I try to avoid political topics in my blog, but the recent hack of GoDaddy caused me to contemplate the tendency in our society to denigrate success and successful people.  The hack affected me personally - it took my website and e-mail down for a few hours.  The person who claimed responsibility for the hack stated, ""I'm taking godaddy down bacause (sic) well i'd like to test how the cyber security is safe and for more reasons that i can not talk now".  For clarification, GoDaddy is now saying that they weren't hacked, the shutdown was due to internal problems.

The "hacktivist" group Anonymous claimed that they weren't involved in the attack, but the genius who took credit for it used the term Anonymous in his Twitter handle and his statements regarding cybersecurity reflect the credo of the group.  Anonymous is strongly opposed to digital anti-piracy laws and has hacked organizations that support digital anti-piracy.  They wear Guy Fawkes masks in public, as do many in the Occupy movement.

Here's my problem with those who favor a collectivist approach to economics and think successful people are a problem:  you're hurting people and businesses that you allegedly support.  For example, do you think Exxon Mobil is hosting their website on GoDaddy?  NO - GoDaddy is generally used by individuals and small business owners.  So by taking GoDaddy down, you hurt the small guy trying to make a buck in an extraordinarily difficult economy.

For those of you who have read my previous articles on disruptive innovation, you'll remember that my passion in business is to help small businesses (like mine) compete successfully with large corporations.  Nothing makes me happier professionally.  Paradoxically, my opinions on large corporations are not terribly far apart from the those of the Occupy movement.  However, I want to take business from them, not hurt their small business customers.

Most of today's politicians will say or do just about anything that they think will help them get re-elected.  This goes for both sides of the aisle.  Shame on those politicians who use terms like "pay your fair share" and "you didn't build that."  I'm a small business owner that quit a well-paid corporate job to pursue my dream of running a small business. It's been hard work, but I've never been happier in my life.

None of my four grandparents were born in this country and my parents were the first in the family to obtain college degrees.  They both worked their tails off to pay for their educations and become successful.  That's why so many immigrants come to this country - to pursue their dreams of success.  We should honor and encourage successful people, not accuse them of greed and selfishness. 

I notice that the politicians that attack successful people haven't lifted a finger to pursue the corporations and people that have caused so much pain in our society (Jon Corzine, call your office.)  I'm not aware of one meaningful prosecution of a person or corporation that by means of greed or malfeasance destroyed our economy.  Please let me know if I'm missing something.  It's funny, but many of those decrying successful people have their fingerprints all over that disaster.

We the people have the power and the duty to choose leaders.  We don't work for the government, the government works for us.  I urge everyone to open their minds and look beyond the slogans and talking points.  Be a revolutionary in your own way - chart your own path to success.  Don't depend on the government or anyone else to provide for you: a culture of dependency is not good for anyone except the politicians that promote it.  We absolutely need to help those in our society that need help.  We each can and should do that every day in our lives

Neither political party has the answers.  I'm for freedom - that means freedom to live your life the way you want and freedom to pursue success.  There's never been a better time to chase success and freedom.  Affordable cloud-based computing options, crowdsourcing, crowdfunding and outsourced business services allow those with good ideas to chase their dreams.  In fact, the CEO of Box, Inc recently said that startups have an "unfair advantage" in the enterprise market.

So my advice to those who seek success - go for it!  If you fail, don't complain about those that didn't fail.  Pick yourself up off the ground and try again.  And one last thing:  as meager as my busines may be, I built it with my colleagues and customers.  The government did nothing for me.