What’s the Republican takeaway from President Obama’s State of the Union address? That they should be unwavering opposition to an unconditional increase in the U.S. debt limit. The statutory debt ceiling of $14.3 trillion will soon be reached. Republicans should oppose increasing it to permit more borrowing without meaningful spending cuts as part of the deal.

The vision that the president presented to the nation in his speech, that we need more government, a lot more, to address the challenges before us, shows he sees the world no differently than he did when he entered office two years ago.