Friday, July 20, 2012

No Man is an Island.

President Obama, one week after his controversial "you didn't build that" remark, claimed Friday that the criticism he's taking from Republicans is "bogus."

Though Republicans say the president was implying that business owners didn't build their businesses, Obama said he was just talking about roads and bridges.


Read more here .

You can watch the video (he was on the radio, so it is actually an audio) - the statement is at 1:01. I don't care about the blowhard who follows. But, please, Mr. President: I have heard enough about "it depends on the meaning of 'is'" to recognize backpeddling. Have the courage of your convictions or quit lecturing us.

I can't get the embed code to work. The video is here www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DwJE1VbJtU
No Man Is An Island

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
John Donne

2 comments:

LSquared32 said...

Yeah, I was listening to that the other night. I think it's a dangling modifier problem? There was a pronoun (that? those? it? something like that) which could have been referring back to either the businesses or the roads. Ah, the horrors that are brought upon us by poor grammar (and/or perhaps poor complex sentence interpreting?).

I heard the quote before I heard any of the pundits talking about it, and I thought it was referring to the roads (not a very exciting speech, but whatever), and was quite surprised that it could be interpreted as referring to the businesses themselves, but that is the problem of a poorly constructed sentence. (And I look back to see if I have poorly constructed sentences. Probably I do: *sigh*)

Ricochet said...

" If you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen."

"that" would refer to business (singular). "those" or "them" would refer to the previous comments about roads and bridges.
I haven't heard the President abuse English this way before, so I assume t referred to business.