Did Eisenhower have the constitutional authority to build the interstate highway system? Yes, but not to improve economic development -- and he knew it. In fact, the official name of the interstate highways is the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways. Ike argued that the country needed paved highways to move missiles around to protect the country. From a military standpoint, the argument was dubious. Missiles could be launched from fixed positions, as technology continually increased range, speed, accuracy and power.

The Founding Fathers identified a handful of allowable federal duties, not least of which is national security. But what about economic development? President James Monroe cast his only veto when Congress appropriated money to expand the Cumberland Road -- even though the road went through and would have helped his home state of Virginia. The Constitution, said Monroe, prohibits spending money for this purpose.

Rather than expanding "entitlements," they must be dealt with -- and eventually ended. What about selling land (the fed is by far the largest landholder) and using the proceeds to pay for current and near-term obligations to Social Security and Medicare -- with a view toward complete eventual privatization? What about private charity instead of Medicaid? What about a free market approach to making health care more accessible and affordable? This means IRA-type accounts; cutting health care insurance regulation; allowing nonlicensed practitioners to perform tasks now done only by government-licensed doctors and other medical practitioners -- which shuts out competition and keeps prices high; allowing health care plans to be purchased out of state; allowing individuals to deduct their health care premiums as businesses do now; and adopting an English-style "loser-pays" legal system, which would likely minimize the incentive for doctors to practice expensive "defensive" medicine.

Even if all of this makes sense, the toothpaste is out of the tube, right? So let's just try to stop things from getting worse. Unraveling the welfare state can be done. Indiana, for example, just leased one of its highways to a private consortium that charges tolls for maintenance and profit.

Obama's anti-capitalist, Big Government, command-and-control economic vision exceeds mere "childishness." It is dangerous. After 100-plus days, the jury reached its verdict.

Obama is a neo-Marxist.