Jon Swaine: Barack Obama didn’t call Americans lazy, but even thinking it is bad politics
BARACK Obama has come under-mild strafing over the past few days because of a comment he made at the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-Operation (APEC) summit in Hawaii last week. Discussing the need to attract investment to the US, he said: "We’ve been a little bit lazy, I think, over the last couple of decades". It looks as though the comment could shortly become a bigger problem for the president.
With the headline unemployment rate stuck at nine per cent, and the poverty at its highest rate since 1983, this was a fantastic opportunity for Obama's usual critics, and they did not disappoint. Donald Trump called the remarks "disgusting", telling Fox News – where they were replayed repeatedly – that Mr Obama “never made a deal in his life”. Rush Limbaugh added: “Once again, the president of the United States insults the people who make this country work”.
If by now you're wondering whether President Obama's comments were taken out of context, however, your answer is yes. Here is the transcript of the relevant section, from from White House, which came after a discussion about US-Chinese trade relations.
MR. McNERNEY: ‘‘I think one related question, looking at the world from the Chinese side, is what they would characterize as impediments to investment in the United States. And so that discussion I’m sure will be part of whatever dialogue you have. And so how are you thinking about that?’’
PRESIDENT OBAMA: ‘‘Well, this is an issue, generally. I think it’s important to remember that the United States is still the largest recipient of foreign investment in the world. And there are a lot of things that make foreign investors see the U.S. as a great opportunity — our stability, our openness, our innovative free market culture.
‘‘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. And so one of things that my administration has done is set up something called SelectUSA that organizes all the government agencies to work with state and local governments where they’re seeking assistance from us, to go out there and make it easier for foreign investors to build a plant in the United States and put outstanding U.S. workers back to work in the United States of America.’’
It seems pretty clear that Obama was talking here about government efforts to sell the country overseas, which he claims were bad but better since he took over. “Because of our federalist system,” he added after the section above, “sometimes a foreign investor comes in and they’ve got to navigate not only federal rules, but they’ve also got to navigate state and local governments”.
At a stretch, he was also talking about business leaders.
The row had seemed likely to disappear as mere noise.
But on Wednesday it was thrown into the mainstream of the contest for the Republican presidential nomination. Speaking about it on the campaign trail earlier, Mitt Romney, the former Governor of Massachusetts, said: "Sometimes, I just don't think that President Obama understands America."
Rick Perry, the Governor of Texas, has gone one better, releasing an entire campaign advertisement titled simply “Lazy”.
After replaying a tightly cropped section of Obama's comments, Perry says to viewers: “Can you believe that? That's what our president thinks (sic) wrong with America? That Americans are lazy? That's pathetic”.
This now has the potential to do significant damage to Barack Obama, and that's slightly unfair.
From the sluggish economic recovery, to America's breathtaking national debt (it passed the $15 trillion mark today), via his "leading from behind" on foreign policy, the list of legitimate and debatable reasons why Americans might not wish to re-elect him is quite long.
Thinking that ordinary Americans are lazy should not, however, be on it. Even if he believed it, he probably wouldn't say it out loud. To paraphrase Mitt Romney: he's running for office, for Pete's sake.
© Telegraph.co.uk
