you are not, actually, in control of your own life

Obama giving the commencement address at Morehouse College:

Nobody cares how tough your upbringing was. Nobody cares if you suffered some discrimination....If you stay hungry, if you keep hustling, if you keep on your grind and get other folks to do the same — nobody can stop you.

Setting aside a liberal Democrat making this point, and all the attendant problems with that— the notion that you are in charge of the outcome of your life, and that all it takes is working hard and trying, is not true. Realizing it isn't true is a big part of adjusting the adult world. As time goes on and on, more and more empirical measures demonstrate it isn't true. And saying that to students like these, at this age of their lives, in this economy, at this terrible point in history for recent college grads... it's cruelty. Cruelty.

Update: Of course I don't think that the president should have said, "You guys are screwed! Give up!" What I want the president to do is, in the best liberal tradition, recognize that while hard work and dedication are important, chance and injustice are powerful, so we need to work together. I wanted him to say "You should work hard and strive for what you want, but you should also remember that the things you achieve come on the back of chances and advantages not everyone has, so you should work to help those who find themselves in harsh circumstances. And you should naturally expect, without guilt or shame, to be able to call on help from society if you find yourself in those circumstances yourself."