a specific shout-out (a positive one!). I guess he doesn't mind that they're "the 1%" of companies and that they're sitting on tens of billions in largely idle cash reserves, another practice he has criticized elsewhere.
Any serious discussion of bipartisan spending reductions
The President made some vague remarks about "working together" in a bipartisan fashion, along with some passing comments about reducing waste in the federal budget. But he didn't come anywhere close to making it a serious and substantive part of his speech. Too bad. We already worked with the liberal U.S. Public Interest Research Group to give him a $1 trillion head start on spending cuts that left and right could agree upon and stand ready to assist him. Let's just say I'm not eagerly awaiting his call.
What else should the President have covered if he were serious about economic growth and job creation?