One has to be forever bemused by our President of Perpetual Irony.  Recently, in his big economic speech, he stood at the port in Jacksonville, FL  to emphasize infrastructure’s role in creating jobs.  He then proceeded to call out House Republicans as obstructionists.

Question 1: What is a project which will immediately increase the capacity our energy infrastructure and create jobs at no cost to the government?

Question 2: Who is the obstructionist not allowing that to happen?

The Keystone XL pipeline would do both, of course, but Mr. Obama has unilaterally chosen not to allow it to proceed. Initially the excuse was the pipeline’s original route crossed some “sensitive” areas in Nebraska.  But that has since been reconciled, the new route approved and the governor of Nebraska has stated that everyone is happy with the result.

Except Mr. Obama.

Then there is his all but declared “war on coal”, a product critical to our energy infrastructure. It begins to become clear that ideology is much more important to the President than middle class jobs.  If Mr. Obama has his way, many thousands of middle class jobs will be lost in the coal mines and coal fired electrical plants as those plants are regulated out of existence. Those who understand  economics  realize the ripple effect those sorts of job losses would have on communities all across the country.   The obvious other consequences of such a policy, such as brownouts and blackouts, don’t seem to be of a particular concern to this president either.  It is clear that while he has the executive power to do it, he plans to use agencies such as the EPA to do his ideological dirty work through regulation.  Congressional oversight is not welcome.  And watch for the big push for climate change legislation coming soon. This is where the left intends to literally create tax revenue from thin air by trying to scare Americans to death.

So, one has to wonder how serious Mr. Obama really is about middle class jobs given the reality of his administration’s total lack of focus on jobs for the past 6 years.   Is the speech about jobs?  Or, in Obama’s world of the perpetual political campaign, is this just another in a series of spool ups for the next election – in this case the 2014 mid-terms.  Is it again time to name the “enemy” and begin the demonization process?

Read the speech carefully – I think you’ll conclude that jobs is just a cover for politics as usual.

~McQ

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