This is a kato special podcast. I'm Caleb Brown. For all the

pageantry, the state of the union is typically just a stew of bluster,

schmaltz, and a laundry list of wishful spending.

And this one was no different.

Responding to elements of last night's State of the Union, the Cato Institute's

Neil McCluskey on education and Chris Edwards on spending and taxes.

But first, Cato's John Glazer comments on the foreign policy content of the speech.

There was an inordinate focus here specifically on North Korea and Donald Trump

you know had guests who were people who had escaped from North Korea

he talked about the regime, but not a lot there that really indicates

that he's willing to talk.

Yeah, well I think actually his comments on North Korea are sort of like his comments throughout the entire speech.

The speech itself was very light on actual policy.

What he did was tell a lot of harrowing stories that relied on nationalist themes and

deeply emotional connections to specific anecdotes in order to try to drum up Americans emotions about specific policy issues.

So he talked about brave border guards doing extraordinary things to protect Americans from violent gangs coming over the border.

He told stories about, you know, children being killed by MS-13 you know obviously this is in order to drum

up emotions towards a harder-line immigration stance he also told stories at war anecdotes of brave soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan

again and Iraq and Syria against the Islamic State because who could not applaud brave soldiers and heroes in war

and this is to kind of drum up support for our continued and various occupations and the greater Middle East region.

And the same with North Korea.

So he told this harrowing story of a North Korean refugee.

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