"The federal government’s budget deficits are pushing the nation toward a fiscal meltdown, yet our leaders can’t seem to curb their zeal for infrastructure spending. President Obama has been pushing a $50 billion package for infrastructure and will likely include a similar plan in his upcoming budget. For their part, most Republicans eagerly pursue all the spending they can get for road, rail, airport, and dam projects in their districts. 
 
"The enthusiasm for infrastructure spending is emblematic of broader problems in the bloated federal budget. Federal politicians love to intervene in activities that should be left to state governments and the private sector. And they claim that new and expanded programs will produce great results even after decades of waste on existing policies. ... 

"There are few, if any, advantages to funding infrastructure at the federal level, and long experience shows that there are many disadvantages. Rather than increasing federal infrastructure spending and adding to the federal deficit, policymakers should sort through current programs and start handing back responsibilities to the states and the private sector."

"On Feb. 5, 1963, 50 years ago this week, President John F. Kennedy addressed Congress on 'Mental Illness and Mental Retardation.' He proposed a new program under which the federal government would fund community mental-health centers, or CMHCs, to take the place of state mental hospitals. As Kennedy envisioned it, 'reliance on the cold mercy of custodial isolations will be supplanted by the open warmth of community concern and capability.' ... 

"Fifty years later, we can see the results of 'the open warmth of community concern and capability.' Approximately half of the mentally ill individuals discharged from state mental hospitals, many of whom had family support, sought outpatient treatment and have done well. The other half, many of whom lack family support and suffer from the most severe illnesses such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, have done poorly.

"According to multiple studies summarized by the Treatment Advocacy Center, these untreated mentally ill are responsible for 10% of all homicides (and a higher percentage of the mass killings), constitute 20% of jail and prison inmates and at least 30% of the homeless. Severely mentally ill individuals now inundate hospital emergency rooms and have colonized libraries, parks, train stations and other public spaces. The quality of the lives of these individuals mocks the lofty intentions of the founders of the CMHC program."

"It must be terribly inconvenient for the Obama White House to be reminded every quarter and every month that the $800 billion stimulus — and subsequent mini-stimuli — failed to ignite the boom Obama economists repeatedly predicted through the first term. The president has so many higher priorities, after all: immigration reform, gun control, climate change, income inequality. Stuff with which to build a legacy. 
 
"Faster growth and faster job creation apparently don’t make the cut. A president deeply concerned about growth would perhaps have followed a few more of the recommendations of his own Jobs and Competitiveness Council before letting it expire, as Obama did last week. Sure, Obama acted on agenda items that comfortably synced with his ideology, like retrofitting government buildings for energy efficiency. But he ignored commonsense ideas that didn’t mesh, such as expanding domestic oil and gas drilling and revamping the corporate tax code. More high-skill immigration? Sorry, it will have to wait for comprehensive immigration reform."

"Many have rightly condemned MSNBC's serpentine editing of a video to make it appear that certain gun rights activists heckled the father of a 6-year-old victim of the Sandy Hook shooting massacre, but let's not pretend this was a one-off event. 

"The liberal media long ago forfeited their respected role as watchdog over the government and have voluntarily descended to the status of a public relations arm of the Democratic Party and various liberal causes. 

"It doesn't do it justice to call them cheerleaders, for they are active participants, every bit as much involved in bringing about the events as the party with which they collude."

"Rubio's bill is nothing but amnesty. It isn't even 'amnesty thinly disguised as border enforcement.' This is a wolf in wolf's clothing.  ... 

"Step One of Marco Rubio's plan is: Grant illegal aliens the right to live and work in America legally. (Rubio's first move in poker: Fold.) 
 
"People who have broken our laws will thus leap ahead of millions of foreigners dying to immigrate here, but -- unwilling to enter illegally -- waiting patiently in their own countries. 
 
"The only thing the newly legalized illegal immigrants won't get immediately is citizenship. Rubio claims that under his plan, they won't be able to vote or go on welfare. But in practice, they'll have to wait only until the ACLU finds a judge to say otherwise."

"Want a reality check? Not one of the past federal amnesties was associated with a decline in illegal immigration. Instead, the number of illegal aliens in the U.S. has tripled since 1986. The total effect of the amnesties was even larger because relatives later joined amnesty recipients, and this number was multiplied by an unknown number of children born to amnesty recipients who then acquired automatic U.S. citizenship. ... 

"You want 'comprehensive immigration reform'? Start with reliable adjudications, fully cleared backlogs, consistent interior enforcement, working background checks for the existing caseload, and efficient and effective deportation policies that punish law-breakers and do right by law-abiders. 

"And please don't pretend that piling millions of new illegal aliens onto an already overwhelmed system is going to fix a darned thing."

"We would be in a much better position to achieve immigration reform if the Obama Administration had spent that last four years enforcing federal law rather than dismantling it. Brave immigration agents have been left with no recourse but to sue their own Department head, simply so that they — like any other law officers — will be allowed to do their jobs. … No comprehensive plan can pass Congress as long as this administration continues to defy existing federal law. What good are promises of future enforcement when the Administration covertly undermines those laws now in place?"

"George W. Bush's 51 percent re-election, with 11.5 million more votes than four years before, got his strategist Karl Rove musing about a permanent Republican majority. That didn't happen. 
 
"Now Obama's 51 percent re-election, with 3.6 million fewer votes than four years before, has Democrats talking about annihilating the Republican Party. That's not likely to happen, either."

"The media herd is stunned to discover that Barack Obama is a man of the left. After 699 teleprompted presidential speeches, the commentariat was apparently still oblivious. Until Monday’s inaugural address, that is. 

"Where has everyone been these four years? The only surprise is that Obama chose his second inaugural, generally an occasion for 'malice toward none' ecumenism, to unveil so uncompromising a left-liberal manifesto. ... 

"[...] His mission is to redeem and resurrect the 50-year pre-Reagan liberal ascendancy. Accordingly, his second inaugural address, ideologically unapologetic and aggressive, is his historical marker, his self-proclamation as the Reagan of the left. If he succeeds in these next four years, he will have earned the title."

"There was a make-believe quality to President Obama's second inaugural address, as if all that's required to solve serious problems are the intelligence to produce proper policies and the political grit to get them approved. Perish the thought that there are deep conflicts among the things that Americans want, or the possibility that some problems lack easy, obvious and inexpensive remedies. This isn't the vision Obama was peddling. ... 

"Why are Americans so disillusioned with politics? One reason is that our leaders -- and this applies to both parties -- often create narratives that seem uplifting and convincing only because they are completely detached from underlying realities. These fantasies transcend routine rhetorical flourishes and self-serving exaggerations and simplifications. But sooner or later, the realities assert themselves. People grasp that they've been misled. They feel betrayed; there's a backlash. 
 
"The job of the president is not merely to inspire. It is first and foremost to inform -- to help people see the world as it is, not as they wish it to be -- and then to craft policies based on that understanding. Barack Obama is so confident of his rhetorical powers that he violates such self-restraint. In his speech, he casually mentioned 'hard choices' but didn't say what they are; he offhandedly acknowledged that combatting climate change will be 'long' but didn't say why. His make-believe assumptions sound good but will have a short shelf life."