Watching Fox News’ “Huckabee” Sunday night, I had two occasions to shout obnoxiously “I’ve said that!” The first was after the Governor’s monologue (previous post) and the second was during his interview of Ed Klein, whose book “The Amateur” has been number one on the New York Times bestseller list for two weeks.
I haven’t read the book yet, but Klein said at one point that President Obama “doesn’t know what he doesn’t know”.
And I’ve said that too.
Actually, I’ve said “No one is more dangerous than someone with great power who doesn’t know what he doesn’t know”.
The reason Obama doesn’t know what he doesn’t know is that he has has never worked in the real world and has surrounded himself with people who have never worked in the real world. Barely eight percent of the people in the Administration have EVER had a private sector job. They’ve all worked in academia, government and nonprofit organizations, but 92% of the administration has NEVER had a real job in a productive for-profit company.
I’m not saying that being a college professor, a bureaucrat or an officer in a charitable organization isn’t real work. I’m just saying that one’s perception of what is required to generate wealth is skewed, because you don’t have to generate wealth in those jobs; in academia and nonprofits, you receive wealth from the government, other nonprofits like foundations, or people who work in the private sector. In government you simply confiscate wealth from those who create it.
People who work in the private sector generate the money, not just for their businesses, but for academia, government and nonprofits as well. But almost nobody in the Obama Administration understands that, least of all Obama himself, which was Ed Klein’s point.
A hilarious episode that illustrates this point occurred when none other than George McGovern left the Senate and decided to start a for-profit business. After a short period of time he actually admitted that he had no idea how government regulation makes things more difficult for business.
DUH!
McGovern was a war hero but after the war he was a college professor until he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1956. He graduated to the Senate in 1962. He ran unsuccessfully for president, then lost his seat in 1980 during the Reagan revolution. From the Senate he went back to teaching and eventually went to work for the United Nations(!). But in the midst of that time he operated a hotel for a while. It was a revelation.
“It was an eye-opening introduction to something most business operators are all-too familiar with,” McGovern said recently, “the difficulty of controlling costs and setting prices in a weak economy. Despite my trust in government, I would have been alarmed by an outsider taking control of basic management decisions that determine success or failure in a business where I had invested my life savings.” (more)
Again, DUH! He worked in academia and government for 60 years, but had no idea about the impact of the unnecessary and unjust hardships government places on business. Yet he had tremendous power to compel private business to do his bidding.
Perhaps if President Obama bought a restaurant…
