President Obama’s lecture commencement speech to the Naval Academy graduates on Friday left behind such a poor and lingering aftertaste, I thought this commencement speech from Sen. Ted Cruz to the graduates of Hillsdale might make a nice sort of belated palate cleanser. Sen. Cruz’s message was all about the inherent virtues of freedom, the American meritocracy, and the accompanying economic mobility, in which people’s rises and falls are directly related to their “talent, passion, perseverance, and willingness to fight for the American dream.” The best part about it all, of course, is that by pursuing and developing your own unique talents and interests, you are helping to contribute to the type of robust economic growth that is truest and most efficient method for lifting people out of poverty, no matter how much big-government progressive types will extoll the virtues of collectivism and “shared sacrifice” and equality of outcomes. Those fake virtues are inhibitors to economic growth, and “more and more government is not the answer. To say otherwise is to ignore the fact that all major European nations have higher levels of public spending than the United States does, and that all of them are poorer. Human beings are not happiest when they’re taken care of by the state. Areas under the yoke of dependency on government are among the least joyish parts of our society. The story of Julia is not an attractive utopia. We all flourish instead when afforded opportunity, the ability to work and create and accomplish. Economic growth and opportunity is the answer that works.” Enjoy: