(lucianne)
Posted on 07/21/2012 6:16:24 AM PDT by Kaslin
President Obama blasted American entrepreneurs last weekend, boldly claiming the self-made man is an illusion to an audience in Roanoke, Virginia. Since the Obama apologists in the mainstream media are claiming that the president is being quoted out of context, here is how he led into the subject:
If you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own. You didn't get there on your own. I'm always struck by people who think, well, it must be 'cause I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something: There are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there.
If you don't know what that means, you must be incredibly dense. It gets worse. The president continued:
If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen.
There is no way to read any of this and not be acutely aware of what the president is trying to do. Whenever anyone on the left tells you that you didn't earn your own success, that you had help from others — you know what's coming next…If you didn't earn what you have, you don't deserve it! And if you don't deserve what you have, it follows that…
Well, nothing actually follows from that. Suppose I'm rooting around in the woods and I stumble upon a valuable diamond. I didn't put forth any physical effort. I didn't exert any mental effort. The discovery is pure, blind luck. So you can say that, in a sense, I don't deserve it. But you don't deserve it either. It doesn't follow from the fact that I was the beneficiary of luck that others are justified from taking the diamond from me.
If the roll of the dice or the spin of the roulette wheel favors me rather than you, I can't claim that I "deserve" my winnings or that you "deserve" your losses. But it doesn't follow from those facts that you are entitled to what I have won.
Ah, but I'm being too logical. The left believes that all they have to do is undermine peoples' entitlement to whatever they have. If successful people don't deserve their success and unsuccessful people don't deserve their lack of success, the left believes they are justified in massive redistribution.
Some of President Obama's defenders have claimed that the critics are reading too much into his speech. That all that's going on here is the classic conflict between individualism and social needs. But there are degrees of disagreement. Obama's articulation of the issue is an extreme collectivist point of view. It is remarkable precisely because it is so very far outside the mainstream of contemporary thought.
That's why so many people are outraged and why there is a sudden surge of gallows humor. On Facebook and in other social media, people are sharing examples of inventors and entrepreneurs "who didn't build it."
Steve Jobs didn't create the iPad. Other people did. Bill Gates didn't create Microsoft. Others did it. I guess Michael Phelps didn't really win eight Olympic gold medals either. Think of all the help he must have had along the way.
Still, there is a serious point to be made. For more than 200 years economists have been studying the distribution of income. Granted that what each of us does affects other people, what determines how much income any one of us receives? The economists answer is straightforward. In a capitalist system, each one of us tends to receive an amount equal to our marginal contribution to nation's output of goods and services. That is, each of us tends to receive an income equal to our contribution to generating national income.
In plain English: people tend to get the value of what they produce.
There is logic to how the economic system functions. Incomes are not distributed randomly. For the most part, they are not the result of misfortune or luck. They are very much affected by the attributes the president derides: smart thinking and hard work.
In a previous post, I described how low-income families have been systematically deprived of the benefits of capitalism because of unwise regulation.
If President Obama really wanted to help those at the bottom of the income ladder he would be calling for massive deregulation, for liberating the entrepreneurial spirit and allowing the dynamics of the marketplace to meet the needs of the poor, the way they meet the needs of everyone else.
Instead of deriding and belittling people who build businesses, the president should understand how helpful they could actually be.
Not for those who benefited from Affirmative Action, that's for sure!
You either believe in the individual, or you believe in collectivism. It’s clear where Obama stands.
(lucianne)
My guess is that Obama is speaking about himself.
He certainly didn’t get where he is on his own-—but he is hiding who got hime there.
Oh!! We know some of them, Bill Ayres, Tony Rezco, Jeremiah Wright,Frank Davis, but there are others hidden in his background. Others who now benefit from his Government Largesse.
Of course the Media is doing a superb job of covering up for this waste product who wants to continue tearing our country down for another 4 years.
Not for those who benefited from Affirmative Action, that's for sure!
That's correct.
Add to that the idea that Obama has been so steeped in Marxism that he believes the state (with him at the head of it, of course) is all powerful and preeminent.
He is the voice of the state...laying claim to all rights of the individual. It has never dawned on him that when the state takes those rights, the individual will cease to contribute...and the state will collapse.
The first ape to use a stick to dig ants owed nothing to the other apes.
In a way, he’s right. Many people give God the glory for helping them with their businesses and any success they have.
Obama is only talking about himself,he could not have Pulled off the Biggest scandal in American History without a Lot of Help.He Obviously is not one of the smartest people he was talking about
That’s over his paygrade to get. He’s just an evil commie playtoy with strings - because they know liberals fall for anything that’s evil. They shun goodness like the plague.
Obama is never right - the godless are the dregs of society.
He's killing the spirit of his own "people" as he concurrently kills America.
Now we are being told that we didn’t understand the words that were coming out of his mouth...
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=don%27t++you+understand+the+words+that+are+coming+out+of+my+mouth&view=detail&mid=34142854ED6F4FCFB29B34142854ED6F4FCFB29B&first=0&qpvt=don%27t++you+understand+the+words+that+are+coming+out+of+my+mouth
They ALL helped him by keeping quiet - ALL accomplices in the destruction of America. Except Col Lakin who stood SOLO as took his oath, seriously, in spite of everything/everyone against him.
Of course, because he can’t find an idiot/his staff to give him a defense - so it’s someone else’s fault - OURS. Typical, if he could, he’d blame it on Bush or Rush.
Perhaps, he saw this....
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2908410/posts
I don’t doubt he sincerely believes this. He also probably gives a masonic prayer to whomever provides for him. Considering he hates Christ and anything Christian, his statements manifests he likely has fully intentionally worshiped another and been given everything he has ever had by the Father of lies.
As someone pointed out on Rush last week, the old Soviet Union had roads and schools.
Thanks!!!
Bfl
Obama, who has never had to do anything on his own. ‘His’ books are penned by others, he was accepted into college and given titles and positions and community jobs based on affirmative action. He was run for president by his handlers and the press has made every excuse for him. The telepromptor gives him his speeches and when he leaves them it is painfully obvious. He has been given everything based on entitlement, the color of his skin and not his character. He lacks the imagination to see how success can also be earned by the individual. Such a person should not be reelected.
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