Does Obama actually understand business?

So, because successful, wealthy people can count their success on the backs of others, they should "give back" in the form of more taxes!

Now, please, explain to me how that message is the same as Romney's.

McGentrix wrote:

Now, please, explain to me how that message is the same as Romney's.

His message that we are a community, and that we all benefit from support from the community, is exactly the same.

It's the same point that the folks on the right have been trying so desperately to spin as negative against Obama, but all they end up doing is reinforcing Obama's point.

If you had started a thread on the premise that Obama doesn't understand business because he wants to raise taxes, then we'd be discussing that message. But that's not how you couched the discussion; you tried to play a "gotcha" game and you got your ass handed to you, because you started off by lying.

Now, having been caught in your lie, and having undermined your own credibility, you want to suddenly change the terms of the discussion.

Boo-freakin'-hoo.

If Obama's speech is true, then haven't taxes already paid for roads and bridges that everyone uses to be successful? Don't they pay for the teachers that help people to be successful? Don't they pay for the Internet they use? Isn't all government already paid for by taxes people have already forked over?

Remove all government sponsered infra-structure and services and there will still be people who build businesses, and who will rightly expect to be rewarded for their risk taking.

Quote:

Remove all government sponsered infra-structure and services and there will still be people who build businesses, and who will rightly expect to be rewarded for their risk taking.

That may be but none of them will be making $1 million a year nor have a wealth in the billions.

And I'll be the first one to line up to kill them and steal the money or goods they've earned, in a little risk-taking of my own. No gov't services = no police force and army. Good luck running a successful business when there's no reliable way of keeping us wolves from coming in the barn.

Cycloptichorn

The Journal reported:
When Mitt Romney took over the troubled Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, it was tainted by allegations of corruption and facing a yawning budget hole.

Mr. Romney immediately saw several cuts that could get the Games back on track, including a cultural-education program, a youth camp and free catered lunches for committee board meetings. The cuts required tough conversations with a community that had big expectations for the Games, but in dozens of meetings with local officials and residents, Mr. Romney portrayed the situation as dire.

Mr. Romney's 2002 Olympics stint remains one of the clearest examples of how he sought to transfer his corporate-restructuring experience to a public institution, a theme that runs through the heart of his challenge to President Barack Obama. Both the kudos and the criticisms will be back in the spotlight this week when Mr. Romney visits the London Games, a pointed reminder from the candidate of his former role.

What followed was a run-down of the various cost-cutting measures Romney put into effect (eliminating a youth camp, charging committee members for pizza lunches, etc.) that, per the article's implication, resulted in "a $100 million surplus, a number that included $65 million in cash and contributions of computers and food that were distributed to the community."

But that surplus didn't come just from cheap pizza. As ABC's Jonathan Karl reported in March, Romney, during his 2002 run for governor of Massachusetts, boasted of the more than $410 million he got from the feds to pull off a successful Games, which he described as a collaborative effort between the private sector and all levels of government:

As for his experience running the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics, Romney says, ""the whole winter games was a combination of the federal, state and local governments along with private enterprise."

"We actually received over $410 million from the federal government for the Olympic games. That is a huge increase over anything ever done before and we did that by going after every agency of government," he says.

He even cites money one his colleagues managed to get for the Olympics from the Department of Education.

"She said, 'Why don't I get the Department of Education to buy tickets to the Paralympics so that high school and grade school kids can go to the Paralympics?' She literally got, I believe the number was over $1 million from the Department of Education, funding to buy tickets for kids," Romney said. "This way we got kids there and we also got additional revenues that we wouldn't have had. That kind of creativity I want to bring to everything we do."

Cycloptichorn wrote:

And I'll be the first one to line up to kill them and steal the money or goods they've earned, in a little risk-taking of my own. No gov't services = no police force and army. Good luck running a successful business when there's no reliable way of keeping us wolves from coming in the barn.

Cycloptichorn

One of the reasons it will most likely be successful is because they will be the ones with the guns.

It won't help - they've got to sleep sometime and I can always burn their buildings down if I have to. Guns won't protect you against that, and since there's no fire department, you'll have very little hope of stopping it.

I also don't know why you think I or my kind wouldn't have guns as well. There's a pretty long and well-developed history of bad guys having guns, yaknow.

You're really not thinking this through very well, are you? There's a reason you don't see businesses flourishing in regions without a developed government.

Cycloptichorn

Haven't you watched enough movies to know how these things work?

So, are you saying that without a govt, there is no way to be successful?