Rep. Paul Ryan sat down with AEI’s Jim Pethokoukis and gave President Barack Obama a verbal tongue lashing for his recent comments about entrepreneurs.
Lest we forget, here’s what Obama said 2 days ago:
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.
Ryan told Pethokoukis that he didn’t believe the president actually said those things at first. He thought that someone must “have been putting words in the president’s mouth.”
But in these extended excerpts, Ryan counters the president’s limited understanding of wealth creators in a “free community”:
Every now and then, he pierces the veil. He’s usually pretty coy about his ideology, but he lets the veil slip from time to time. … His straw man argument is this ridiculous caricature where he’s trying to say if you want any security in life, you stick with me. If you go with these Republicans, they’re going to feed you to the wolves because they believe in some Hobbesian state of nature, and it’s one or the other which is complete bunk, absolutely ridiculous. But it seems to be the only way he thinks he can make his case. He’s deluded himself into thinking that his so-called enemies are these crazy individualists who believe in some dog-eat-dog society when what he’s really doing is basically attacking people like entrepreneurs and stacking up a list of scapegoats to blame for his failures.
His comments seem to derive from a naive vision of a government-centered society and a government-directed economy. It stems from an idea that the nucleus of society and the economy is government not the people. … It is antithetical to the American idea. We believe in free communities, and this is a statist attack on free communities. … As all of his big government spending programs fail to restore jobs and growth, he seems to be retreating into a statist vision of government direction and control of a free society that looks backward to the failed ideologies of the 20th century.
[...]
Those of us who are conservative believe in government, we just believe government has limits. We want government to do what it does well and respect its limits so civil society and families can flourish on their own and do well and achieve their potential.
How does building roads and bridge justify Obamacare? If you like the GI Bill therefore we must go along with socialized medicine. It’s a strange leap that he takes. … To me it’s the laziest form of a debate to affix views to your opponent that they do not have so you can demonize them and defeat them and win the debate by default.
Ryan’s description of Obama’s strawman arguments about who is opposing him is spot on. In order for Obama’s policies to be seen as he sees them, one must create a bogeyman who believes in “social Darwinism” and is selfish, cruel and unwilling to pay their “fair share” in taxes. How much of it is deliberate obfuscation and how much is sincere doesn’t really matter. It is a community organizer’s view of economics and society — naive, ignorant, with a shallow understanding of rote generalizations about how wealth is created.
Rep. Ryan is apparently on Romney’s short list of Veep candidates. There are few people in elected office who speak so articulately and passionately about the free market and capitalism. There are also few people who understand our entitlement problem as well and are willing to offer solutions — controversial or otherwise.
Romney could do a lot worse if he chose Ryan as his running mate.
Exactly right!
I despise Obama. I can’t help but note however that upon listening to the passage of his speech where he makes this comment it is abundantly clear he is referencing the public works he had just mentioned when stating ‘you didn’t build that’. But what the heck. Hang this and anything else to hand around his neck. What a pig.
This is an odd thing to say, considering its coming from a man who uses the words “I” and “Me” far more than he ever uses the word “We”.
And speaking as a small businessman, I appreciate the sentiment that we all share in success, but I cant help but notice that when its 2:00 am on Sunday night and there’s a problem out there in customer-land, I’m the one who gets the call and loses sleep.
I dont mind people wanting to share but for some strange reason, people are only interested in sharing in the goods and the glory from the final product. the actual hard work that creates the final product is always being done in solitude.
The tale of “Henny Penny”. But they probably don’t let kids read such preposterous capitalist propaganda any more.
Nor the “Goose That Laid Golden Eggs”.
Heck, I bet you can’t find Orwell’s books in almost any public library any more.
Orwell didn’t write that book alone, He had to go to school to read and write and the government set up that school, so really, the government wrote that book.
In fact since no one writes alone, he should have paid people to read his books. People shouldn’t have to pay for books. We shouldn’t live in a world where some people can have books and others cannot. Authors should not profit from something that benefits everyone especially when everyone helped write those stories.
Now that I think of it, book readers and book writers are exactly the same thing! The more I think about it, the more its clear that all these creative and productive people have just been ripping us off. Its a lie to think that you are somehow special because you wrote a book.
Nicely done, Frank.
And don’t forget the classic, “One of these days, when I get some free time, I’m gonna write a book.” Because, it’s so easy anybody can do it.
CNBC news producer Michael Tomaso backed up Obama on Twitter and blamed small businesses for not hiring. He protected his account after realizing he just outed himself as a partisan hack.
There is a corollary to what Obama said:
If you were unsuccessful, somebody along the line “gave” you some help. There was a bad teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American welfare system that we have that caused you to lose your job because of high employee cost and the drain on the economy. Somebody diverted money from the roads and bridges and levee repairs. If you’ve go out of business — you didn’t cause that. Somebody else made that happen with regulations, taxes and high license requirements. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that we could kill our enemies more efficiently and by happenstance all the companies could make money off the Internet.
Obama legacy in 10 words…
The apex of affirmative action advancing America to the abyss.
Of course in context to what he said it was that the public invested and build the bridges and the infrastructure. He never said that the business man/women didn’t build their own business but they did have help.
Of course Rep Ryan will be getting his along with Romney shortly as we will be giving both a colostomy regarding the Ryan budget. It’s amazing once people know what’s in it, and they will, how much they will dislike it.
Let’s face it you guys picked a weak sister who even tried to hide behind the skirts of John Kerry’s wife for goodness sake. You’re stuck with him so good luck defending him. Oh and he didn’t like Reagan much either and those comments will be surfacing as well.
Willard has no spine and he can’t fight because he’s never had to take a values position that he believed in as he just wanted you to like him and would wisper to you anything you wanted to hear.
“…but they did have help.”
Which they paid for with their taxes.
What point was he trying to make? That you can’t do business in a vacuum, that nobody succeeds alone, that there’s no such thing as a “self-made man?” I don’t think so. I think he’s trying to tell us that people OWE the Government for whatever successes they’ve achieved, and that if SOME Government helped them succeed a little then MORE government will help them succeed a lot.
As I’ve said before, two aspirin are good for a headache but a whole bottle will kill you.
You Libtards think you have it snookered, don’t you? Hope and Change? Here’s the real problem: with 16 Trillion debt, you’re in fantasy land. Once YOU have to cut your entitlement bunnies, from gov.union cronies, to gov. agencies, to overpaid and undereducated professors of “studies”, to… and Romney or whoever takes his place points the finger at YOUR lies, then sane folks –and that’s most of us– will clamor for things even MORE drastic than the Ryan budget. The pitchforks will be pointed at YOU. YOU did the lying, led by your fearless choom smoker(s) and part-Cherokee bunnies.
One thing everybody seems to have forgotten is that had our dear choom-smoker been speaking only of and for himself, he could have been actually telling the truth, for once.
Namely, HE didn’t even get created without US Government (read: taxpayer) help. Or, am I wrong in recalling that the USG gave foreign aid to Kenya, which permitted the Kenyan government to support his father’s coming to the US on a scholarhip, where he met his mother?
Doesn’t something similar hold true for Ms. Fauxahontas of Cambros who, without Federal AfA laws and her alleged Cherokee heritage, might well have been passed by for tenure.
All that’s left is to point out the extreme arrogance of these obvious government products in denouncing the very people who paid to create them.
Time to shut down Harvard, if these are the best examples of their “best and brightest”. Who needs THEM?
Anyway, some 40+ years ago the mayor of Cambridge, Mass. proposed to turn Harvard Yard into a parking lot over some cockamamie dispute with the Corporation. Maybe he was on to something?
I’ve been nice and waiting around for the point when we all can officially start calling the O an idiot…have we reached that yet? Please
No, that would be an insult to idiots.
Obama is simply the sum product of his education and life experiences. Neither of which, prepared him for reality or common sense.
obama is not an idiot
he is an effeminate statist ideologue; it is us – the masses/rabble/victims who are the idiots
So, since the people who built businesses “didn’t build them,” and since millions of illegals are streaming across the border to work in those businesses that these people “didn’t build,” I guess Obama’s philosophy is, “If you didn’t build it, they will come.”
“To me it’s the laziest form of a debate to affix views to your opponent that they do not have so you can demonize them and defeat them and win the debate by default.” – Well written, and so truthful.
It also happens to be the only argument Obama can win. Obama has never had a true debate on the issues, that’s why he starts conversations with conservatives like this: “I won.”
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the government created the Internet so that businesses could use it. Like GPS, it was built for the military. Civilian use was a side-effect.
Still, I get his point. Without a lot of the services, infrastructure, loans, antitrust laws, etc., that Government provides for us, entrepreneurs would have a much harder time getting rich. However, he seems to imply that entrepreneurs are getting something for nothing and therefore owe the government a debt – of gratitude, loyalty, and a bigger cut of their profits. Does he really believe that successful, profitable, tax-paying businesses constitute a “free rider problem” for the nation? Where does that idea come from?
I’m prepared to agree with nueces’ comment that Obama was referring to roads & bridges when he said “You didn’t build that.” But what a stupid thing to say. I didn’t build my house, either, but I still get to live in it. Am I supposed to send the builder a Christmas card every year? Have him over for dinner? Let him borrow my car? Consult him when I’m planning the family budget? In Obama’s world, I guess the answer is “Yes.” Otherwise, I’m some kind of deadbeat. How dare I enjoy living in my house without acknowledging, in word and deed, that I didn’t actually build it myself?
How is it that so many believe that if the government didn’t build roads no roads would exist? Substitute any good or service that does not involve the use of force or the threat of force.
There were roads before governments started building them. There were utilities before governments started running them. There were banks and money before governments took them over.
We need government to protect our lives and property, not for anything else.
Conservatives see Liberals as wrong-headed or mistaken.
Liberals see conservatives as EVIL!
That’s why they don’t worry about attacking, they don’t worry about hurting a conservatives feelings, that’s why they don’t feel bad when they blow off or ignore something a conservative says. Conservatives are evil. Not much better than the Devil himself. Conservatives have no feelings, being nice, being polite isn’t just against a conservatives character, they’re not sure conservatives are even capable of such actions.
If you go in with that idea, figuring out what a liberal might say or do will be a lot easier. There will be a lot less surprises.
Ryan’s comment was excellent — called out all the exact points about the O’s warped thinking.
And so were your comments on Ryan’s comments, Rick — excellent.
Thank you.
(Although I know you didn’t do that by yourself — it was the road you walked (or drove on) to get you to your computer. [sorry, couldn’t help a tiny bit of snark re the O.)
Ryan would make a terrific V.P., but he doesn’t really want it, nor to run, because he knows the disgusting MSM will tear him — and his family — to shreds — especially because he is so smart and has such good ideas.
Fact is, he’s doing really, really well right where he is — and is able to make, probably, the best contribution of what he’s capable of — from there.
We’re lucky to have him in Congress — a lonely, sane voice of reason.
I’ve let this stupidity of Obama’s soak in for a day and I’ve come to a different conclusion on his reasons for making this statement. Although I believe that Obama is indeed a narrow-minded ideologue, it’s through the narcissist’s lens first and foremost. For years this man has been promoted up through no effort from him other than (as Biden put it euphemistically) clean cut and articulate, and thinking correctly. He’s told himself that this experience is universal because he is the center of the known universe.
When we discovered our family dog had cancer, we had to explain to the children then 8 and 11 why it was our responsibility to end her suffering. I explained to the girls that Sheba had been there for them every step of the way, even their very first steps, and we had to be there for her when she needed us. They absorbed this speech with complete understanding, I thought. This was my daughter’s eulogy: “Sheba, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be walking today.”
Is this any different from the leap Obama made? Is Obama smarter than an 8 year old? Apparently not.
….for the Peter Principle as it applies to Affirmative Action !
Even dumber than Joe Biden. Arrogance and stupidity hard to fathom. Narcissism!
all by himself — on one occasion in his life at least — is shink, i.e., to take a shit in someone else’s sink.
he wiped his ass all by himself, too, like a big boy.