One of the most salient messages from Obama’s State of the Union Address is that he is unwilling to take responsibility for any of his failures.  Instead, he took credit for successful policies that he opposed, and ascribed blame on others for failed policies that he supported.

Here is just a partial list of some of his most hypocritical moments:

Iraq

“For the first time in nine years, there are no Americans fighting in Iraq.”

Obama fought tooth and nail to oppose the surge of troops and force that helped defeat the insurgency in Iraq.  In fact, his entire political career and successful run for president was born out of his opposition to the surge.  Yet, he has the impertinence to take credit for the success of policies he tried to defeat.

War on Terror and Afghanistan

“For the first time in two decades, Osama bin Laden is not a threat to this country.  Most of al Qaeda’s top lieutenants have been defeated.  The Taliban’s momentum has been broken, and some troops in Afghanistan have begun to come home.”

Obama has forced our troops to fight with egregious rules of engagement, zero intelligence from interrogations, inferior force, and looming cuts to our weapons and war craft.  While our troops are fighting valiantly, yet dying in scores because of the tepid war effort, Obama is negotiating with the Taliban.  Biden believes that the Taliban are not our enemy, and as such, the administration has released many of the most dangerous terrorists from captivity.  We are propping up a failed government that will make peace with the Taliban – the very threat that we sought to eradicate in the first place ten years ago.

Yet, Obama has the audacity to claim victory in the war on terror?

Bad Economy & Joblessness

“Let’s remember how we got here.  Long before the recession, jobs and manufacturing began leaving our shores.   Technology made businesses more efficient, but also made some jobs obsolete.  Folks at the top saw their incomes rise like never before, but most hardworking Americans struggled with costs that were growing, paychecks that weren’t, and personal debt that kept piling up.”

It speaks volumes that we can elect a man to the highest office in the land who has no understanding of creative destruction.  This is a man who blames stagnation on modern technology and exhibits nostalgia for bank tellers, wagon drivers, and letter carriers.  Yet, all these supercilious elitists regard Obama as the most intellectually gifted president in recent years.

Housing

In 2008, the house of cards collapsed.  We learned that mortgages had been sold to people who couldn’t afford or understand them.  Banks had made huge bets and bonuses with other people’s money.  Regulators had looked the other way, or didn’t have the authority to stop the bad behavior.

Not only did he advocate for Freddie and Fannie’s interventions and mandates on banks before the collapse, he continues to do so now.  His acolytes at HUD are still leveraging the market to push an “affordable housing” agenda.

Budget

“Together, we’ve agreed to cut the deficit by more than $2 trillion.”

YOU LIE! Under Obama’s budget proposal, there will never be a year in which we spend less money than we did the previous year – discretionary or mandatory.  They are all baseline cuts from his unsustainable baseline created as part of the spending spree during his first two years in office.  Just during Obama’s speech, the government spent over a half billion.

Corporate Tax

Right now, companies get tax breaks for moving jobs and profits overseas.  Meanwhile, companies that choose to stay in America get hit with one of the highest tax rates in the world.  It makes no sense, and everyone knows it.

Obama promises to lower the corporate tax every year, yet he never mentions a specific proposal, and never pushes for it outside of major speeches.  He also fails to mention that he has encumbered American businesses with the most odious regulatory regime in our history.  Yet, he has the nerve to complain about jobs moving overseas.

Trade

We’re also making it easier for American businesses to sell products all over the world.  Two years ago, I set a goal of doubling U.S. exports over five years.  With the bipartisan trade agreements I signed into law, we are on track to meet that goal – ahead of schedule.  Soon, there will be millions of new customers for American goods in Panama, Colombia, and South Korea.

Due to pressure from his bankrollers in Big Labor, Obama and his party dragged their feet on the three free trade agreements for years.  They only caved to the enormous bipartisan pressure when Republicans agreed to reauthorize a failed protectionist welfare program called Trade Adjustment Assistance.  Yet, he has the cowardice to take credit for the trade deals as if they were his own.

Illegal Immigration

I believe as strongly as ever that we should take on illegal immigration. That’s why my Administration has put more boots on the border than ever before.  That’s why there are fewer illegal crossings than when I took office.

This president has protected illegals to such an extent that he is willing to use federal resources to fight several states for enforcing immigration laws passed by Congress.  As for the drop off in illegal crossings, that is a function of Obama’s failed economy.  One way to dry up the job magnet is to destroy jobs for everyone.  In that sense, Obama has been the most effective president in combating illegal border crossings.

Entitlements

As I told the Speaker this summer, I’m prepared to make more reforms that rein in the long term costs of Medicare and Medicaid, and strengthen Social Security, so long as those programs remain a guarantee of security for seniors.

One sentence is all Obama devoted to the programs that consumer 40% of the budget and over $50 trillion in unfunded liabilities.  And that is leadership?

Personal Income Taxes

Now, you can call this class warfare all you want.  But asking a billionaire to pay at least as much as his secretary in taxes?  Most Americans would call that common sense.

OK.  Let’s do this slowly, so that the intellectual midgets on the left will process the data.  In 2009, the top 1% earned 16.9% of AGI, yet they paid 36.7% of federal income taxes.  The top 5% earned 31.7%, but paid 58.7% of all federal income taxes.  The bottom 50% earned 13.5% of AGI, yet they shouldered just 2.3% of the burden.  Almost all of those taxes come from those near the 50 percentile mark.  In fact, 29% of all tax filers actually have a negative tax liability when the refundable credits are factored in.

Obama is definitely right on one point: there is inequality in the tax system.

Cross-posted to The Madison Project