It’s not often that you get not one, but two ridiculous assertions from the same politician in the same week, but President Barack Obama managed to pull it off. His first gem: “The private sector is doing fine. Where we’re seeing weaknesses in our economy have to do with state and local government. Oftentimes cuts initiated by, you know, Governors or mayors who are not getting the kind of help that they have in the past from the federal government and who don’t have the same kind of flexibility as the federal government in dealing with fewer revenues coming in.” The second gem: “The notion that my White House would purposefully release classified information is offensive. It’s wrong.”

First, quote number one. I’ll spare you the obvious rebuttals by the GOP, all of which couple together the incredulity and shock that accompanies an outright gift from their main opponent in the upcoming November election. In one fell swoop, Mr. Obama revealed the depth of his economic ignorance and his socialist/Marxist reflexes. Moreover, he revealed them a day after Democrats and their government union allies had their collective butts kicked in Wisconsin, San Diego and San Jose.

As an aside, it’s truly remarkable how little mainstream media coverage has been aimed at the explosion in California, given the enormity of the government union defeat in those two cities. San Deigo and San Jose voted to cut retirement benefits by whopping margins of 66 percent and 70 percent, respectively, with San Jose opting to cut them for existing workers, not just new hires. The union will undoubtedly take them to court for that, but here’s the kicker: even if the unions win, Proposition B calls for the city to take the equivalent savings in pay cuts. For the voters of San Jose, it’s heads we win, tails you lose.

To be exceedingly kind, government union workers and the president are standing on the wrong side of history. For them and their ilk, everything good in life comes from the state and goes to the people. That’s not only the essence of arrogance, it’s exactly backwards. But don’t take a conservative’s word for it. Take it from the tens of thousands of former dues-paying union members who stopped contributing, once it was no longer mandatory to do so. Union “solidarity?” What a giant steaming load, slowly being revealed for the fraud it has been for quite some time.

Yet if it were up to the president, the fraud would not only continue, it would be expanded. Again one might be inclined to think that three trillion dollars of stimulus, consisting of one package aimed at, by the president’s own admission, non-existent shovel-ready jobs, and two rounds of quantitative easing, aimed at artificially pumping up the stock market – all of which did next to nothing to revive the economy, might cause the president to re-consider his assumptions. Unfortunately such a reassessment requires a certain degree of humility. That is a character trait with which this president is singularly unfamiliar.

Which brings us to quote number two. Anyone besides the Kool-aid drinkers buying this one? The Associated Press says the president “promised investigations into the source of leaks about U.S. involvement in cyber-attacks on Iran and drone strikes on suspected terrorists.” That’s all well and good, but what about the other two major leaks? Who’s investigating why the Pakistani doctor who provided us with Osama Bin Laden’s DNA, and got 33 years for his trouble was outed, or who outed the British double-agent who prevented an underwear bomb from getting on a jetliner, and will now spend the rest of his life living in fear of reprisal?

The dead giveaway here is simple. Obama uttered the second quote above on Friday. That was June 8th. On January 28th, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta revealed the name of the doctor who provided us with Bin Laden’s DNA. Stories about the British double-agent and the underwear bomb began appearing on May 8th. The New York Times story about drone strikes was published May 29th, “according to two officials present.” Stories about the Stuxnet virus began appearing on June 1st, with the New York Times attributing them to “current and former American, European and Israeli officials involved in the program, as well as a range of outside experts.”

Thus, Mr. Obama wasn’t “offended” until is almost six months after the first story, and a full week after the last one. And Americans are supposed to believe these stories, every one of which is designed to make the president look tough on terror and enhance his re-election prospects in the process, didn’t come from the top of the Obama administration food chain – or perhaps the president himself?

The only thing more laughable is the idea that Attorney General Eric Holder will be conducting the investigation into the leaks.

Mr. Obama is an economically ignorant, out-of-touch narcissist who characterized American forces as “fighting on my behalf.” Not the country’s behalf. His behalf, which means it’s only baby steps from there to a place where anyone, from the soldiers in Seal Team 6 to Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi, can be sacrificed on the altar of Mr. Obama’s re-election campaign. Furthermore, unless an independent special prosecutor conducts an investigation into these breaches of national security, bet the farm the most corrupt AG in modern history will bury this investigation completely, or stonewall it until after the election.

Lastly, some early advice for Mr. Romney should he be fortunate enough to win the presidency: one of the first orders of business has to be draining the swamps in the numerous government agencies infested with the kind of progressives who believe they have the divine right to run a shadow government, regardless of who occupies the White House or controls Congress. Note that all of the major leaks that occurred both during the Bush administration and this one consistently accrued to progressive sensibilities, be they to Bush’s detriment or Obama’s credit. It’s bad enough that the nation must endure such arrogant progressive careerists when the left controls the levers of power in Washington, D.C. There is absolutely no reason a Republican administration has to put up with such dangerous nonsense.