The Apology Tour: Will It Ever End?

Earlier today, President Obama addressed the Parliament of Turkey. What made news were his positive references to Islam:

"Let me say this as clearly as I can," Obama said. "The United States is not at war with Islam. In fact, our partnership with the Muslim world is critical in rolling back a fringe ideology that people of all faiths reject."

This is, of course, indistinguishable from many similar pronouncements that were made by President Bush.

What I want to focus on is Obama's continuing attack on his own country, unprecedented, to my knowledge, for a President on an overseas tour. Here are Obama's comments on his own country's history:

An enduring commitment to the rule of law is the only way to achieve the security that comes from justice for all people. Robust minority rights let societies benefit from the full measure of contributions from all citizens.

I say this as the President of a country that not too long ago made it hard for someone who looks like me to vote.

This is untrue. A minority of states did "make it hard" for someone who "looks like Obama" to vote until "not long ago," but most did not, and the federal government certainly did not. There has never been a time when it was hard for people who look like Obama to vote here in Minnesota, for example.

As we've seen before, Obama appears to betray a surprising lack of knowledge of American history. It seems that instead of actually having studied his own country's history, Obama has merely absorbed the ignorant, left-wing narrative that is peddled by Jeremiah Wright and others of his ilk. As a result, Obama not only confesses his country's sins overseas, he confesses wrongly.

But it is precisely that capacity to change that enriches our countries. Every challenge that we face is more easily met if we tend to our own democratic foundation. This work is never over. That is why, in the United States, we recently ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed, and prohibited -- without exception or equivocation -- any use of torture.

Torture has been illegal for a number of years, and President Bush insisted just as strongly as Obama that the U.S. does not torture. There was a legitimate debate about waterboarding, which does no physical injury, and which I do not believe constitutes torture. But according to press reports, only two or three top-ranking terrorists were waterboarded, none after 2003. And waterboarding has been banned by the U.S. military since 2006. So what was Obama's purpose in implying that until he came along, his own government was engaged in torturing prisoners? His speech was carried live by Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya, broadcast into countries where "torture" doesn't mean getting your face wet. Obama at least impliedly exaggerated the supposed sins of his predecessors and the "change" brought about by himself. Why? For what purpose? Isn't the campaign over?

Another issue that confronts all democracies as they move to the future is how we deal with the past. The United States is still working through some of our own darker periods. Facing the Washington monument that I spoke of is a memorial to Abraham Lincoln, the man who freed those who were enslaved even after Washington led our Revolution. And our country still struggles with the legacy of our past treatment of Native Americans.

Human endeavor is by its nature imperfect. History, unresolved, can be a heavy weight. Each country must work through its past.

These words were a lead-in to Obama's comments on "the terrible events of 1915," i.e., what Obama himself has referred to as the "Armenian genocide." So what was the point of Obama's gratuitous reference to "our past treatment of Native Americans"? Did he mean to suggest that it was somehow equivalent to the Armenian genocide? If so, once again, he needs to be better educated about history. If not, why on earth is he throwing it into this part of his speech as a mea culpa?

Obama's seemingly compulsive need to apologize to foreign audiences on behalf of the United States cannot be explained as a rational approach to diplomacy. As Paul suggested here, the roots of Obama's America-bashing seem to lie in a combination of ideology and psychology.

Thank goodness he's coming home soon.

The new GM logo - from Malkin

Gore the Hypocrite

Even during Earth Hour. President of the Tennessee Center For Policy Research Drew Johnson takes a Saturday drive by Al Gore’s during the time most environmentalists went dark:

I pulled up to Al’s house, located in the posh Belle Meade section of Nashville, at 8:48pm – right in the middle of Earth Hour. I found that the main spotlights that usually illuminate his 9,000 square foot mansion were dark, but several of the lights inside the house were on.

In fact, most of the windows were lit by the familiar blue-ish hue indicating that floor lamps and ceiling fixtures were off, but TV screens and computer monitors were hard at work. (In other words, his house looked the way most houses look about 1:45am when their inhabitants are distractedly watching “Cheaters” or “Chelsea Lately” reruns.)

The kicker, though, were the dozen or so floodlights grandly highlighting several trees and illuminating the driveway entrance of Gore’s mansion.

I [kid] you not, my friends, the savior of the environment couldn’t be bothered to turn off the gaudy lights that show off his goofy trees.

Czech Premier Calls Obama Administration's Economic Policies 'a Road to Hell'

Harry Reid is despicable

Read the story for yourselves

Reid seeks to clarify stimulus rule on casinos.

Can you believe the nerve of this asshole? Read that letter carefully and with a discerning eye. He’s trying to say that the only way those so-called non-profits can operate is if they receive grants out of the stimulus bill that can be spent in his Vegas casinos. Bullshit! So - none of those services can be provided UNLESS they get money from the stimulus bill and they can ONLY operate within the casinos?

How the hell were they operating before the stimulus bill was passed?

I hope you people in Nevada are watching this clown! I’m sure Nevada does not rely on Vegas alone. I’ve been to Vegas - it’s not exactly a really large town. The county I live in here in Florida is twice the size of Vegas and all of the same similar services in my country don’t need no damned hotels and casinos as locations for providing these services. If you jokers in Nevada re-elect this idiot - you all deserve to go to hell with him. He doesn’t give a shit at all about the rest of this country. All he cares about is providing pork to the casinos in his state.

This isn’t about getting money to provide services to those small groups - it’s about getting money that can be funneled in to the casinos.

As predicted, Iran is not going to be sitting down with Obama

Iran's Leader Did Not Feel A Thrill Up His Leg After Watching Obama's Holiday Video

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is less than impressed with President TelePrompter public outreach efforts thus far.

He mentioned U.S. sanctions against Iran, U.S. support for Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein during his 1980-88 war against Iran and the downing of an Iranian airliner over the Persian Gulf in 1988.

He also accused the U.S. of provoking ethnic tension in Iran and said Washington's accusations that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons are a sign of U.S. hostility. Iran says its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, like energy production, not for building weapons.

"Have you released Iranian assets? Have you lifted oppressive sanctions? Have you given up mudslinging and making accusations against the great Iranian nation and its officials? Have you given up your unconditional support for the Zionist regime? Even the language remains unchanged," Khamenei said.

Khamenei, wearing a black turban and dark robes, said America was hated around the world for its arrogance, as the crowd chanted "Death to America."

I think it's safe to say Iran's fist is still clinched. Unfortunately I doubt that means Obama isn't devising new and exciting ways to suck up to these bastards in private talks that are no doubt going on or about to start.

From Confederate Yankee...

Cradle and All

If you thought that American media outlets are little more than extensions of JounoList and the White House Press Office... well, you might be on to something.

Unlike the eight years that ended January 20th, the sharpest critiques of our failing and flailing government are now coming from those outside of America, as foreign newspapers do the job Americans won't do:

Helicopter Ben Bernanke’s Federal Reserve is dropping trillions of fresh paper dollars on the world economy, the President of the United States is cracking jokes on late night comedy shows, his energy minister is threatening a trade war over carbon emissions, his treasury secretary is dithering over a banking reform program amid rising concerns over his competence and a monumentally dysfunctional U.S. Congress is launching another public jihad against corporations and bankers.

As an aghast world — from China to Chicago and Chihuahua — watches, the circus-like U.S. political system seems to be declining into near chaos. Through it all, stock and financial markets are paralyzed. The more the policy regime does, the worse the outlook gets. The multi-ringed spectacle raises a disturbing question in many minds: Is this the end of America?

Probably not, if only because there are good reasons for optimism. The U.S. economy has pulled out of self-destructive political spirals in the past, spurred on by its business class and corporate leaders, the profit-making and market-creating people who rose above the political turmoil to once again lift the world out of financial crisis. It’s happened many times before, except for once, when it took 20 years to rise out of the Great Depression.

Past success, however, is no guarantee of future recovery, especially now when there are daily disasters and new indicators of political breakdown. All developments are not disasters in themselves. The AIG bonus firestorm is a diversion from real issues , but it puts the ghastly political classes who make U.S. law on display for what they are: ageing self-serving demagogues who have spent decades warping the U.S. political system for their own ends. We see the system up close, law-making that is riddled with slapdash, incompetence and gamesmanship.

One test of whether we are witnessing the end of America is how many more times Americans put up with congressional show trials of individual business people and their employees, slandering and vilifying them for their actions and motives. And for how long will they tolerate a President who berates business and corporations as dens of crime and malfeasance? If the majority of Americans come to accept the caricatures of business as true, then America is closer to the end of its life as a global leader, as a champion of markets and individualism.

Our incompetent Congress and President are so lacking in situational awareness that they can't see that nearly every move they've made has compounded the problems facing our country. Every massive spending bill passed, every angry attempt at placing the blame on others, every pathetic foreign policy rookie mistake and unforced diplomatic error, every abortive attempt to impose massive new government controls over American life, is pushing us closer towards a point where we have no confidence in our nation's supposed "leadership." Closer to a failed state than we could ever imagine.

A member of our Senate last week had the audacity to proclaim that businessmen should resign or commit suicide for accepting money they were owed under contract.

Perhaps some people should eat a bullet, or swallow a handful of pills with a bourbon chaser, or at least resign as a result of the horrific decisions they've made that have threatened and wrecked not just individual lives, but entire economies.

But there is no honor among thieves, and the thieves in our Congress and White House lack the integrity to do the honorable thing. They won't admit their incompetence and resign. They sure as Hell won't voluntarily die to assuage some foreign (to them) sense of honor.

I still hold out hope that we'll find a way to pull out of our current economic collapse, but the more Congress grandstands in order to ignore real problems, and the more our President bogs himself down in constant gaffes, petty dalliances, and dreams of social engineering the America of his dreams, the less likely it seems that will happen.