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As the dust and smoke begins to clear from his historic legislative achievement, President Barack Obama (D-Finland Station) is enjoying the sort of hosannas appropriate to an avatar of change. Sunday morning talk show wags stroke their chins sagaciously and intone about Obama’s “coming of age,” his “growing comfortable with the exercise of power,” his courage in wagering his Presidency on the passage of “health care reform.”

Revitalized, Obama has gone from victory to victory, moving full speed ahead on his mission to unalterably transform the United States and her citizens. Refusing to go back to the table, Obama pushed ahead in the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles to force the bill(s) through Congress. Resorting to bribery, cheating, threats and outright lies, he got his way, and then he got underway. He nationalized student loans.

Under the guise of postpartisanship, (which, if Samuel Johnson were around today, he would rightly identify as the last refuge of the scoundrel), he opened up new offshore regions to geologic exploration (with drilling for oil viewed as a possibility around the time the national debt eclipses 100% of GDP). In exchange for this gesture, a handful of Republican Senators are expected to roll over on some version of cap and trade.

Not content with domestic policy, the suddenly refreshed President launched a foreign policy blitz not seen since the heyday of Jimmy Carter. He instructed his Secretary of State to side with Argentina against our once close ally, Great Britain, over the Falkland Islands. He achieved a breakthrough arms limitation treaty with Russia. (Don’t worry about the details, the important thing is he got it done). He set a new deadline for Iran to come clean on its nuclear weapons program, or face economic sanctions. If they don’t comply, the international community is confident Obama will respond forcefully and immediately by setting a new, really, really serious deadline for compliance.

Finally, and most impressive of all, Obama achieved the first significant breakthrough in the mideast peace process since Anwar Sadat recognized Israel. He seized upon a diplomatic misstep to drive a wedge between Israel and the United States. With public and private insults, the Obama administration let the Israelis know in no uncertain terms that our patience is growing short. They need to make peace with the Palestinians. Right now. And if they don’t, well, they will be on their own.

It has been an amazing flurry of activity, all brought on by the passage of that fatal mishmash of pork and paybacks, favors and back room deals masquerading as reform. Democrats are fond of comparing “health care reform” to Medicare and Social Security, despite the fact that those two entitlements are going broke. They have already saddled the American people with $100 trillion of unfunded liabilities. On top of this travesty the new health care law will cost untold trillions more.

There will be new taxes, huge new expenditures, a vast increase in the size of the federal government and the size of its work force. And nothing will be done to rein in the cost of medical care. Despite having begun his presidency with the enthusiastic support of the vast majority of Americans, and having huge majorities in both houses, Obama, who seemingly could have achieved anything during his honeymoon, chose instead to outsource health care legislation to the left wing of his party.

It took him fifteen months, but he finally got it passed. He got it passed at the expense of his popularity, and that of his party. It cost him the respect of the majority of Americans. His focus, even obsession with this travesty of a bill, meant that the economy continued to languish, much to the dismay and injury of the ten to twenty percent of American workers unable to find work.

None of that matters to Obama. He was elected to be a transformative President, and a transformative President he will be. If that transformation involves destroying the American economy and reducing  the world’s greatest superpower to the status of, say, Argentina, so be it. From where Obama sits, and according to the beliefs of his closest advisors and lifelong philosophical guides, the destruction of American is not necessarily a bad thing. These are all people who honestly believe American power is the most dangerous threat to world peace. They believe that American exceptionalism is the biggest obstacle to an effective international community.

Obama is offering the world America on a silver platter. He is the Dr. Kervorkian of the American Dream.