At a recent fundraiser in San Francisco, President Barack Obama made the statement:
“We [America] have lost our ambition, our imagination, and our willingness to do the things that built the Golden Gate Bridge…” He then went on to say:
“I mean, there are a lot of things we can do…the way I think about it is, you know, this is a great great country that had gotten a little soft and, you know, we didn’t have that same competitive edge that we needed over the last couple of decades. We need to get back on track.”
The key to strong ambition and imagination belongs to a simple concept called liberty and that the less liberty people have the less ambition and imagination they will also have? The Golden Gate Bridge was built in an era that held both economic and personal liberty close to the people. For example, the people that built the Golden Gate Bridge did not have the extra financial burden of complying with unconstitutional federal mandates such as being forced into private contracts to purchase health insurance. They also didn’t have enormous bureaucracies such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) there to fine them for using extension cords to plug in their water coolers. This list could go on and on but I’ll just stop there because I think I made my point.
I find it somewhat ironic that the same administration that is telling the American people that we have lost our competitive edge and our ambition is the same administration that told Gibson Guitar to export their labor to Madagascar. No, this wasn’t the demand of some super villain from a spy novel; the current administration actually told Gibson Guitar that they should export their labor out of the country. If you ask me, we have an administration that is exporting our ambition, our imagination and is forcefully closing the door on any competitive edge we still have. This isn't unique to the current administration, this is a problem that has persisted for years.
How can the president criticize our “lack” of ambition when he is the one bailing everybody out? How does it help to foster ambition when you are constantly applying policies that foster a cradle to grave nanny-state? Recently the president announced his plan to help “ease” the debt on a number of borrowers but isn’t the responsibility of paying back that money what provokes ambition and possibly imagination? When people don’t apply for a job because they know they will make more money off the unemployment check they have been getting, why is the president surprised that people are losing ambition?
“We have lost our willingness to do the things that built the Golden Gate Bridge”.
I find it hard to believe this was said by the same president who ended the space program as we know it and has done all but shut down NASA even to the point of putting thousands of NASA employees out of work.
And what’s with this “We have gotten soft” talk? If I remember correctly, one of the first things the president did after getting elected was travel around the world and apologize to everyone on behalf of America for our “arrogance” (I guess the same arrogance that liberated Europe twice).
Political parties aside, understand that my hope that President Obama doesn’t get re-elected doesn’t hinge on the fact that he is a Democrat, it hinges on the fact that he doesn’t understand the basic concepts of liberty and economic growth and that he has absolutely refused to follow the Constitution at every turn.
I would like to further point out that the President of the United States is the most public figure in America and provides the best example of the point that I am making here:
You can't have have a prosperous economy when your leadership doesn't understand the most basic principles of economic freedom, and raiding a guitar factory and shutting them down with out even charging them for any crime isn't the way to promote production and job growth, it is also a direct violation of the US Constitution as it deprives the parties involved of due process. I could not care less if someone has democrat or a republican next to their name (as I point out in the article), when the administration says one thing but then acts contrary to their message and violates the Constitution to do it, I have a problem with that.This isn't about Barack Obama, it is about foolishness that stretches across party lines and makes both Republicans and Democrats responsible for the many of the problems face our nation today. For example: GW Bush- "I have to abandon the free market principles in order to save the free market" = your tax $ going to bail out big banks on wall street. I don't know what you think but I'm not a fan of increasing the national debt based on, among other things, that kind of illogical nonsense.