Obama shares his beliefs about business

[Onkel Neal]

This was his magic word gaffe: a statement that reveals not what a politician believes, but what you already feared, in your bone marrow, that a politician believes.

Brit Hume explained this first and best. "It is fair to say that we know more tonight than we ever have about the president's view of business and the economy," he said. His assertion over the weekend that "if you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen" explains nearly everything. He wasn't talking about God. He was talking about government.

Yowser! He better stick with the teleprompter.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a...resident_.html

[Tchocky]

Good post by Weigel, really gets into the way diferent people can react to the same input.

[artao]

Taken in context, it's not nearly as damning. It's certainly a big gaffe however. .. not an Obama supporter myself, but people are really grasping at straws with this gaffe IMHO.

[AVGWarhawk]

There is no grasping IMO. He said exactly what has been interpreted.

Tribesman will think otherwise though.

[Ducimus]

Ddin't read it. Looks like the usual political "rally the troops" BS. However, i counted the word gaffe six times, so i have to wonder if this applies.

[Tchocky]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

There is no grasping IMO. He said exactly what has been interpreted.

Interpreted by who, though?

On July 14, a conservative North Carolina activist named Erik Soderstrom that made it sound like Obama gave business owners no credit for building anything.

...versus...

In his 2008 nomination speech, for example, then-candidate Obama talked endlessly about safety nets letting “someone with a good idea … take a risk and start a new business” without having to “choose between keeping their jobs and caring for a sick child.” The Washington Examiner’s Conn Carroll points out that Obama’s Roanoke speech merely “made a long-standing and fundamental liberal argument in an unappealing way.” The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent argues that Mitt Romney, who does not plan to dismantle the Small Business Administration or the Department of Education, concedes some of the argument.

The quote means pretty much what you want it to mean.


Here's the full wording and transcript of what was said:

There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me -- because they want to give something back. They know they didn’t -- look, 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. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.

The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together. There are some things, just like fighting fires, we don’t do on our own. I mean, imagine if everybody had their own fire service. That would be a hard way to organize fighting fires..

I bolded more than the sentence being talked about, because I think you can't separate it out any further.

[AVGWarhawk]

Interpreted by who, though?

The right of course. I also think it was interpreted correctly. How else could it be interpreted?

Tribesman will think otherwise though.

Of course, its so obvious I don't see how anyone could honestly say otherwise.
My business was built up initially with connections to some handy aquaintances, government contracts(plus government susidised training), very good accountants, damn good employees and a bloody horrible bank manager....the list could go on a hell of a lot longer than that

[artao]

What Obama was saying, obviously, is that no one exists in a vacuum. We all owe our successes to other people to some degree.
He phrased it very very poorly however.
I'm still voting Nader.

[gimpy117]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

The right of course. I also think it was interpreted correctly. How else could it be interpreted?

read the above post?

I believe that whole speech, rather than the agenda filled cherry picked Blurb is an acknowledgement of the fact that nobody really "makes it on their own" there is this thing called society and public services that people use every day and don't even know it. Heck...what business can be made with no other input by anyone else? None. Who educated you? Who educated your work force? Who built the roads your people drive upon? Obama correctly makes this point; the point that you cannot really just "make it" in this modern world without somebody else footing the bill somewhere.

but really this is just another sad attempt at boiling down speeches and taking them out of context for partisan purposes.

[August]

Originally Posted by artao

He phrased it very very poorly however.

I'd call it a Freudian Slip

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Of course, its so obvious I don't see how anyone could honestly say otherwise.
My business was built up initially with connections to some handy aquaintances, government contracts(plus government susidised training), very good accountants, damn good employees and a bloody horrible bank manager....the list could go on a hell of a lot longer than that

Awesome!

[artao]

Um. Big Fat NO!! on that one.
People mis-use "Freudian slip" all the time.
A Freudian slip is when you MEAN to say "I'd like to <boink> your mom" but you ACTUALLY say, "I'd like to <boink> MY mom."
Given the context of what he was saying, his meaning is clear: We all owe at least SOME of our successes to other people. That is 100% True.

-not an Obama supporter at all. Ralph Nader for President!!!

[Tchocky]

The biggest problem with the wording is that it left a nice little gap open for the kind of stuff quoted in the article, and allowing the Romney campaign to push ads implying the President thinks business owners didn't do squat to make a living, it was all the Big Government handing out welfare*.

I don't think it the wording reveals anything or hints at anything we haven't already heard from the President

Taking the president's own summation is enough I think - "The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together."

Now you can disagree about what role government has and whatnot, but there isn't much room for serious discussion of the meaning of the sentence.



*= To anyone who thinks this is what This All Means - In this pair of sentences, to what does the "that" refer?

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.

Answers on a postcard care of Tchocky-should-cut-the-grass-and-get-off the-computer.

[mookiemookie]

This is a manufactured controversy. All you have to do is back up a few words and see that the pronoun "that" is referring to "roads and bridges." Ducimus is right:

That's where the gaffe stories come in. See, in this game, your "team" scores a point each time the other team says something stupid. It lets all of the supporters of your team mock and humiliate the supporters of the opposing team, on Internet message boards and around water coolers and in coffee shops nationwide. "Haha! The supposed 'genius' Obama thinks there are 57 states in the U.S.!" "Oh, yeah? Well, your last president said he was going to help terrorists plan their next attack!"

And it never ends, because if your "team" gives up a gaffe, then you need to dig one up on the other side to even the score. So, last month the Romney campaign was embarrassed when an adviser came off like he was comparing his own candidate to an Etch A Sketch toy. Thus, this month the Romney campaign had to jump on an Obama adviser's gaffe that came off like she was saying that stay-at-home moms don't do work. And on and on it goes.

Obama phrased it clumsily, but the idea is correct. We're a society and we're a lot more dependent upon each other than some would like to admit. No man is an island.