Boy, he sure sounds good. That cocky stride to the podium, that authoritative voice, that precise delivery, those confident, perfectly timed head movements, that straight-ahead, no-nonsense, focused manner of an inspiring leader. Wow. Aren’t we all fortunate to have a great, valiant courageous intellect in the White House instead of that dimwit who preceded him?
“My single most important responsibility as President is to keep the American people safe.” His predecessor, incidentally, despite all his numerous faults, did that for over seven years even though he faced one of the most evil, murderous, diabolical enemies in American history. This is the same administration whose national security policy Obama savagely attacked throughout his speech at the National Archives.
“We are cleaning up something that is quite simply a mess…” If Americans had to choose between the ‘mess’ he inherited and the alternative tragic loss of innocent life which Obama’s moral cowardice may well precipitate, they would gladly take the mess.
“I ran for President promising transparency…” “National security requires a delicate balance…” Empty platitudes resonate through his enraptured throng like insights from a profound thinker. He will continue to enjoy his masquerade of vacuous moral-intellectual stature right up until another 9-11 reveals him to be an empty suit and a disgrace to his office. We can only hope that his national security advisors can convince him that saving human lives is slightly more important than gilded rhetoric.
“We uphold out most cherished values, not only because doing so is right, but because it strengthens our country and keeps us safe.” So we are obliged to empower those who want to kill us by letting them use our values against us, thereby weakening our ability to defend ourselves? Please take note: you to do not owe ethical conduct to someone who wants to kill you. Honesty does not oblige a woman to tell a prospective rapist that she is home alone. You cannot permit an enemy to transform your values into the means of your self-destruction. When your life and survival are threatened with violence, the only value that counts is self-defense. Period.
“Some have argued that brutal methods like water-boarding are necessary to keep us safe. I could not disagree more.” Translation: The fact that it worked on the mastermind of the 9-11 terrorist attacks and saved countless American lives can be conveniently ignored if I make it sound like I am some high-minded idealist. Meanwhile, he authorizes (correctly, in my view) the collateral deaths of Pakistani civilians in bombing raids targeting Al Quaeda strongholds. No inconsistency there?
“We should give detainees greater latitude in selecting their own counsel.” So we must now give enemy combatants all the protections of the US Constitution. Those who are devoted to destroying America and everything it stands for should have all the rights of U.S. citizens—while their daily sustenance is provided by the U.S. taxpayers they want to kill.
“Our government made a series of hasty decisions.” Guantanamo is “a misguided experiment that endangered America” and has become “a recruiting tool for Al Quaeda.” Perhaps. But for the opposite reason Obama suggests. America is endangered because our overly benevolent treatment of those who want to kill us is seen as weakness. There is no good reason to close Guantanamo. To call it a national embarrassment is an act of sickening cowardice in the face of unfounded ‘touchy-feely’ criticism and unconscionable moral timidity.
Is philosophy irrelevant to daily life? Here is the mind-body dichotomy—the quasi-religious view that the spiritual is inherently cut off from and in conflict with the physical world—rearing its ugly head in governmental policy, working to undermine human survival. We can be thankful to have a President who is not held hostage by an archaic, anti-life, evangelical perspective, but unfortunately many of his policies reflect the exact same religious base as his predecessor.
There is no conflict between moral values and the real world—the whole purpose of values is to sustain human life. A divine perspective on moral values enables evil to use your values against you, because religion drops the context that it is life which makes the concept of values meaningful. Ayn Rand called it the principle of “The Sanction of the Victim.”
The national media seem quite impressed with the emperor’s new clothes. If only it was just the emperor who was naked. And not the brazen weakness of America’s national security.
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