Hi, everyone.

Hope you're off to a great Friday wherever you are. Welcome to Smarter News. I just thought I would jump on real quick for a little coffee talk on a Friday sitting in my car here. It's not the typical studio. I'm in transit, as I'm sure many of you are before the weekend. And there's so much news about the State of the Union last night.

I just decided I needed to pull over, quite frankly, do a little work, pull out a couple

takeaways so we can make what happened last night a little clearer.

Instantly, after a big news event like this, you have the news and the headlines, and then you have the commentary. Very quickly, the commentary will overtake some of the news. And at Smarter News, what we want to do is make sure you get the news, quick, concise, and nonpartisan, and we're also able to distill what really matters. The State of the Union really matters, because it's an opportunity for the President to speak directly to the American people. And as you know, the way the state of the union really matters because it's an opportunity for the president to speak directly to the American people.

And as you know, the way the state of the union is done is not stipulated by the Constitution.

The Constitution just requires the president from time to time just to address Congress and to give an assessment and an update about the state of the Union, the United States of America.

And it's just recently, over the last several decades, really over the last hundred years,

where the president has done this in person, and now, of course, does this televised and on prime time.

So there are three takeaways in my mind from the speech last night based on this being the

opportunity for the president to speak directly to the American people to choose whatever he

wants to talk about in whatever way he wants to talk about it. He's not responding to the news.

He is the news. And the editorial choices that he makes really matter

and tell us something not only about the current state of the country, but the current state

of the administration. And what the administration is looking to prioritize, especially in an

election year, remember, the timing really matters here too, because this isn't just an

opportunity for the president in office at the time this isn't just an opportunity for the president

in office at the time. It's also an opportunity for him as he's embarking in this big re-election

campaign. So three key takeaways. And then I want to talk to you about something I think

is really important when it comes to public speaking.

Three key takeaways from last night.

Again, we're looking at this based on the fact that the president can pull from any topic

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