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Romney Shreds Obama Economic Philosophy in Southwest PA Stop

Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney contrasted his economic philosophy with that of President Obama by using the President’s own statements against him during a campaign stop in southwest Pennsylvania Tuesday afternoon.

Standing in front of a large sign that read “Obama’s Upside-Down Economy” at Horizontal Wireless Services in Irwin, Romney addressed a speech Obama made last week in Roanoke, VA where he said, “If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that,” while speaking on the role of government-funded infrastructure in U.S. commerce.

“I’ve got to be honest: I don’t think anyone could have said what he said who had actually started a business or been in a business,” Romney said. “In my own view, what the president said was both startling and revealing.”

Romney countered Obama’s statement with his own five-point plan to mend the U.S. economy, including loosening regulations on coal, oil and natural gas, improving international trade policies, balancing the federal budget, improving the education system and encouraging “economic freedom.”

Lis Smith, a spokesperson for the Obama campaign, said in a press release that Romney attacks were “over the top” and took the President’s words out of context.

“As President Obama said the other day, those who start businesses succeed because of their individual initiative – their drive, hard work and creativity,” Smith said.

“But there are critical actions we must take to support businesses and encourage new ones – that means we need the best infrastructure, a good education system and affordable, domestic sources of clean energy.”

Romney also attacked what he called “political cronyism” by Obama, saying the President granted $529 million in loans from the federal government to Fisker, a high-end­­ electric automotive company that donated to Obama’s 2008 campaign. He added that Fisker’s assembly line is in Finland.

“When the government comes in and it becomes based on who you know in government, who is a friend in government – you get money from them, you get taxpayer dollars,” Romney said.

“That’s happening in this country today. I’m ashamed to say that we’re seeing our President hand out money to campaign contributors.”

Following a common theme in his campaign, Romney also addressed what he called an “attack on success” by Obama, saying he would encourage Americans to celebrate prosperity and innovation.

“I don’t want to see Americans ashamed of success. I want Americans to welcome, to celebrate success and encourage people to reach as high as they can,” Romney said.

“I don’t want government taking credit for individuals’ accomplishments, whether they work in government or work in the private sector, it’s the people of America that make America great.”

Republican Senate candidate Tom Smith, who was also an Armstrong County businessman, opened for Romney at the event and said those in attendance had the opportunity to end the decline of the country under Obama and Sen. Bob Casey through their collective effort.

“So, please, keep up the good work. There are long days and nights ahead of us,” Smith said. “But if we work hard, if we work together, we can turn this country around.”

8 Responses

  1. Again, I see very few people know how business works. If you knew and worked in business, you wouldn’t be advocating the Prez and his comments. Roads were built by companies and people with TAXPAYER money. You know, those people to either run their own business, with their own money and hard work, or people who work for them, for which they have the luxury of having their hard earned wages confiscated by the government and redistributed to those who will not work. There is no hope for you memes who regurgitate DEM talking points. You have no ideas or any concept of how to acquire self respect, wealth, and accomplishment of doing a good job.
    Just remember, the useful idiots are the first to be obliterated in a Marxist/Communist Society; you have nothing to offer.

  2. David D:

    “Wealth is generated by labor.”

    as you say. But Napoleon Hill (Think & Grow Rich) credits CAPITAL invested in a coherent plan to build the Commonwealth gives purpose to Labor. A Convent where no individual is wealthy, is wealthy as a community even though individual Nuns take a vow of poverty. Work teaches the baseline principle Americans learn when they take a job, paid or not. Political Scientists agree, the Socialist notion of -to each according to needs, from each according to ability “to pay” doesn’t work. Unless you Dems can induce American Citizens to take the VOW OF INDIVIDUAL POVERTY in the interest of the COMMONWEALTH, your earnest values are simply being exploited by your Wise Guy president. “Make work” projects would foster wealth, but the pompous academic the Democrats insist on substituting for an accomplished leader is unfamiliar with how much coordination-not to mention risk- it takes to get any project to the “shovel ready” phase…the educational, enlightening aspects of legitimate work. We don’t need to invest money in more TEACHERS (academics,) we need working partnerships with those who understand the elements the Academic In Chief ignorantly lectures about. The interactive process of hearing each other out in the effort to succeed together is pre-emptively disparaged in his speaches as yet another excuse to quit without even making the attempt. Folk who elected him based on “HOPE” were kidding themselves. Those who succeed in the American System have a motto: “When it doesn’t work, MAKE it work.” Your crowd projects your own squeamish values on a “blank screen” who clearly considers anybody who actually works to be a schmuck. He hits them up for money which he seems to always know how to find, but “earning it” or amassing wealth is neither in his wheelhouse nor worthy of his will to invest himself in legitimate work. He reads speeches written by frat boys. Let him take financial risks in a business dependent on loyal employees. He’s your classic bait and switch cynic. Americans who live by “Shoulder to the wheel, Nose to the grindstone” are his prey, not his heroes! He honestly cannot comprehend that inventors and physicists tinker in their garages, on their own time, at their own expense. I doubt any of those wealthy people indulging him with campaign contributions take the time to fill out their NCAA Basketball Brackets, nor hobnobbed with pretentious socialites when they were pounding the pavement seeking investors who believed in their business plans. No! In Obama’s world, that’s what the TAXPAYERS are for! Look at how some of the smartest Democrats critique his positions and LISTEN to them. You squandered the majority for which Dems worked so hard, to extend Bush III with a disengaged, work-averse excuse mill.

  3. Here is an article that puts it in context:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/17/business-build-that_n_1680590.html

    BTW, a lot of this country’s early wealth and infrastructure was built from slave labor.

    Wealth is generated by labor. Workers mining raw materials from the ground, workers forging them into products. Farmers growing crops, and laborers (often underpaid illegal immigrants) picking the crops. Truckers, shippers, and loading dock workers who haul goods from factories to stores. Minimum and low wage workers at cash registers, or stocking shelves, whose labor generates profit each hour above their paid salary.

    And, these workers pay taxes, and purchase final products produced by the raw labor of others. Their taxes fund schools, build roads, etc.

  4. Yes, thats right, the highways built themselves! The tax money came from trees! Businesses in no way create the wealth from which government can operate. Welcome to Obama’s world.

  5. But the pt is if the business wasn’t there u wont be getting taxes from them to do anything. Circular argument. Alternatively, those roads were there for everyone. The difference in their success was the ideas in their brains or the risks they were willing to take. They should be rewarded for that.

  6. The fuller in-context quote from Obama is:

    ” Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business. you didn’t build that. ”

    That means, you didn’t build the roads and bridges your business relies upon.

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