As alluring as the grammar goof excuse appears, it doesn’t pass the laugh test for two reasons. The entire context of that section of the president's speech contradicts his claim of grammatical error only. His consistent message of the last four years undermines it as well.
Obama's contested statements were part of his justification for increasing taxes on the rich. They were made toward the end of a 40 minute monologue given to a very receptive audience. Apparently, he was inspired by the recurring cheers and applause to state frankly the ideological underpinning of his economic thesis: the government creates private success.
A couple of paragraphs earlier in the speech, Obama stated, in referring to the Clinton tax increases:
“And, by the way, we’ve tried that before — a guy named Bill Clinton did it. We created 23 million new jobs, turned a deficit into a surplus, and rich people did just fine. We created a lot of millionaires (emphasis supplied).”
After crediting the government with private wealth creation, Obama went on to chastise successful business owners on two counts. According to him, they believe, and wrongly so, that they are smarter and harder working than other Americans. The president further stated that only two factors drive private business success: the government, and the initiative of those who choose to own businesses.
Obama would not be more incorrect if he had stated a belief in an earth-centric universe. If success in business only requires the government and personal initiative, the failure rate of small businesses would be virtually zero. Instead, even in non recession years half of the people who start their own businesses fail. The main reason is mismanagement. Owners can have all of the initiative in the world, but the doors will close anyway if they can’t manage money, people, resources and time.
While competent management skills are necessary to succeed, they are not enough. Small business owners must be willing to risk personal financial disaster and work as if they’re indentured to the venture, because they are. The small business owner, tiny actually, in our pack was typical of the breed. During the fiscal year, our pack member and a co-owner paid their people first, taking only a monthly stipend for themselves. At the end of the year, employees were given bonuses according to the business’s profitability and their relative contributions. After that, money was put back into the company to fund the next year’s growth. Only then did the two owners take their bonuses, which typically were less than those of some of the employees.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Igor
But it's true: American prosperity was fueled by large government projects: canals, dams, river control, airports, harbors, interstate highways, etc. All created by the government, financed by General Obligation bonds. None of it was built by pre-funding from business. None was undertaken by private enterprise. No venture capital to build Hoover dam, just government General Obligation bonds.
Across America business has been the beneficiary of government roads, harbors, airports, river projects, railroads, etc.
It was the American sense of community that built the Great Projects that have nourished American business. The American people were willing to advance the money to build the infrastructure that made commerce possible.
2 - El Bicho
It was obvious from the first day what Obama meant, but very few let the truth get in the way of politics.
3 - Arch Conservative
The fact is that the vast majority of small to medium sized business owners are Republicans. To run a successful small to medium sized business you have to be a somewhat intelligent person, cognizant of how the world actually works. Just not intelligent enough to fully comprehend the sheer genius that is Barack Obama and his acolytes.
The one explained it plainly for all of us mere mortals.......If you run a successful business the reason for that success is not your own effort but rather your third grade public school teacher and a benevolent federal government that enabled you.
4 - Dillon Mawler
Mr. Conservative:
Here's what the President actually said:
"The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together."
Here's what you say you believe he said: "If you run a successful business the reason for that success is not your own effort, but rather..."
These are opposites.
5 - Zingzing
But, you see, mr. Mauler, that's how the world actually works: you take what someone says and say they said the opposite because... Well, just because.
6 - Glenn Contrarian
Arch -
The fact is that the vast majority of small to medium sized business owners are Republicans.
And WHERE did you get this 'fact', hm? Here's a clue, Arch - just because you want so badly to believe a thing doesn't make that thing true.
Your great conservative "job creators", like to send their money to the Caymans or Switzerland...and as such create ZERO jobs with that money that they stash overseas.
7 - Dillon Mawler
Yes, Mr. Zing, and then someone points this out, and the commenter never returns to the thread, because he's been exposed as a bullshit artist whose views are properly disregarded. He will, of course, say the exact same thing on other threads.
I have visited BC before.
8 - Igor
Most businessmen have a pretty parochial view of the world. They generally know just enough to operate successfully in their little world.
For many years I thought it would be a good idea to have a businessman for president, you know, like Herbert Hoover. Oops! Maybe that wasn't a good example. OK, how about Jimmy Carter. Oops! All the rightists excoriate him mercilessly (in spite of he created the only lasting peace in the Middle east between Egypt and Israel).
More to the point, I was a businessman all my life, from when I started working at 12 (as a caddy, pinsetter, paperboy, lawn roller, house painter, farmhand, etc.) and started several companies. I'm a pretty good guy, and pretty successful businessman. So I should be an excellent President. Alas, in all modesty, I must confess that I would be a terrible president. It's a sobering realisation.
9 - Glenn Contrarian
Igor -
That reminds me of the GOP brouhaha at the idea that we'd have a president that had never served in the military - it was Clinton, and I remember being against him for the same reason.
But neither service in the military nor success in business is what a president needs in order to be successful. What he or she needs is the ability to GOVERN. That's what the GOP doesn't - or refuses to - get.
And like you, I'd make a terrible president. It took a lot of years for me to be able to admit to myself that I'm not a natural leader. I'd be better serving in a supporting role. No guy likes to admit that he's not able to lead, but there it is.
10 - Glenn Contrarian
Sidney and Riley -
The president's denial of the personal risks taken, the extraordinary effort expended and the sacrifices made to succeed in business is shameful. Equally wrong is his claim of a government-centric economy. His roads and bridges example is, simply put, ass-backwards. The government is a facilitator of commerce, not a creator of wealth. It did not provide infrastructure from which commerce then flowed. Commerce, or business, came first and thrived.
Of course, of course! That's why all those small businesses that line the freeways were there before the freeways were built! And all those online businesses were thriving online before DARPA did anything to help build the internet!
Yep! All those businesses on the street corners were there and were quite successful before the streets - or even the sidewalks - were built! Brilliant! Sidney and Riley, you're both (if there's indeed two of you) perfect examples of right-wing brilliance in this modern world!
11 - Sidney and Riley
Re #1 & 8, Hi, Igor. Yes roads and bridges were financed by GO bonds but those bonds had to be repaid and that was through taxpayer dollars. Regional governments (cities, counties and states) also finance roads and bridges and airports and whatever through bonds. Sometimes, the regional governments repay road bonds via tolls but those are, at least where we live, the exception.
As a businessman, do you believe that this infrastructure creates or facilitates commerce? That's really the point of the President's argument. He believes the government creates wealth. We believe that infrastructure facilities business but cannot create wealth. Ultimately, wealth creation is the result of individual effort.
12 - Sidney and Riley
Re #10, Speaking of DARPA, if the government could replicate the structure, management principles and execution strategy of that tiny agency, we'd be a huge fan of government agencies. But, so far, it's just a one-off. There's an excellent article on
how the Internet was invented that shows what government can do but, except for that one shining example, has not.
13 - Zingzing
So infrastructure facilitates business, but then has nothing to do with it after that? Put a highway down, start a gas station, move the highway, the gas station does just fine in the middle of nowhere? We have entered... The twilight zone. This gas station demands profit, so it kidnaps customers from roads far flung across the land. A man, on his way to LA after losing all his money in Vegas, suddenly finds himself in Michigan. How did he get there? The profitable gas station of doooooom, that's how! Now the man is stuck in Michigan! Wth nothing to do! Oh, horror.
14 - Igor
Originally it was just ARPA, Advanced Research Projects Agency. The DoD horned in on it later when it looked useful. At first ARPA just sent out manila envelopes full of smelly mimeographed sheets with research project titles and contact info for researchers. The first computer use was about 1959 when they setup an IBM 1401 (workhorse minicomputer) with a 2701 communications adapter for TTY and then a guy with a leased line to Raleigh could signon from an IBM 1501 workstation, which was a selectric typewriter with an ASYNC comm adapter for IBMs peculiar protocol. So then you could query the ARPA database instead of waiting for the mail. That is, if you had the leased line, about $1000-$2000 a month typically, and the 1501 which had a similar lease cost. The 1501 ran at 15 char/sec., about 50% better than a TTY.
Most people waited for the mail.
It wasn't until the mid 80's that 'internet' started to assert itself, and then mostly as a backbone for 'quikmail' networks serving local BBS's. With email, usenet, IRC, FTP, etc.
More later.
15 - Dillon Mawler
Mr. Sidney and Mr. Riley:
The President specifically said what the point was: "The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together."
You say his real point was that "government creates wealth," which he never said, hinted at, or implied, anywhere in that speech. In fact, I've never actually heard ANYONE claim that.
Here's some of what he DID say; any of these quotes could be logically inserted in your comment #11, right after "wealth" and before "Ultimately.":
"In this country, if you’re willing to work hard, if you’re willing to take responsibility, you can make it if you try."
"I'm betting on America's workers. I’m betting on American industry."
"We're not guaranteed success, but we're guaranteed the right to work hard for success."
16 - Igor
@15-Dillon: Well, I'll say it: Government creates wealth.
Right here, where I live, in the SF Bayarea, we have some premium examples of it.
For example, the Bay Bridge, which goes between SF and Oakland. That massive transportation link between the cities has been responsible for most of the riches created in the two cities. On the SF side, it has provided a link for SF to get workers from the Oakland area, greatly needed because housing is limited in SF (a stable population figure around 800,000 for 50 years) and even environs.
Countless fortunes were bequeathed on business by easy access for workers. That wealth was created when the government built the bridge. Business exploited the opportunity, that's all. And it would never have been built if we had waited around for private business to get things together.
Countless fortunes were bequeathed on east Bay real estate developers, salesmen, contractors, etc., by the wealth potential created by the bridge.
Now, today, the government is going to kick in another big chunk of wealth by replacing the eastern span with a glamorous new span. Incidentally, that new span will cost $6billion, or more. That's pretty expensive since the entire bridge only cost $77million in 1939, and that was $6million under budget. How did they do it? Well, they used all-union labor back in those dark days, and now we have advanced to privatization and sublet the bridge sections to China. Hey, wait a minute! There's something wrong with this picture. Oh well.
17 - Dillon Mawler
Mr. Igor:
I'm sure many will quibble over "create," but your point is completely valid: without that government-built bridge, the economic activity on both sides is lessened. I can't believe anyone would argue the opposite.
18 - Glenn Contrarian
Sidney and Riley -
Re #10, Speaking of DARPA, if the government could replicate the structure, management principles and execution strategy of that tiny agency, we'd be a huge fan of government agencies. But, so far, it's just a one-off
So all our roads and highways and freeways are just "one-offs", too? Infrastructure ENABLES commerce. Go ask most businessmen of New York City - the financial capital of the planet - how well the Big Apple would function without a subway system!
Another shining example would be our health care system which - though it is not available to tens of millions of Americans - IS the best in the world. So many of our best medicines and treatments and therapies were developed by or in partnership with the CDC and the NIH...and ONE-SIXTH of our economy is directly involved with our health care system.
Then there's our nuclear power plants - are you going to claim that business came before government there, too? Or is this just another "one-off" in Sidney and Riley World?
And do you use a cell phone? Or GPS? Or do you watch television? What private business put every single one of those satellites in orbit that enabled the Information Age?
Hm? I guess that's another "one-off", too....
19 - Arch Conervative
Nice to see all the Obama apologists are out full force spinning the shit out of what he said. No wonder this country is going down the tubes.
20 - RJ
6:
Gallup: U.S. Business Owners Now Among Least Approving of Obama
But hey, maybe they are mostly pissed off Democrats?
21 - RJ
Here's Obama in full context.
22 - Dr Dreadful
From Wikipedia:
"Spin is a form of propaganda, achieved through providing an interpretation of an event or campaign to persuade public opinion in favor or against a certain organization or public figure."
Now, taking the President's words out of context to make it seem that he was dissing small business owners is certainly spin. Reacting to the ensuing collective right-wing hissy fit by trying to defuse it by claiming that Obama made a grammatical error is also spin.
But, Archie, Blogcritics commenters explaining the context of the President's words and pointing out what it was he was actually talking about is not spin: it's the presentation of facts.
23 - RJ
I love how the Smartest President Ever - who is world renown for his Masterful Oratory - is such a stuttering clusterfuck when he's off teleprompter that he has to have leftist bloggers clean up his mess and explain "what he really meant" for him.
This is getting embarrassing.
24 - Glenn Contrarian
Why RJ, I do believe we've misunderestimated you....
25 - Dr Dreadful
I love how the Smartest President Ever - who is world renown for his Masterful Oratory - is such a stuttering clusterfuck when he's off teleprompter that he has to have leftist bloggers clean up his mess and explain "what he really meant" for him.
Or perhaps our right-wing friends are so staggeringly stupid that they think it hasn't occurred to a single leftist blogger to actually read this particular bit of Masterful Oratory in its entirety, and that they will therefore actually find their spin credible.
This is getting embarrassing.
Indeed.