The Obama Badge of Honor: Snubbing the Free Market
Senator Barack Obama would like the country to believe that snubbing the private sector adds to his qualifications to be President of the United States. For the past eighteen months, he has touted that he turned down Wall Street after college for community organizing and walked away from lucrative big law firm jobs after law school for civil rights lawyering. In the Obama campaign narrative, the candidate’s rejection of corporate America is a badge of honor, a manifestation of what Obama’s wife refers to as his commitment to closing the gap between “the world as it should be” and “the world as it is.”
Self-congratulation and self-adulation are not the same as reality. Each day, clients of large law firms and Wall Street, not just political activists, take concrete actions that make the world a better place. Senator Obama does not understand, so he refuses to acknowledge the possibility.
Who are these clients that Obama could have served as a corporate lawyer or a Wall Street banker? They include: energy companies that produce solar power; steelmakers that manufacture products used in automobiles, highways and trains; food companies that deliver meat to supermarkets; technology giants that invent computer hardware, software and information systems used by ordinary individuals from Seattle to Mumbai; and private equity firms that invest in and improve such companies. There are numerous other examples. For a profit, companies of all stripes serve the U.S. and global economies, and are served by large law firms and Wall Street entities.
But big law firms and Wall Street were not good enough for Senator Obama. He likes to remind voters that he opted for much more meager earnings as a community organizer and a civil rights lawyer. He forgets, however, that in a market economy, salary often reflects the work performed and the sacrifices exacted. Instead of writing memoirs about themselves, law firm and Wall Street types write memos, conduct analysis and devise strategies for their clients. Their higher salaries reflect everything ranging from all nighters pulled, vacations cancelled, personal lives postponed-prices paid far less frequently by community activists or nonprofit idealists.
This does not mean that community activists and nonprofit idealists do not serve the public good. Nor, as the turmoil in today’s financial markets reminds us, does it mean that profit driven adventures are anything close to perfect. But rejecting the private sector for low-paying jobs is not a stand-alone virtue. It is not even an indication of success.
Obama and many of his leftwing supporters, however, prefer to believe that making a difference must come from community service, political activism, pro bono legal services or activities that generate little or no income. Not surprisingly, the presidential hopeful advocates policies and viewpoints that reflect his bias against private enterprise, such as soaking the rich (e.g., increasing taxes on those making $250,000 per year); slapping a windfall tax on big oil companies (whose shareholders consist of pension plans and ordinary Americans); or blaming the current financial crisis on deregulation promulgated by Republicans (when a major piece of deregulation legislation affecting the banking industry, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, passed the Senate on a 90-8 vote and was signed into law by a Democratic President, Bill Clinton, in 1999).
Elsewhere in the world, even some Communist countries seem to have more faith in the private sector than Senator Obama. China and Vietnam, for instance, have in recent decades rapidly moved away from their command economies in favor of the imagination and entrepreneurship of their respective private sectors. China’s annual economic growth has averaged 10 percent for much of the past 30 years while Vietnam’s has averaged 7.5 percent for much of the past decade. Along the way, these countries have alleviated much poverty, brought about impressive modernization and drastically altered ordinary lives.
Mr. Obama, the self-proclaimed citizen of the world, draws no inspiration from the transformation of other parts of the world or from the realities of his own country. He prefers to remain the hero who rebuffed corporate villains to do the American people’s work. This is a great narrative, but only for those predisposed to seeing the world as worse than it is.
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Your post is some hot garbage! Spending one minuet of time helping other people rather than climbing some imaginary financial ladder is the true path of a righteous person. You need to get a grip on what is truly important to OUR culture and society. We need a mix of both types; greedy bastards like yourself, AND bleeding heart do-gooders. However; I don’t recall hearing about a bunch of liberal, do-gooders destroying our country with community service. Yet capitalist pigs like you are wallowing in the cesspool of Wall Street’s blunders. How many people do you think were hurt, physically and financially during this housing mess versus Obama working on the South Side of Chicago? Guess who is there to help these people re-locate, rearrange, and reassess their lives after they were duped into taking on a mortgage that they shouldn’t have been sold? A federal funded community organization. Your taxpayer dollars! A crime was committed against the citizens of our country by unscrupulous Wall Street profiteers. Your conribution is to belittle the people that will help them in OUR countrys time of need.
I challenge you to live anywhere on the planet with Obama’s salary back then, (adjusted to inflation of course), doing that type of work, then talk some shit! You may feel privileged to spend a butt-load of money on your dwellings; however, your address is not an achievement. I clearly doubt you live in the West Village anyway.
It is very obvious from your self righteous insipid babbling that you do not care about helping those less fortunate than you. You could be helping people with your “wisdom” yet you only look to anger and direct people down your own evil path. You should consider another direction in life. You will regret misleading people like this. You are not helping anyone, and you are hurting everyone. Please Stop!
Okay, first - great article. Interestingly enough, earlier today I received an email about Obama and where his money has come from. It talked about how he traveled the world during college even though he was from a working class family. Where did that money come from? Then it goes on to talk about his ties to the Middle East because of his roommates and their financial backings of his rise in politics and so forth. Anyway, it’s just interesting to read the two articles on the same day.
You make some great points. The reason the big law firms make the money they do is because they work hard. It all goes back to what I said in my own blog a few weeks ago - if we started distributing wealth the way that Obama and his leftwing supporters talked about - taking the money away from those big law firms for instance and distributing it to other, less accredited law firms (this is just an example) - you start getting into communism. There has to be a class tier. That’s how this society works. Everything isn’t “fair”. You have to work hard if you want to get ahead. I guarantee you that those big firm lawyers worked their butts off to get there. They deserve to get paid well. That’s just how it needs to be. Otherwise society as we know it will collapse.
The only people whining about this distribution of wealth are the same people that whine when their kids lose a soccer game, then scream “It’s not fair to the kids!”. That’s why half the country now plays games where no one wins. What is that?? People need to learn that life isn’t fair, and you have to work hard to get what you want. And even sometimes when you work hard, you still lose out. That’s just the way it is. Get over it.
Now… Evan - You are entitled your opinion, but to come on here and attack someone on their own blog is a little harsh, in my opinion - and I’m entitled to that. There is a way to state an opinion without calling someone names and going for their throat. That right there shows that you’re on the defensive, which makes me wonder if somewhere deep down you don’t know that we’re right.
Society can’t survive with someone like Obama in charge. My only hope is that, if he wins, Congress will keep him in check.
Sadie*
Sadies last blog post..A New Holiday.
Society can’t survive with someone like Obama in charge.
Wow. All I can say is…wow.
Sadie, you REALLY believe that society will break down, and the world will end, because one individual is in charge? I think, my dear, if that were the case, then this planet would be a charred, lifeless ball floating is space after 8 years of Bush rule.
I will say in President Bush’s defense, however, that after years of unhappiness with his policies, his initial speech regarding the election of President-Elect Obama, and how he is committed to a smooth transition, was very impressive. It is the most “presidential” he has sounded since he took office. Only…if ONLY…he could have made that much sense 8 years sooner…
I can’t stand much more of the OH praise Obama. I was a Hill supporter and for my own Dem. reasons voted because I do believe we need to change the directionn of our country. I get so mad when the Obama diehards blame it all on the Cintons. Or you know George. WE WANT OUR JOBS BACK…