Durbin Repsonse to State of the Union Address

DURBIN RESPONSE TO STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS

U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) today released the following statement on this evening's State of the Union Address:

"I think Americans were looking for a new direction and new ideas from the President, and sadly there was very little of either in the State of the Union Address tonight."

"While I did not agree with everything in the President's speech tonight, I am glad that he addressed three key issues - health care, energy and education."

"The White House told us before the speech that the President was going to spend significant time addressing the problem of health care. Instead, the ideas we heard tonight were mostly recycled concepts like health savings accounts. Health savings accounts offer high costs, high risks and low benefits to consumers."

"The energy initiative the President put forward tonight is important. The President abandoned the energy bill which he signed just a months ago -- and he should have; it was a bad bill. He has announced that the nation must move away from our dependence on foreign oil. That is a worthy bipartisan goal and I support it."

"I thought his education initiative putting more math and science teachers in the classroom was exactly the right thing to do."

"We need to work closely together to find common ground in these three areas."

http://durbin.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=251027