President Obama, in his long-promised address to the Muslims given Thursday in Egypt, embraced Islam, gave a green light to Iran’s nuclear program, and said that the “trauma” of 9-11 led America to act contrary to its ideals.
In 6000 words, the president managed to prove that everything conservatives worried about - his naivete, lack of expertise and belief in moral equivalency - was correct and even understated.
The Commander-in-Chief described his view of America’s relationship to Islam and his own responsibility:
“I consider it part of my responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear,” Obama said. He continued, “So let there be no doubt: Islam is a part of America. And I believe that America holds within her the truth that regardless of race, religion, or station in life, all of us share common aspirations - to live in peace and security; to get an education and to work with dignity; to love our families, our communities, and our God. These things we share.”
But do we really share these things? Is Islam a part of America? No. Its influence isn’t seen in the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers or, most importantly, in the Constitution. In fact, Islam - by its system of Shari’a law - sets up its own system of civil and criminal law in which church is inseparable from state. Separation of church and state are a fundamental principle without which democracy cannot exist.
Perhaps we do share with Islam a desire for peace and security, but that desire appears more clearly in the mind of our president than in the minds of the jihadists. Obama thinks of 9-11 as a trauma that caused America to react - in fear and in anger - in ways that were, to him, apparently unjustifiable and cowardly.
There was a lot of anger and fear after 9-11, and the fact that he believes we sacrificed principle to fear is not shocking to those of us who believed he would take this tack and said so during last year’s campaign.
The President of the United States has the responsibility to defend American lives, values, laws and the foundation of our government, the Constitution. But from what does he derive his responsibility to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam?
Obama quoted the Koran, the Holy Bible, and the Talmud in his speech. But the only religion Obama truly professed was internationalism: “Human history has often been a record of nations and tribes subjugating one another to serve their own interests. Yet in this new age, such attitudes are self-defeating. Given our interdependence, any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail.”
There again, he proposed no defense of America or American values: multiculturalism and multilateralism are, apparently, more important to him.
Most importantly - and most radically - Obama said, in the context of our “tension” with Iran, that no nation should be able to decide whether another can or cannot have nuclear technology.
I understand those who protest that some countries have weapons that others do not. No single nation should pick and choose which nations hold nuclear weapons. That is why I strongly reaffirmed America's commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons. And any nation - including Iran - should have the right to access peaceful nuclear power if it complies with its responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. That commitment is at the core of the Treaty, and it must be kept for all who fully abide by it. And I am hopeful that all countries in the region can share in this goal.
This is a nuclear policy worthy of the late John Lennon: imagine there are no nations, no nuclear weapons, no war. Obama’s view of nuclear weapons is so utopian, so dream-oriented, it belies any understanding of the realities that have faced the world since World War II.
Every American administration since 1981 - when Iran’s nuclear weapons program first became obvious - has said that Iran must be denied nuclear weapons. Before Thursday, even Obama said that. But now, that too is apparently overboard. Or under the bus, with our ally Israel.
Obama said the people of Israel deserve peace, but he also said, “America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.”
In other words, whether they give up terrorism or not, Palestinians will get their own state. Unlike Reagan at the Berlin Wall, Obama didn’t call out the real problems: the terrorist organization Hamas, which by election now governs the Palestinians in Gaza. How Israel is supposed to negotiate peace with Hamas - whose only mission is to destroy Israel - is not obvious. And of the two, Obama chose to throw under the bus the only reliable ally we have in the Middle East - Israel.
What Obama has done is to remove the protective American umbrella over Israel and make Israeli military action against Iran a certainty. Many people - both Israeli and Iranian - will die because of Obama’s acceptance of the Iranian nuclear program’s legitimacy.
There are those who believe that Obama’s speech was an overdue break with the Israel - and its lobby in the U.S., AIPAC - that they despise so deeply. Some conservatives think that Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu will be “broken” by Obama’s action. But they are comprehensively wrong, blinded by their hatred for the Jewish state.
Netanyahu will be strengthened, and propelled to war by Obama’s speech. Any restraining influence had on Israel was trash-canned in Cairo.
Obama’s statement that Iran has the right to “peaceful” nuclear development to be enforced, I suppose, by the U.N.’s purblind nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, is tantamount to saying America will accept a nuclear-armed Iran because there is no way for us to tell the difference until it’s too late.
As HUMAN EVENTS’ Rowan Scarborough reported on May 21, our intelligence on Iran’s nuclear weapons program is too thin to even base a strategy on. The 2007 National Intelligence Estimate that said Iran stopped its program in 2003 has been thoroughly discredited, but we lack better intelligence to say what is going on where. And Iran has again, since about 1981 - lied to the U.N. and the world about its nuclear program.
To accept, as Obama did, the Iranian nuclear program’s legitimacy is to accept a nuclear armed Iran.
Israel now cannot rely on American diplomatic help to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran. Its own diplomacy will have no effect whatever. Israel is left with only the military option, which it will pursue, probably this year.
For someone so intent on making everyone like him, Obama should realize that choosing to court one often means spurning another.
And when you try to be all things to all people, you end up being nothing to anyone except a danger to those you have a duty to defend, and America’s allies and interests abroad.
