Speaking at a fundraiser in Denver for Senator (Who?) Michael Bennet yesterday, The One said:

Look, something you got to understand — for those who don’t believe in government, those who don’t believe that we have obligations to each other, it’s a lot easier task. If you can gum up the works, if you make things broken, if the Senate doesn’t get anything done, well, that’s consistent with their philosophy. It’s a whole lot easier to say no to everything. It’s a whole lot easier to blame somebody else. That politics that feeds on peoples’ insecurities, especially during tough political times — that’s the easiest kind of politics. There’s a long, storied history of that kind of politics.

This sort of rhetoric might be music to loving supporters and those were the audience so maybe this doesn’t matter. But if he’s the president of all the people and not just a political hack we might expect that he not stray so far from the truth, especially with the sort of childish petulance that has, sad to say, become his trademark.

It’s the Republicans’ fault!

Byron York at The Washington Examiner was having none of this:

Obama flip flops on his own record

In his speech at a Denver fundraiser yesterday, President Obama repeated what has become a key talking point for Democrats — that the Senate “doesn’t get anything done” and the reason for that is that some Republicans, who “don’t believe in government,” are happy to block the administration’s initiatives because blocking government initiatives is “consistent with their philosophy.”

It’s a charge you’ll no doubt hear more in the coming campaign. But it’s a striking flip-flop from Obama’s earlier statements in which he praised Congress’ ability to get things done. As a matter of fact, at a DNC fundraiser in California last October, Obama said his administration and Congress had accomplished so much that, “If we stopped today, this legislative session would have been one of the most productive in a generation.” And if you go to the White House website, you’ll find the president touting the very things that the administration and Congress have gotten done — bills passed by the House and Senate and signed by the president.

Then Byron York gets right to the heart of the matter. What Obama is really talking about is the Congress’s inability to pass a massive healthcare bill that would destroy the best health care system in the world, and more than 60% of the American people don’t want any part of it.

The fact is, when you hear the president and Democrats in Congress complain about not being able to get anything done, or about Washington being broken, they’re talking about one thing: their inability to pass a national health care reform bill. Congress can do, and is doing, lots of things — just not sprawling, omnibus “comprehensive” bills that are unpopular with the American people. (The same can be said for cap-and-trade legislation, now dead in the Senate.) If you put aside enormous bills that would re-order the American economy in ways the public does not want, Congress can do things just fine.

You may not like it Mr. Obama, but this is America. This is a representative republic. This is a democracy. The American people get to have a say.

And the people may get the last laugh. If this appearance by Mr. Obama fits with his current track record it will do Michael “Who?” Bennet more harm than good.

Further reading: Bennet only helps himself financially with Obama visit