President Barack Obama's final State of the Union speech offered little in the way of new policy initiatives, but plenty of upbeat talk about prospects for a strong future. His hour-long address predicated future gains on bridging the partisan divides so evident between the White House and Republican-controlled Congress, and in the sharp rhetoric flowing from the 2016 presidential campaign. Some highlights of his address:
In what some Republicans are calling a defiant act intended to humiliate the United States, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized and detained two U.S. Navy boats and 10 American sailors on Tuesday, just hours before President Obama was to deliver his final State of the Union address to the nation.
The sailors, nine men and one woman, were detained near Farsi Island. The sailors were reportedly on a training mission when one of the boats encountered mechanical problems and drifted into what Iran says are its territorial waters.
