Barack Obama’s State of the Union address last night didn’t tell us much about the state of the union. It merely told us what we already knew about the state of Obama: that he wants to control the economy and “spread the wealth around.”
True, in a few minor ways Obama actually called for curtailing the expansion of government interference in people’s lives by “modestly” reforming entitlements, slightly simplifying the tax code, and allowing marginally more freedom of immigration. Republicans pushed the first two causes into prominence, and a coalition consisting largely of market-friendly right-wingers and Hispanic Democrats rallied around the third.
Obama also claimed credit for the energy revolution of hydraulic fracturing, which exists only despite the concerted efforts of Obama’s leftist allies to destroy it.
For the most part, though, Obama did what he does best: promote government control over people’s property and lives.
He repeatedly called for raising taxes on the “wealthiest and the most powerful.” He called for more corporate welfare for (useless) “renewable” energy and for “efficient” building construction. He called for more government funding for scientific research. He called for a “market-based solution to climate change,” one of his many euphemisms for more government regulation of the economy. He called for more federal control of and funding for transportation and education. He called for more extensive wage controls, including a $9 “minimum wage”—which he wants to tie to inflation (imagine where that will be in ten years). And he called for more welfare for foreign nations and more federal controls of gun owners.
Did anyone expect anything else?
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Related:
- Ayn Rand: America’s Comeback Philosopher
- The American Right, the Purpose of Government, and the Future of Liberty
Image: Wikimedia Commons
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