I would submit that the most revealing utterance of the entire Barack Obama presidency remains the president’s “you didn’t build that” speech in the summer of 2012 in Roanoke, Virginia.
It is the key to President Obama’s economic thinking and his disdain for business and people who build businesses, along with his faith in government over individual initiative and fortitude. He famously said:
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.
This kind of economic brilliance produced six years of stagnation.
So voters should be wary of a candidate who says something similar. Hillary Clinton just said almost the same thing (White House Dossier even calls it her “you didn’t build that” moment). Mrs. Clinton said this:
Don’t let anybody tell you that raising the minimum wage will kill jobs. They always say that . . . Don’t let anybody tell you that, you know, it’s corporations and businesses that create jobs. You know that old theory, trickle-down economics. That has been tried, that has failed. It has failed rather spectacularly.
White House Dossier thinks that Mrs. Clinton is merely trying to get to the left of Senator Elizabeth Warren, one of the few Democrats who could plausibly challenge her for the nomination (but likely won't). Dossier finds this more base because she (in his opinion) does know the truth. I’m not so sure she isn't speaking from her well of deepest convictions.
Jay Nordlinger raises the possibility that "you didn't build that" Hillary is the real Hillary going back to her radical roots, Hillary before she learned to knock back shots to show primary voters that she's just folks.
At any rate, should the country risk another president who will not stand up for the creativity and job-creating propensity of American business over and against job-killing regulation?
Raising the minimum wage may be good politics for Democrats–but it will cost jobs.
Clinton’s words raise the possibility that, if she is elected, we will have yet another president who thinks like President Obama.
Bill Clinton, who is often thought to be less ideological than his wife, did step aside and let the U.S. economy thrive. Voters should not assume that Mrs. Clinton would do this.
Whether it is pandering or an expression of core beliefs, Hillary's "you didn't build that" moment does not bode well, if she were to be elected.