Fantasy Politics USA

President Obama was giving an energy speech and claiming the GOP candidates were part of “the flat earth society,” since they are so backwards. But then the President takes a shot at one of his predecessors, President Rutherford B. Hayes, and gets his facts mixed up. According to the President, “there have always been folks like that. There always been folks who are the naysayers, that don’t believe in the future, that don’t believe in trying to do things differently.” He continued, “One of my predecessors, Rutherford B. Hayes, reportedly said about the telephone, “it’s a great invention, but who would ever want to use one?” That’s why he’s not on Mount Rushmore. He’s looking backwards. He’s not looking forwards. He’s explaining why we can’t do something, instead of why we can do something. The point is, there will always be cynics and naysaysers who just want to keep on doing things the same way that we’ve always done them. They want to double down on the same ideas that got us into the some of the mess that we’ve been, but that’s not who we are as Americans.” According to the curator at Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center in Fremont, Ohio, President Hayes never said that about the telephone. President Hayes was actually quite impressed with the telephone and was the first President to have one in the White House. He also invited Thomas Edison over to demonstrate the phonograph, and was the first President to use a typewriter. President Hayes was on the cutting edge despite what President Obama said about him.