"You didn't get there on your own"

[Cecilie1200]

I just finished building an 8'X16' garden shed.

In Obama's world all the credit should go to Dewalt for making my tools, right?

And whoever grew the trees that became your lumber, yeah. Oh, and OF COURSE, the government officials who issued you a building permit.

 

[Dr Grump]

I just finished building an 8'X16' garden shed.

In Obama's world all the credit should go to Dewalt for making my tools, right?

Yeah, that's what he meant

 

[Dr Grump]

Only people who have never accomplished or achieved anything feel the need to give the credit to the tools, rather than the craftsman who wields them.

Oh really? So when those athletes thank their parents and coaches for getting them to training, then training them, feeding them, making sacrifices for them, then those parents and coaches have had no input? And they have accomplished nothing? Is that what you are saying? Really??

 

[GuyPinestra]

Only people who have never accomplished or achieved anything feel the need to give the credit to the tools, rather than the craftsman who wields them.

Oh really? So when those athletes thank their parents and coaches for getting them to training, then training them, feeding them, making sacrifices for them, then those parents and coaches have had no input? And they have accomplished nothing? Is that what you are saying? Really??

The athletes appreciate the SACRIFICE made for them, can you tell me where the government has SACRIFICED for business owners?

Well, other than the taxpayers they TAKE from, that is??

 

[bripat9643]

/facepalm

another idiot in desperate need of a civics class....sigh


do you have any concept of what self governance means? at all?

"Self governance" is a euphemism for mob rule.

Why do you hate America?

I don't. I just hate our government and all the prehensile vermin that populate it.

 

[thereisnospoon]

I just finished building an 8'X16' garden shed.

In Obama's world all the credit should go to Dewalt for making my tools, right?

Nope..To the politicians that run the local government that issued the building and other permits....THEY get the credit for your shed.

 

[francoHFW]

ALL Pure Pubcrappe, dupes.

"This great American system, these roads and bridges- you didn't do that." is what he said, MORONS.

 

[Mac1958]

This is a point that's being overlooked (gee, I wonder why). Obama's comments were questionable if taken in a vacuum, but they fit right into the theme that Obama and the Democrats are anti-business. It's a little tougher to believe the spin when taken in the larger context.

And then there is the passage that pissed me off, personally - "I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because 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."

That's the President of the United States first putting words (bolded, to make it simple) into the mouths of business owners, and then mocking them for those words. Does anyone else recall such a statement from a President?

You say you know what we think? You don't. You couldn't.

And business owners don't talk about what you claim. I'm with them every day. They're too busy trying to keep the doors open.

You can't spin an insult.

.

Y'know, I've brought this up at least a couple of times now, and I can't get any of the spinners to provide a response.

I realize it can't be spun with the diversionary "roads and bridges" schtick, but can't you come up with something else here?

.

Im going to give you some credit there Mac.

Thats an interesting point. I will try to answer it.


Look at the arguments on this forum. Not just this thread but this forum.

"They WORKED for it" is a big one. "They EARNED it!" is another one along the same lines. Its said repeatedly by those that would defend the top 1% gaining 90+% ( I believe the stat is 93% but Im unsure ) of all new wealth created in this country.

With so MANY on the right making that statement, is the President REALLY putting words in their mouths or is he simply answering the argument we've all heard so many times?

Thanks for the response, Vidi. I was beginning to think this was just going to avoided permanently. The avoidance already tells me quite a bit.

Certainly not all business owners are on the Right, though. I don't have any polls or figures, but I've never noticed a preponderance in that direction. Along those lines, by the way, I think the right-wingers overdo claims of the damage that would be done to job creators by returning to the 39.6% top marginal tax rate, by the way. Significantly. But that's for another thread.

Now that you mention it, if Obama thinks that most business owners are conservative, that just seems weird . The passage really sticks out to me - he clearly infers that business owners (party affiliation irrelevant) have a bloated and undeserved view of their importance to their business. This makes it easy to knock down that straw man.

Y'know, in a way, conceiving and nurturing and growing a business has many similarities to being a parent, both good and bad. I've worked pretty hard to raise my children, and I wouldn't appreciate it if some politician made some sweeping mockery of parenthood to make political points. It's like a politician saying, "well, parents have too high an opinion of their importance in their children's lives." Well, wait a minute. Yes, society plays a big role, but I changed her diapers and walked with her all night when she was sick and sacrificed my wants so she could have stuff and suffered with her when someone broke her heart. All happily, she's my kid. Cripes, there are other influences in her life, obviously, but you don't need to mock my efforts. That's how this feels.

I'm sure as hell not a right-winger, I just really hate straw man arguments like this, especially from (ugh) politicians. I'm neck-deep in that stuff every day, and as I've said, business owners aren't asking for sympathy or thanks or a crutch, but we'd definitely appreciate it if the President didn't mock us.

Anyway, thanks again.

.

 

[Dr Grump]

Only people who have never accomplished or achieved anything feel the need to give the credit to the tools, rather than the craftsman who wields them.

Oh really? So when those athletes thank their parents and coaches for getting them to training, then training them, feeding them, making sacrifices for them, then those parents and coaches have had no input? And they have accomplished nothing? Is that what you are saying? Really??

The athletes appreciate the SACRIFICE made for them, can you tell me where the government has SACRIFICED for business owners?

Well, other than the taxpayers they TAKE from, that is??

Take it up with Cesspit...

 

[Listening]

Why doesn't Obama quit building roads and bridges.;

Let's see what happens ?

My guess is that people will figure out how to survive without him.

In fact, I'd be willing to bet that they do whatever they do better and cheaper than he thinks he can do it.

 

[Listening]

Along those lines, by the way, I think the right-wingers overdo claims of the damage that would be done to job creators by returning to the 39.6% top marginal tax rate, by the way. Significantly.

Damage ?

The damage isn't in the numbers, but then neither is the impact. Increasing taxes on the rich hardly makes a dent in our debt.

I'll vote to raise taxes on the rich, the day Harry Ried can produce 4 dollars of real spending cuts for ever 1 dollar of increased revenue.

My guess is that the wealthy will have less problem paying more to a government they see responsible as opposed to one that seems quite willing to freely give out money to people so they can buy alcohol on the government dime.

 

[P@triot]

ALL Pure Pubcrappe, dupes.

"This great American system, these roads and bridges- you didn't do that." is what he said, MORONS.

Even if that were true (and you know damn well it is not) - that is equally insulting. Since we have the highest corporate tax rate in the world, how exactly does Obama figure that he and his Marxist commrades built all of this but business owners and hard working Capitalists didn't?

 

[Uncensored2008]

So Microsoft helped you get your intended result.

No Gump, they didn't. Microsoft created a toolkit that offers a foundational infrastructure that anyone can use to aid the development of programs.

Just as societies form and create common infrastructure that offers a foundation that anyone in that society can use to build a business. Only a drooling fool would claim that Microsoft built the end program, or that Government created the business. Obama's idiotic class warfare is absurd in every regard. Obama formulates his speeches for the stupid, which are his core constituency.

IOW, you agree with Obama's analogy. Good, now we're getting somewhere....

Gump, stick to shagging sheep, you have no aptitude for debate.

 

[Foxfyre]

All you need to do to refute the President's argument on this issue is to look at Americans and American businesses.

EVERY American born into the same neighborhood in the same year as the businessman enjoyed at least some of the same parenting, the same education, the same occasional 'help along the way', the same infrastructure, and the same public services as everybody else. But a relatively small percentage of those Americans who 'were all in it together had the incentive, drive, creativity, or capacity for risk taking to start and build a business.

This group of Americans probably represent many different races and religions and political ideologies. As Mac pointed out, one's political dispensation is not really a factor into whether he or she takes the risks to go into business.

But if the businessman's success is purely because 'we're all working together', then why doesn't everybody have a business? If the businessman can't take credit for the business he built, what was the incentive of everybody else who built it for him and not themselves?

The more you think about it, the more absurd it becomes.

 

[Some Guy]

All you need to do to refute the President's argument on this issue is to look at Americans and American businesses.

EVERY American born into the same neighborhood in the same year as the businessman enjoyed at least some of the same parenting, the same education, the same occasional 'help along the way', the same infrastructure, and the same public services as everybody else. But a relatively small percentage of those Americans who 'were all in it together had the incentive, drive, creativity, or capacity for risk taking to start and build a business.

This group of Americans probably represent many different races and religions and political ideologies. As Mac pointed out, one's political dispensation is not really a factor into whether he or she takes the risks to go into business.

But if the businessman's success is purely because 'we're all working together', then why doesn't everybody have a business? If the businessman can't take credit for the business he built, what was the incentive of everybody else who built it for him and not themselves?

The more you think about it, the more absurd it becomes.

Good point. So simple and common sense but well articulated. I have to remind myself sometimes that some people either don't know or don't comprehend even the simplest of things such as this.

 

[flacaltenn]

THat section of the speech was pure Collectivist primer..

You could take it out of the WH wrapper and it would sound exactly like Noah Chomsky or Michael Moore...

 

[Dr Grump]

So Microsoft helped you get your intended result.

No Gump, they didn't. Microsoft created a toolkit that offers a foundational infrastructure that anyone can use to aid the development of programs.

Just as societies form and create common infrastructure that offers a foundation that anyone in that society can use to build a business. Only a drooling fool would claim that Microsoft built the end program, or that Government created the business. Obama's idiotic class warfare is absurd in every regard. Obama formulates his speeches for the stupid, which are his core constituency.

IOW, you agree with Obama's analogy. Good, now we're getting somewhere....

Gump, stick to shagging sheep, you have no aptitude for debate.

I didn't see Obama saying anything about the infrastructure helping you people build anything, but it helped them along the way. The US govt invested heavily in, and supported, the building of the internet. Without that your apps would be useless. Without Microsoft you wouldn't have been able to build that app. Does Microsoft deserve credit for you building your app? No. That's on you. Does it deserve credit for giving you the tools to create the app? Abosutely. That is what I see..

Oh the irony...the guy who supports anybody but Obama and therefore the Republican party that gave us such brain surgeons as Dumbya, Palin and Quayle - three of the dumbest politicians to ever be anywhere in the world - says that Obama's speeches are for the dumb...

You telling me I have no apptitude for debate is like Eric The Eel telling Michael Phelps he can't swim.

 

[oreo]

ALL Pure Pubcrappe, dupes.

"This great American system, these roads and bridges- you didn't do that." is what he said, MORONS.

The White House is in full PANIC mode over this:

In his regular weekly address Saturday, President Barack Obama asserted that “we’re still paying” for the Bush tax cuts. It was a not-so-subtle jab aimed at blaming tax reductions enacted a decade ago for today’s bad economy. But desperate times require desperate measures, and the White House is desperate to divert the voters’ attention from Obama’s failed policies and his infamous “you didn’t build that” remarks disparaging Americans entrepreneurs, successful business owners and job creators.

The White House has been in damage control mode ever since those remarks, and Friday’s report showing the economy grew at an anemic 1.5 percent in the last quarter only added to the urgency of Obama’s re-election campaign to find a way to change the subject. The main thrust of Obama’s defenders is that his comments were taken out of context. Here’s what he said:

“[L]ook, 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 because 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 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.”

In context, it’s devastating. Obama is indicted by his own words, condescending to small-business owners and elevating government as the wellspring of all success. If that’s so, why can’t government help all the smart and hardworking among us pull down 1 percent incomes? After all, any of us smart, hardworking individuals could have come up with the iPhone, right?

It takes more than smarts and long hours. Sometimes it begins with a simple ambition: I want to be my own boss. Or it’s an idea: a computer in every home. Starting a business involves a daunting risk — sinking every penny you have in your dream, abandoning the safety net of a 9-to-5 job, focusing to the exclusion of all else on what it takes to realize that dream. It’s a lonely quest. No, government does not make that happen.

What does make it possible is good governance — a society committed to the rule of law, property rights, reasonable taxes and dependable fiscal policy. Yet, Obama displays a cavalier attitude to those principles.

For political purposes, he refuses to enforce an immigration law and packs the NLRB to get around Congress to rewrite union election rules. In the auto industry bailout, he elevated the interests of his union allies over the bondholders in these corporations, an affront to property rights. He rejected the reasonable tax reform proposed by his own deficit reduction commission to pursue redistributive tax policies inimical to job growth. The uncertainties generated by his massive expansion of government with laws such as ObamaCare and Dodd-Frank have frozen all sorts of business investment.

Either Obama doesn’t understand the free-market system or he has disdain for it because it doesn’t meet his standard for “fairness.” Either way, it translates into policies that have turned this recovery into the weakest in modern history, keeping millions of Americans jobless. Voters have a fateful decision to make in November.

Obama insults small-business owners - Chicago Sun-Times

"If you have no record to run on, you paint your opponent as someone people should run from"--Barack Obama

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Obama formulates his speeches for the stupid, which are his core constituency.

well, there is some dispute about that. Some feel the core is more mentally ill than stupid. According to Dr. Rossiter they are like children who as grown ups seek to replace their parents with a government that will provide for them much like their parents once did.

The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness [Paperback]
Jr. M.D., Lyle H. Rossiter (Author), George Foster (Cover Design), Bob Spear (Designer

 

[Bfgrn]

And not to mention long, dull, quite frankly boring posts. He hasn't learned the old Shakespearean Axiom that tells us that brevity is the sould of wit.

I read the posts, but find them difficult to respond to. There is so much B.S. in one place.

I'd prefer to handle them more part by part. But then Bf gets all bent out of shape. Seems he can't index to anything that does not look like his manual.

Exactly, and why I tend to ignore his tripe.

Yea, you folks wouldn't want any facts or truth to disturb your dogma, doctrinaire or parroting script...