By Dustin Beilke

The good news in Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan's response to the State of the Union address is that Social Security is still standing. Ryan's intentions to weaken or phase out Social Security are well known, but somehow he left those sentiments out of his speech.

The bad news is that the GOP's rising star seems to live in an alternate reality where taxes have never been higher, government spending has never been greater, and the federal deficit was incurred entirely in the time since his party went out of power. These suppositions are not just inaccurate around the edges. They are inaccurate to the extent that something close to their opposite is true.

This loose connection to facts does not seem to hurt Ryan with the voters in his district, but it does not portend good things as we attempt to make progress as a nation and a state. If Ryan is really the best one of our two dominant political parties has to offer, and he is truly unwilling to live in the world as it really is, it could be a long couple of years for those of us who follow public policy debates.