It's what's known as a rhetorical question.
Is the Obama Administration the most anti-business administration in our lifetime? Recently, I was invited to CNBC's Kudlow Report where I had the joy of debating former Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean and BET founder Robert Johnson on that very question.
During the course of that interview, Dean -- naturally -- argued that in fact Americans' animosity was directed primarily at business these days, which is about as absurd and counter-factual a position as one can take. However, I was pleasantly surprised when Johnson, an Obama supporter and also a business owner, generally agreed with my views on the current administration.
Johnson is only seeing the obvious, as was I when I said the Obama administration is the most anti-business in my lifetime. Which others come close? Presidents Kennedy and Johnson dealt with big issues but viewed business as partners. President Nixon saw business as an ally, despite his missteps on wage and price controls and leaving the gold standard. President Ford understood that business created jobs and had little opportunity to hurt business.
While generally remembered as unfriendly to business, President Carter was a businessman and his "malaise" and oil cartel challenges were not anti-business. The first President Bush was good for business as was President Clinton, whose main defects were moral. President George W. Bush made some whopper mistakes -- but could hardly be called bad for business.
But in just under three years, the Obama Administration has hurt American business more than all these Administrations put together.
Let's see: Obama appointees at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) have not only blocked Boeing from making planes in South Carolina, but they have greased the speed of union elections, made decertification votes impossible, changed the requirement that a majority of workers vote for a union, and required almost every workplace in America to put posters up advising workers of their unionization rights.
The Obama Administration claims to want to double exports and support free trade, but it took it nearly three years to send the pending trade agreements with Panama, Colombia and South Korea to Congress. Which means that in all this time American companies have been paying higher tariffs for exports.
The Obama Administration has proposed 219 new rules affecting industries, each of which will cost at least $100 million to comply. While the Washington legal business is growing, every industry and business is affected, scared, and confused by the massive new proposals. Small businesses are especially overwhelmed and must hire lawyers to understand and comply with the massive amount of new regulation.
The Obama crown-jewel "achievements" of the new health care and Dodd-Frank financial laws adversely affect almost every American business, totaled almost 3,000 pages of statutory language, and will result in huge costs on employers.
I believe President Obama is not anti-business. Nor is he pro-business. He doesn't have the experience to be either. I think he wants more American jobs but he has hired hordes of bright, passionate, and aggressive political appointees primarily committed to various causes. The causes sadly have little to do with jobs or business and more often focus on the environment, social justice, and union rights. More important, Obama's politically appointed officials generally lack any significant business experience.
What else makes this Administration anti-business? It has proposed rules for government employees restricting their ability to help host and participate in major trade events like our International CES, which is held each January in Las Vegas. So while we host 30,000 international government officials and trade visitors, U.S. government employees would not be able to attend. By comparison, our competitor in Germany has its chancellor, Angela Merkel, attending and hosting a welcome dinner every year. We can't even get a welcome letter out of the White House. So let's make our smallest companies travel abroad if they hope to export.
And if all this isn't enough, what about the president's class warfare rhetoric? "Corporations" and "greed" seem to go together in every Obama address. "Spread the wealth around" and all forms of higher taxes on successful entrepreneurs are part of the president's reelection platform. I don't recall a President benefiting from so much American innovative business success (Facebook, Google, Twitter, Groupon and scores more) who is so hostile to the concept of the American Dream.
So is this Administration the most anti-business in recent memory?
Yes. No one else even comes close.
Letter to the Editor
"So is this Administration the most anti-business in recent memory? Yes. No one else even comes close."
Spot on!
And to Michael's excellent comments I must add---I do believe that this President IS anti-business. I think he hates Capitalism and Entrepeneurs. I think he is a natural ally to America's enemies.
In short, I don't believe that he is a good man, let alone a good President.
Amen, brother!
Ditto!
Clinton did the same thing as Obama is doing '93- '96, and then feinted to the Right: "the era of Big Government is over"-- until George W. Bush resurrected Big Government in its highest form.
feint to the Right feint to the Left get re-elected is what's best!
Need to work on your rhyming.
This may be the eugenics PostAmerican keeps referencing:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wi.....aganda.jpg
HAVE TO FACE the unfolding reality of the 4 decades underway, deliberate, carefully planned, Globalist RED China set up, sellout and TREASON and EUGENICS OP.
---------------------HIGH TIME-------------------------
eugenics! yes, the T4 program!
Thank God PA is so crazy, he makes me appear in comparison to be almost sane.
Mr. Shapiro: ALL of the Republican candidates should focus on King O's anti-business administration. Maybe they will read your comments and start to swing away instead of playing rope-a-dope. Well done, sir.
Australia's economic developmenmt was crippled by, among other things, over-mighty unions. Ever noticed why no ships fly the Australian flag, though Australia is an island? - unions priced them out of business. That's just one example. Don't let it happen in America. I was a lawyer for an Australian union for several years and I know what I'm talking about.
It's already happened. There are virtually no civilian American flagged vessels on the high seas.
"I believe Pres obama is not anti business" THAT couldn't be farther from the truth Gary. Was this a typeO? He hates anyone who makes a profit, unless they are giving some of those profits to HIM. He hates us who don't march in lockstep with his marxist ideals and he hates business.
Obviously.
Look at the company he has kept in his lifetime. A veritable rouges gallery of whiners, communists, terrorists, and other such human debris. Regardless of his lack of experience in business, he has drunk from the Cup of Marx his whole sorry life.
He's a communist, Duh!
Pecos Pete: They should also read McCotter Trailblazes Social Security Prosperity in the same posting of TAS online. Another creative plan to save FDR's failed Ponzi scheme.
It is not anti-business as such. If your business has administration connections or you are willing to pay the price, particularly if you are large company the One's administration is happy to accept your contribution and grant you a waiver or fast track a government loan. Barack is not anti-business. He is anti-market. People keep calling him a Socialist or Communist, but what he does with policies of intervention, regulation favoritism for large friendly corporations and shared government ownership is Fascism. He may be the first non nationalist Fascist.
Excellent point, JimH. "Non nationalist Fascist" -- I believe you've coined a new term, and it fits the O to a T.
Not a bad term at all, it does define this system. What we have been calling "croney Capitalism" is in fact Fascism. Remember how rich Goering got with the Nazis? Government picking favored companies and those companies funding election campaigns is exactly as the F word describes.
"People keep calling him a Socialist or Communist, but what he does with policies of intervention, regulation favoritism for large friendly corporations and shared government ownership is Fascism. He may be the first non nationalist Fascist."
JimH,
This is a brilliant point; well done!
Jim H: Exactly! Fascism the worst of communism, socialism and crony capitalism.
Nice article. Thanks for "Informing us" that he's not User Friendly, where Businesses are concerned. Next, you'll be telling us that he's a Liberal. That, he's Half Black, and was Raised in Indonesia, and that his Wife, has a Fat Ass, $600 Sneakers, and $3,000 Handbags, to go with her Bow Legs, her Big Mouth, and her Circus Clown Wardrobe. I'm curious. Does he tell LIES, all the time? Is he a Hypocrite? Does he bash Millionaires and Billionaires bye Day, and Wine and Dine, with them, bye Night? Does he tell us that we must SHARE in the SACRIFICE, while he and the Wookie, blow $10 Million of OUR MONEY, on Vacations? Did he take the School Vouchers away from POOR BLACK CHILDREN, in D.C., forcing them in to the same Dysfunctional D.C. Public Schools, that he said were "Not up to my Daughter's Standards"? How much do they pay you, at this job? And, can I get a job there, too?
Daaaang brother! Go, Go Go!
But I believe you were wrong on one count. "They" did not spend $10 mil on "vacations." If I recall correctly, the $10 mil was on just one of Michelle's vacations and I have serious doubts the $10 mil was a proper accounting cause they lie about everything.
LOL, can you imagine if Laura Bush had spent just $1 million on a vacation?
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