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Leadership: President Obama told CEOs in Hawaii that the U.S. had been "lazy" in attracting foreign investment. Actually, the White House has been pretty busy demonizing it.
The Obama administration has a record of making life miserable for foreign investors that put their capital on the line to create jobs in the U.S.
Politically wedded to special interests such as Big Labor, White House officials have hurled scurrilous charges against foreign companies and muscled others in ways no domestic company would tolerate.
Foreign investors also have been targets of punitive regulations disguised as "patriotism" and had contracts kicked out from under them. Now the president would have everyone think the U.S. is merely asleep at the wheel in attracting investment from abroad. In reality, it's a different story.
"It's important to remember that the United States is still the largest recipient of foreign investment in the world," Obama told a leery foreign CEO at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Hawaii.
"But we've been a little bit lazy, I think, over the last couple of decades. We've kind of taken for granted — well, people will want to come here and we aren't out there hungry, selling America and trying to attract new business into America," he said.
No kidding. Obama's soft charge of "laziness" deflects attention from his record of discouraging foreign investment. Some cases in point:
Exhibit 1: In 2010 Japan's Toyota was humiliated over a safety issue. It wasn't enough to let the regulators deal with accusations about Toyota's brake pedals — as Ford and GM had been over comparable problems. The Obama White House had to publicly shame Toyota.
Accusations, later proven false, that Toyota brakes were faulty became a special hell for Toyota. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who had a conflict of interest as a regulator and shareholder in Toyota's U.S. competitors due to the auto bailout, encouraged Americans to "stop driving" Toyotas.
Obama's congressional allies hauled Toyota's president, Akio Toyoda, in from Tokyo for a Star Chamber hearing, compelling him to "apologize" before proving any wrongdoing. After a 10-month congressional investigation found Toyota wasn't at fault, none took back the comments or apologized.
Exhibit 2: U.K. oil giant BP was put through a similar wringer after the Gulf oil spill of 2009. Instead of treating BP as a domestic company, Obama proudly announced he had his "boot on the neck" of the British company and, in a move of questionable legality, demanded $20 billion.
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