But you really need to read the entire speech. It is classic Obama, living in a time warp, declaring that unions are the past and the future of prosperity, and focusing on large infrastructure programs as if this were the 1930s.
The entrepreneurs and workers who built the great technology companies that drive our economy are nowhere to be found. It is the proletariat of the old economy who live in Obama's imagination.
But what was most Obama-like about the speech was the launching of vicious attacks on his opponents, only to then cry foul over the fact that his opponents push back. Obama, as he did throughout the campaign and has done throughout his presidency, painted a picture of his political opponents as heartless victimizers of others, and of the capitalist system as cruel and inhumane.
Obama also was in full mock mode. Here are some excerpts:
- "But there are some folks in Washington who see things differently. (Boos.) You know what I’m talking about. (Applause.) When it comes to just about everything we’ve done to strengthen our middle class, to rebuild our economy, almost every Republican in Congress says no. (Boos.) Even on things we usually agree on, they say no. If I said the sky was blue, they say no. (Laughter and applause.) If I said fish live in the sea, they’d say no. (Laughter.)"
- "Now, anybody who thinks that we can move this economy forward with just a few folks at the top doing well, hoping that it’s going to trickle down to working people who are running faster and faster just to keep up, you’ll never see it. (Applause.) If that’s what you’re waiting for, you should stop waiting, because it’s never happened in our history. That’s not how America was built. It wasn’t built with a bunch of folks at the top doing well and everybody else scrambling. We didn’t become the most prosperous country in the world just by rewarding greed and recklessness.
- "I mean, I personally think “Yes we can” is more inspiring than “No we can’t.” (Applause.) To steal a line from our old friend Ted Kennedy: What is it about working men and women that they find so offensive? (Laughter.)"
- "Look, the bottom line is this: These guys, they just don’t want to give up on that economic philosophy that they have been peddling for most of the last decade. You know that philosophy — you cut taxes for millionaires and billionaires; you cut all the rules and regulations for special interests; and then you just cut working folks loose — you cut them loose to fend for themselves".
Too bad.
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To be fair if Obama said the sky was blue I would look outside just to be sure.
ReplyDeleteThat's just silly.
ReplyDeleteOf course America was built by the people at the top doing well and everybody else scrambling.
I guess he's never heard of Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Swift.
Duh.
What is it about the rich man Ted Kennedy that I find so offensive? Everything.
And Vanderbilt.
ReplyDeleteHe is sounding more and more like Hugo Chavez every day. Chavez, despite presiding over an astonishing self-induced economic collapse, continues to blame his many ministers every Sunday on his TV show dressing them down in public and accusing them of incompetence and treachery.
ReplyDeleteAs with Chavez, Obama positions himself as the only one who cares about "the people" and arguing that things would be much worse if he hadn't shown up when he did. That is what passes as leadership these days. The president as victim.
Check out the ad on the left for "John Dalt." Either Galt has a half-brother I don't know about, or someone's afraid of getting sued by Leonard Peikoff.
ReplyDeleteOn the topic at hand: At traffic altercations, the words "F You!" are generally answered by "No, F You!" Contempt for contempt, antagonism for antagonism. Obama has repeatedly, in words (e.g., bitter clingers) and actions (e.g., ramming ObamaCare through against wishes of the majority) brandished contempt for the American people, so it's no surprise that that contempt is now amply returned.
Obama should make strawman arguments out of new straw, not after it's passed through the bovine...
ReplyDeleteNot to take up the thread with more, but all of those tycoons are classic rags-to-riches stories. Vanderbilt quit school at 11 and ran a ferry boat. Rockefeller started out as a bookkeeper. Carnegie was born in Scotland in a one-room weaver's cottage, and came to America because his family was starving. Swift was a farmer and left school at the age of eight.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand Obama's history lesson. It just frightens me somehow, because it's so false.
Did he bring up those bible toting, gun carrying folks from Pennsylvania again? When Obama is with his Union friends or with a black crowd, his gutter jive talk comes to the front. After all he's nothing more then a stinkin community organizer.
ReplyDeleteObama is merely playing the role of Robin Hood Robber Baron....as directed by acclaimed puppeteer George Soros.
ReplyDeleteSyncro
Karl Marx revealed that business owners are leeches on society, draining away the wealth that rightfully belongs to the workers.
ReplyDeleteAt least, from the ones who have jobs.
EasyOpinions
When he says, "Now, anybody who thinks that we can move this economy forward with just a few folks at the top doing well, hoping that it’s going to trickle down to working people...", does he really think imposing a huge new tax on energy that will make electricity rates "necessarily skyrocket" [his words] will improve the lives of the working middle class? The best thing Harry Reid has ever done was to bury Obama's cap and trade bill that Pelosi forced House Democrats to pass.
ReplyDeleteIt frightens me how many times Obama has demonstrated in the past 20 months that he does not have the slightest clue how a market economy works. He would do himself a favor if he could somehow purge his brain of everything he's read by Marx, Engels and Alinsky and take a crash course of stuff written by Fredrich Hayek, Milton Friedman, and Thomas Sowell.
I hope we can make it until 2012.
There is an old Russian joke ..
ReplyDeleteStalin is in power and is riding a train thru Siberia
The train gets stuck .. Stalin declares "get rid of the engineers and bring in the proletariat"
The proletariat gets to work and eventually the train gets moving
After a while Khrushchev is in power and the train gets stuck again
Khrushchev says "get rid of the proletariat and bring back the engineers because they knew what they were doing"
The engineers set to work and free up the train.
After a while Brezhnev is in power and the train gets stuck yet again
Brezhnev says "pull down the shades and pretend the train is still moving"
The truly scary part is, as the presidency fails, so goes the country. It may take generations to recoup our losses.
ReplyDeleteYeah, he sure does complain a lot. I wish he'd come up with some good ideas about how to get us out of this mess.
ReplyDeleteCommunism or cognative dissonance?
ReplyDeletePer Reagan, simple solutions exist but easy they ain't. Usually. Spending on entitlements? Issue IRS Form 1099-GOV for all those "income, redistributed" outlays reporting it like we report our real "income" and we'd soon have a handle on where stuff disappears.
ReplyDeleteHe's crazy - I love my dog - him I'm not so into
ReplyDeleteWith big O lashing out at we "bitter clingers" that we talk about him as if he were a dog comes the truth....he hears us, he knows we are angry yet he cares not. Wake up, America! This guy is toxic, through and through!
ReplyDeleteI just watched this video at Cubachi's blog. It reminded me of your second bullet point above. In the video, Margaret Thatcher explains to the socialists who are complaining about the income gap between the rich and the poor that what they would really prefer is for the poor to be poorer, provided the rich are less rich.
ReplyDeleteSo, here is Margaret Thatcher's response to our Demonizer in Chief who would rather engage in eat-the-rich, bash the wealthy, class warfare than constructive bi-partisan debate that might lead to economic policy that will grow the economy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okHGCz6xxiw
@MaggotAtBroad&Wall - thanks, that will be video of the day tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteSomeone seems to have misinformed our President. He thinks that getting elected meant that he would be immune from criticism, but free to criticize.
ReplyDeleteOn the contrary...he's now the Lightning-Rod-in-Chief, as well as being fair game for anyone he lambasts with his ill founded ideology. Election isn't a Get-Free-of-Criticism Card. Hey, you won! Get over it!
True, as far as it goes, the comments about dog
ReplyDeletetreatment weren't in the President's prepared remarks.
‘Dis Prez like a dog
Unfair to trusty canines
They don’t whine as much.
The President DID name his dog after himself,
ReplyDeleteyou know: "B. O." = "Bo".
Can’t eat his waffle
Won’t show AKC papers
Wait ’til November.
Obama may be the only man in the world who can make a speech condemning the idea of "a few folks at the top doing well" in between numerous vacations, lavish parties and state dinners and his wife's "bad will tour" to Spain. Private sector "trickle down" is evil but public sector "trickle down" is great, especially when it's the Obama's who are doing the trickling.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of dogs...
ReplyDelete...Pres. Obama needs to tie a pork chop around his neck so Democrat office-seekers will appear
with him.
lovin' the haiku
ReplyDeleteused to post much gil thorp 'ku
fuhgettaboutit!
Actually, his proletariat speech for the middle class (most of which are employed by small business) is absolutely contrary to what he has done in his two years of office.
ReplyDeleteHe bailed out the rich bankers.
He bailed out GM.
His stimulus package bailed out union workers and public employees, already paid higher than the middle class, with better pensions.
His health care law will raise taxes in fees on every middle class American.
The regulations and fees in the financial reform will raise the cost of obtaining credit.
His rhetoric is absolutely garbage. He has said that he considers it a gift to be able to say something that others interpret to their benefit. We heard it through his campaign. Some of us were alarmed even then. I believe people are catching on. BTW, it's not a gift. It's arrogant, pandering, and misleading.
taqiyya at work
ReplyDelete