President Obama: ‘If You’ve Got a Business — You Didn’t Build That. Somebody Else Made That Happen’

The White House has released the transcript of President Obama’s recent speech in Roanoke, Virginia, and it holds a number of noteworthy statements.

The official transcript relates:

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.  [Emphasis added]

He continued:

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. [Emphasis added]

Now, I understand that what the President is saying is true, but only from a certain point of view.  Yes, none of us can do anything without the efforts of other people, but the notion that we are as dependent as the President would like us to believe is simply false – especially when it comes to entrepreneurship.

You could make believe that a business person cannot make it on their own, but then, you can only do that if you ignore the role that the business person plays in their own success.  Take the lady who wrote the Harry Potter series as an example.  She made it all up as a bedtime story for her kids: in part – to help distract from the fact that she was unemployed at the time.  Now, Obama would have you believe that her success then depended on her agent, editor and publisher, then on the book stores and finally, on her customers.  But, if this is true, then her agent, editor and publisher depended on her for their success, as did the book stores and, finally, YOU depended on her for your success.  But that is an absurdity: you do not need her to be successful any more than those other people/companies do. 

The truth is, had she never written Harry Potter, someone else would have written something else.  The people and businesses who publish books will ALWAYS succeed because there will ALWAYS be people who want to have their work published.  They do not depend on each other, they help each other.  This is the essence of the free market.  And, given today’s world, had she chose to, our author could have even self-published.  Now, who would she have depended on then?  NO ONE – because the internet would exist simply because someone wants to put it up and maintain it for fun.

Take another example: my old business.  Yes, I had to have companies who produced and shipped raw materials; I needed the products that my products were meant to improve; and I needed advisors and consultants as well as dealers and advertisers.  So, according to Obama, I was dependent on ALL of those people: but was I really?  I could always find the information I needed in a book, written by someone like our previous author.  I could have made my own resins and rubber (yes, I actually know how to do that).  I self-distributed, so I didn’t need them: I also did most of my own advertising on discussion boards, so again, I didn’t need help.  But then comes the part that no one could have done but me: I found, organized and put all of these things together to form my company, and then I made the masters, produced the instruction sheets, labeling and designed the packaging.  When I was first starting out, I also produced and packaged and shipped everything myself.  I did my own books and I handled all my own administration work.  It was my passion and ability that brought all of this together – no one else.  And my company succeeded.  Now, had I not done so, I can assure you, there would have been other companies, but there would have NEVER been another Tiger Model Designs.  And this is why the President is wrong.

Finally, when it comes right down to it, the President knows he is being disingenuous.  You can hear it in his speeches.  How many times have you heard him claim credit for being the person who did something?  And how many times have you heard him humbly give credit to others – or even say he couldn’t have done something major without the help of others?  Just a few weeks ago, he gave a speech in which he used the words “I,” “me” and “mine” some 117 times in approximately 25 minutes and 23 second:

Narcissist-In-Chief Uses First-Person Pronoun “I” And “Me” 117 Times In A Single Speech…

(I apologize for the title, but I wanted to avoid using the Blaze again, and this was among the least offensive of the stories at the top of the search results)

In this one speech, the President referred to himself in the first person once every 13 seconds.  That is a tacit admission that – if nothing else – people proudly take credit for the things they have worked to achieve – just like Obama likes to do.  However, when it comes to people wanting the rewards for their efforts, Obama and those who think like he does seem to differentiate between the credit they believe they’re entitled to and the rewards they believe you should be allowed to have.  I’m sorry, but I see nothing but contradiction and hypocrisy in this line of reasoning, and it sickens me because this is the way people who think they are above you behave toward those they perceive as inferior.

Humbly submitted for your consideration and in sincere hope that you will find something worth considering in my words.  I thank you for reading; stay safe and God bless.