Okay, President Obama didn’t say exactly  that. But the principles he professed while delivering unprepared remarks today at a PR event on the government shutdown sure would seem to apply. In attempting to ridicule a House Republican for his offhanded comments regarding the current fiscal impasse, the president went from being the “ridiculer” to the “ridiculee” when he spoke of the consequences to ordinary people who refuse to do their jobs in order to get what they want:

If you’re working here, and in the middle of the day you just stopped and said, “You know what? I want to get something . . . I’m going to stop working until I get something. I’m going to shut down the whole plant until I get something.” You’d get fired! Right? ‘Cause the deal is you’ve already gotten hired, you’ve got a job, you’re getting a paycheck, and so you also are getting the pride of doing a good job and contributing to a business and looking out for your fellow workers – that’s what you’re getting!

Hmm. Do those circumstances sound strikingly similar to a recent spate of events that took place across the country? If so, it’s because they are precisely  the same circumstances as those of the fast food strikes, Walmart strikes, and all the other recent strikes orchestrated by Big Labor and their various “worker centers” front groups – people were working, one day they stopped and said they wanted to get something, that they would stop working until they got something, and would even shut down the whole business until they got it.

Well, Mr. President, according to the principles you defined, don’t those striking union members also deserve to be fired? What about the non-union employees who walked out on the job at the behest of worker centers – should they, too, lose their jobs?

Perhaps those teleprompters really are that necessary after all.