Obama’s State of Delusion Address

More speeches like this one could elect Ted Cruz or even Donald Trump.

By John Zmirak Published on January 13, 2016

President Obama’s final State of the Union address was a patchwork quilt of leftist talking points, pseudo-patriotic rah-rah, false statements, manipulative rhetoric and evasions. To write a coherent response would convey the false impression that the speech itself held together. Instead, let us act as presidential heckler, and catalog his fallacies. His remarks are best considered broken into discrete categories:

Lies or Distortions

The president referred to “fixing a broken immigration system.” A naive voter might think that by this he means that he is intent upon enforcing America’s laws and securing our borders. But of course Obama has done neither of these things in office. He has made enforcement laxer, has opposed all serious efforts to secure our borders, and used his executive power to evade our existing laws, accepting fake refugees — people not in danger of life and limb — and going beyond his constitutional power to enact de facto amnesties.

Obama cited as one of America’s “unique strengths” the fact that “we secured the freedom in every state to marry the person we love.” There was nothing uniquely American about that — because it was not enacted democratically or even constitutionally. Same-sex marriage was imposed against the wishes of voters in half the country by a narrow court ruling that treated the text of the constitution with all the deference of dental floss. Any old nation can allow its elites to overrule the wishes of voters by misreading its governing documents; the EU does this all the time. So for that matter does China.

Obama claimed that U.S. influence over the world has remained constant during his eight years in office, noting irrelevantly that “the United States of America is the most powerful nation on Earth. Period. It’s not even close” thanks to our military spending. Can he even believe this line — with Russian troops squatting in Ukraine, and intervening (thank God) to keep U.S.-backed Islamist militias from conquering Syria and ethnically cleansing its Christians? With China fortifying islands, North Korea advancing its crackpot nuclear program, Iran moving smoothly toward a nuclear capacity — and capturing 10 U.S. sailors the same night as his speech? In fact, Obama ought to be citing Dinesh D’Souza’s documentaries about him, which claimed that Obama considered U.S. influence excessive, and sought to diminish it. Mission accomplished!

Things That Don’t Mean What He Thinks They Mean

Obama played at magnanimity for a moment by admitting this: “It’s one of the few regrets of my presidency — that the rancor and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better.” Of course, he took none of the blame for this situation, did not own up to the savagely high-handed nature of his unilateral executive actions; or his callous disregard for citizens’ legitimate fear of terrorist attacks when he promised to ship thousands of unvettable Syrian migrants thousands of miles from the “first safe country” they could reach, and place them on the American welfare gravy train. Indeed, Obama has accelerated the Democratic program of using mass immigration to transform America into a democratically ungovernable, ethnically and religiously fractured colossus, which can only be run by powerful bureaucrats.

How about the statement of his solicitor general before the Supreme Court, subtly threatening tax bankruptcy for every organization that continued to oppose same-sex “marriage”? Obama didn’t fire his appointee for saying that, and swiftly reassure worried Americans. No, he let his chief lawyer’s trial balloon loom over our heads, as it does to this day.

Obama addressed the anxieties that clearly trouble millions of Americans, which have propelled Donald Trump to the top of the polls. But his response combined delusional hubris and a catalog of historical falsehoods. The president said:

We live in a time of extraordinary change — change that’s reshaping the way we live, the way we work, our planet and our place in the world. It’s change that can broaden opportunity, or widen inequality. And whether we like it or not, the pace of this change will only accelerate.

What voters clearly want is some sign that the government of their country will act to buffer them from destructive changes, and allow them to plan their lives with some semblance of normalcy. Instead, Obama told them to suck it up, because the ride’s only going to get even bumpier:

America has been through big changes before — wars and depression, the influx of immigrants, workers fighting for a fair deal, and movements to expand civil rights. Each time, there have been those who told us to fear the future; who claimed we could slam the brakes on change, promising to restore past glory if we just got some group or idea that was threatening America under control. And each time, we overcame those fears.

In fact, the way America “overcame those fears” was not to hunker down and obey some president’s order to shut up and get used to the new way of doing things. America was deeply unsettled by mass immigration, much of it from politically unstable countries — and Congress acted to drastically limit immigration in 1926, gaining for America vital breathing space to allow the successful assimilation of newcomers.

We acted boldly — if ineffectively— against the Depression in the New Deal, finally ending it only with our entrance into World War II. We embraced the civil rights revolution, but soon had to crack down on the urban riots and ethnic militancy it unleashed by electing Richard Nixon. We allowed labor unions to grow, but fought tooth and nail to get them out of the hands of Communist cabals. In each case, Americans dealt with change by pushing back energetically, until our legitimate concerns were truly addressed. No, Mr. President, we didn’t just surrender and collaborate then, so don’t expect us to now.

Tasks Which the Federal Government Shouldn’t Be Undertaking

It’s easy to forget, but the U.S. federal government has no business displacing the efforts of states, localities, and private citizens and micromanaging the lives of hundreds of millions of people by doing ANY of the following things:

  • “helping students learn to write computer code”
  • “personalizing medical treatments for patients”
  • “increas[ing] early childhood education”
  • “lift[ing] high school graduation rates”
  • “boost[ing] graduates in fields like engineering”
  • “providing Pre-K for all”
  • “offering every student the hands-on computer science and math”
  • “providing two years of community college at no cost” or even
  • “protecting our kids from gun violence.”

Elite Fantasies

The governing fantasy of Western elites is that deep down everyone is the same, with the same motives and ultimate aspirations — namely, to be just like Western elites. Everyone on the planet, deep down, wants to listen to NPR podcasts, dabble in eclectic “spirituality,” and drink organic, sustainable coffee at a shop with a rainbow “diversity” flag. They just don’t realize it yet. If we are really, really kind and welcoming, that will speed up the process by which Muslim rape mobs transform themselves into transgender support groups.

Obama revealed the depths to which his magical thinking has descended, by saying the following, not even a full week after the truth about what happened in Cologne and other European cities escaped the censors’ net — while European governments are using water cannons to silence outraged patriots:

That’s why we need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion. This isn’t a matter of political correctness. It’s a matter of understanding what makes us strong. The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith.

Does Obama really think that Islamic radicals “respect” America for the “openness” that lets terrorists into our midst, like the San Bernardino massacre couple? Do they “respect” the nations of Western Europe, which have been even more welcoming? Then why are these radicals predicting that sharia law will be imposed on the “unbelievers” actually native to those countries?

Obama clearly envies European elites their power to ignore popular sentiment and ignore public interest. He has governed the United States like an annex of the corrupt and oligarchic European Union. And he has done as much for American security, influence, and greatness as Angela Merkel has done for Germany’s. Voters know that, and we have every reason to be hopeful about the upcoming election.

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