President Obama’s State of the Union Address will be Tuesday evening. We’ll be watching.
We were curious, however, about the administration’s plans for an entire State of the Union week. After the speech, there will be a live panel of “senior advisors” who will answer questions via Twitter, Facebook and Google+ (and carrier pigeon, as far as we can tell).
“Then,” the White House tells us, ” on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, a group of policy experts and advisors to the President will sit down for Office Hours on Twitter — discussing the issues that matter to you and your community.”
Great — as long as “you and your community” aren’t rural.
We’ve looked through the list of White House policy people, and not one of them has anything to do with rural America.
Here are the categories for Thursday: Veterans, LGBT, Women, Seniors, Latinos, Small Business Owners, African Americans, Asian American Pacific Islanders and Youth.
No rural.
Then, on Friday, the White House has a full schedule of issues: Foreign Policy, Education, Health, Energy, Consumer Protections, The Economy, Job Opportunities and Urban Issues.
Yes, we have “urban issues” but no rural.
We are under no impression that these two days of “office hours” will result in any significant change in what the administration is doing. But it tells us something that when you list 17 areas of interest in this White House, rural doesn’t make the cut.
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