80 minutes of State of the Union distilled into 5

Ladies and gents, based on last night’s State of the Union address, I’d like to share two quotes that I believe define the essence of what President Barack Obama was trying to convey – and how it is the antithesis of who we are as a “free” people.

And I will take this moment to remind the president that a minimum wage job is not a career and no one should have a goal of raising a family on $15,000 a year. Perhaps if we actually had real economic and job growth, that wouldn’t be the case?

Also, Mr. President, “the shadow of crisis” has not passed – just ask the two Japanese men being held under threat of beheading by ISIS if $200 million ransom isn’t paid. And if the shadow of crisis has been lifted, then why do we have three U.S. Naval warships ready to evacuate the U.S. Embassy in Yemen? Oh by the way, that’s the second U.S. Embassy that will have been evacuated in less than a year.

Here’s the first pertinent quote from Sir Winston Churchill:

“Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”

I use that quote because to me that defines Obama’s new ‘middle-class economics’ where he stated, “it is the idea that this country does best when everyone gets their fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules (Unless you’re the New England Patriots). We just don’t want everyone to share in America’s success – we want everyone to contribute to our success.”

Hmm, let’s see, who gets to define what’s fair? And I agree, everyone should contribute to America’s success – but remember, the top one percent of income earners pays 38.1 percent of taxes, the top five percent pays 58.9 percent of taxes, the top 10 percent of income earners pays 70 percent of taxes.

So, if 90 percent of income earners only pay 30 percent of all taxes – what is fair about that? And I concur, we need everyone, all hands on deck, to contribute to the American success story. But it seems Obama’s vision is that a few contribute more – his definition of fair – in order to redistribute fairness via “free” benefits. Truly not a principle of a Constitutional Republic, or a free market economy.

And here’s the second quote, from Abraham Lincoln:

“Property is the fruit of labor…property is desirable…is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. Let him not who is houseless pull down the house of another, but let him work diligently to build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.”

What President Obama espoused last night is a disregard for the efforts of individuals to succeed over his desire to promote collective achievement.

His vision is not an America based on an equality of opportunity and the pursuit of happiness. Obama’s objective – truly that of progressive socialism – is one of equality of outcomes through a government guarantee of happiness. And that, ladies and gents, has never ended well in the history of the world.

It does end up as Churchill described, “an equal sharing of misery,” as the personal desire to excel is eroded, degraded, defeated and destroyed – something Obama truly is NOT doing with militant Islamism. Than again, listening to him last night, you’d believe we’ve achieved global tranquility.

And what exactly is “smart power?” Seems to be that means talking a lot about the weather being a severe threat, while denying the enemy is beheading and attacking.

Obama’s speech was nothing about viable policy – and tell the 92 million Americans who have been dropped from the workforce the economy is doing well. His speech was about defiant political posturing that he believes sets the conditions for his successor and forces the masses to vote for their own largesse from the public treasury.

It’s easy to stand up unchallenged, and promise everything to everyone – except those whom you mostly despise, hardworking Americans.

Obama’s speech was brilliantly themed – but promotes only failure. Middle class economics is just a spruced up way for progressive socialists to advance wealth redistribution – you cannot grow an economy without capital investment.

But even after being in office this long, Obama just doesn’t get it. If you have the time, watch the State of the Union address given by President Bill Clinton after the 1994 midterm loss he suffered with his famous quote, “The era of big government is over.”

Someone should have had Obama watch that speech, instead of presenting himself as a tone deaf and obtuse president who lectured us all about “better politics” — and told us that “My only agenda for the next two years is the same as the one I’ve had since the day I swore an oath on the steps of this Capitol – to do what I believe is best for America.”

No Mr. President, that’s not what the oath you took was about.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on AllenBWest.com.