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tallmike wrote:The sound bite makes it sound like he is taking away all credit for individual accomplishment, but the entire statement is far from that and his point is valid.

What we achieve is not in a vacuum. We all benefit from the society we live in, including the infrastructure and security our government provides.

If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.

The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together. There are some things, just like fighting fires, we don’t do on our own. I mean, imagine if everybody had their own fire service. That would be a hard way to organize fighting fires.

Yes, some of his words could have been chosen better when you put it all in context and give it some rational thought you can see that it is true.