In his State of the Union address, President Obama seemed to have two goals: the first was to sound centrist; the second was to try to convince everyone to accept the radical leftward policy lurch of the last two years and simply move on from there. As the tension between these two goals suggests, the speech was replete with examples of the fundamental disconnect between words and actions that have become a hallmark of this presidency. Two passages of this sort particularly deserve a response.

First, he said, “We need to take responsibility for our deficit.” Yet has anyone ever heard President Obama take such responsibility?