Mark Steyn on Obama’s “Talk” on the Union’s State to Spend More Money

THE STATE OF THE UNION 2011

Wednesday, 26 January 2011

The “new Obama”? All I saw was a dull dissembler, inadequate to the charge history’s given him. 2009 buzz word: “Stimulus.” 2011 Clinton-era revival: “Investment”. Either way, it means “massive government spending”. On what? “Within 25 years, our goal is to give 80 per cent of Americans access to high-speed rail”? Good grief, how can even the hackiest of Big Government hacks read that line with a straight face? Or think it has any meaningful contribution to make to the crisis we face? “Within 25 years”? There isn’t going to be a 25 years if the spendaholics don’t stop spending, and then cut it, drastically. Instead, President Blowhard tiptoes up to the edge of bold, decisive action: Now, most of the cuts and savings I’ve proposed only address annual domestic spending, which represents a little more than 12 percent of our budget. To make further progress, we have to stop pretending that cutting this kind of spending alone will be enough. It won’t. And then what does he propose? Nothing. This man looked the future in the eye, and kicked the can down the road. And, even in “discretionary” spending, he wants to blow even more dough even in areas where we’re already spending more than anyone on the planet: In education, America spends more per pupil than anywhere except Luxembourg, which at least has something to show for it, and the President says it still isn’t enough. But at least it was “civil”, and Republicans and Democrats sat next to each other, and some of them wore nice bipartisan ribbons… After all, what could be nicer than holding hands as the high-speed choo-choo plunges into the multi-trillion-dollar abyss?