Tag Archives: speech

Cheney Strikes at the Yellow Underbelly of Belly-aching Obama

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President Obama, by his actions to date, has left the U.S.A. weakened.  He has handed terrorists information that can help them better prepare their trained operatives to attack us and hold out when interrogated.

First, I banned the use of so-called enhanced interrogation techniques by the United States of America.

I know some have argued that brutal methods like water-boarding were necessary to keep us safe. I could not disagree more. As Commander-in-Chief, I see the intelligence, I bear responsibility for keeping this country safe, and I reject the assertion that these are the most effective means of interrogation. What’s more, they undermine the rule of law. They alienate us in the world. They serve as a recruitment tool for terrorists, and increase the will of our enemies to fight us, while decreasing the will of others to work with America. They risk the lives of our troops by making it less likely that others will surrender to them in battle, and more likely that Americans will be mistreated if they are captured. In short, they did not advance our war and counter-terrorism efforts – they undermined them, and that is why I ended them once and for all.

Still without a Gitmo plan, Obama claims high moral ground for himself while playing to the camera and Europe, who as Charles Krauthammer has pointed out has been sucking on the American teet for 60 years.  Personally, in defending my country both morally and ethically,  I’d rather see a machine gun on that high ground than pretentious rhetoric.  Mich McConnell says what we need is a plan not another speech.  No mention from Obama of a plan.

Michelle Malkin calls it Dueling Banjos and Politico writes:

In a remarkable split-screen presentation of opposing worldviews, former Vice President Dick Cheney spoke across town moments later, saying he supported the controversial policies “when they were made, and without hesitation would do so again in the same circumstances.”

“The point is not to look backward,” Cheney said. “A lot rides on our President’s understanding of the security policies that preceded him. And whatever choices he makes concerning the defense of this country, those choices should not be based on slogans and campaign rhetoric, but on a truthful telling of history.”

Dick Cheney in response to Obama’s speech struck at the yellow underbelly of belly-aching and defended the defenders of this country after 9/11.  (Obama still doesn’t seem or won’t admit this country was kept safe on President Bush’s watch.)  Cheney astutely and pointedly argued from a position of experience and knowing our country’s need for expediency at the time of 9/11;

“To the very end of our administration, we kept al-Qaeda terrorists busy with other problems. We focused on getting their secrets, instead of sharing ours with them. And on our watch, they never hit this country again. After the most lethal and devastating terrorist attack ever, seven and a half years without a repeat is not a record to be rebuked and scorned, much less criminalized. It is a record to be continued until the danger has passed.”

Obama for his part argued that water-boarding and other harsh interrogation methods “did not advance our war and counter-terrorism efforts – they undermined them.”

“I was and remain a strong proponent of our enhanced interrogation program. The interrogations were used on hardened terrorists after other efforts failed,” Cheney said during a speech at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

“They were legal, essential, justified, successful, and the right thing to do. The intelligence officers who questioned the terrorists can be proud of their work and proud of the results, because they prevented the violent death of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocent people.”

Cheney noted that Obama has reserved enhanced interrogation unto himself:

This might explain why President Obama has reserved unto himself the right to order the use of enhanced interrogation should he deem it appropriate. What value remains to that authority is debatable, given that the enemy now knows exactly what interrogation methods to train against, and which ones not to worry about. Yet having reserved for himself the authority to order enhanced interrogation after an emergency, you would think that President Obama would be less disdainful of what his predecessor authorized after 9/11. It’s almost gone unnoticed that the president has retained the power to order the same methods in the same circumstances. When they talk about interrogations, he and his administration speak as if they have resolved some great moral dilemma in how to extract critical information from terrorists. Instead they have put the decision off, while assigning a presumption of moral superiority to any decision they make in the future.

Missing words, addressed my Cheney:

President Obama’s own Director of National Intelligence, Admiral Blair, has put it this way: “High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al-Qaeda organization that was attacking this country.” End quote. Admiral Blair put that conclusion in writing, only to see it mysteriously deleted in a later version released by the administration – the missing 26 words that tell an inconvenient truth. But they couldn’t change the words of George Tenet, the CIA Director under Presidents Clinton and Bush, who bluntly said: “I know that this program has saved lives. I know we’ve disrupted plots. I know this program alone is worth more than the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency put together have been able to tell us.”

This is a curious administration – in love with America’s power and seizing it, while demeaning America before the world for Obama’s own aggrandizement as though morality began with his administration.  Most countries on earth owe this country a debt of gratitude, which they can never repay; just as our citizens can never repay the men who defended this country with their limbs and lives.  The Ivory Tower academic community organizer in the White House has yet to appreciate his country’s real history as told my the blood of it’s builders and martyrs.

More from:

Sam Stein in the Huffington Post : A Civil Libertarian rips Obama’s Speech: All Bells and Whistles

“Obviously, he is a very effective speaker, but of course we have major problems with what he is doing,” said Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “He wraps himself in the Constitution, talks about American values and then proceeds to violate them.”

Allah Pundit, “In a fight against terrorism, there is no middle ground.”

Conservative Nation

Karl Rove: Flip-flops and Governance-WSJ

Notre Dame- “Intellectual Vanity”- Archbishop Chaput

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Archbishop Chaput on Notre Dame – “Notre Dame’s leadership has done a real disservice to the Church.”


“I have found that even among those who did not go to Notre Dame, even among those who do not share the Catholic faith, there is a special expectation, a special hope, for what Notre Dame can accomplish in the world.”
~ Reverend John Jenkins, C.S.C., May 17, 2009

Most graduation speeches are a mix of piety and optimism designed to ease students smoothly into real life. The best have humor. Some genuinely inspire. But only a rare few manage to be pious, optimistic, evasive, sad and damaging all at the same time. Father John Jenkins, C.S.C., Notre Dame’s president, is a man of substantial intellect and ability. This makes his introductory comments to President Obama’s Notre Dame commencement speech on May 17 all the more embarrassing.

Let’s remember that the debate over President Obama’s appearance at Notre Dame was never about whether he is a good or bad man. The president is clearly a sincere and able man. By his own words, religion has had a major influence in his life. We owe him the respect Scripture calls us to show all public officials. We have a duty to pray for his wisdom and for the success of his service to the common good — insofar as it is guided by right moral reasoning.

We also have the duty to oppose him when he’s wrong on foundational issues like abortion, embryonic stem cell research and similar matters. And we also have the duty to avoid prostituting our Catholic identity by appeals to phony dialogue that mask an abdication of our moral witness. Notre Dame did not merely invite the president to speak at its commencement. It also conferred an unnecessary and unearned honorary law degree on a man committed to upholding one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in our nation’s history: Roe v. Wade.

In doing so, Notre Dame ignored the U.S. bishops’ guidance in their 2004 statement, Catholics in Political Life. It ignored the concerns of Ambassador Mary Ann Glendon, Notre Dame’s 2009 Laetare Medal honoree – who, unlike the president, certainly did deserve her award, but finally declined it in frustration with the university’s action. It ignored appeals from the university’s local bishop, the president of the U.S. Catholic bishops’ conference, more than 70 other bishops, many thousands of Notre Dame alumni and hundreds of thousands of other American Catholics. Even here in Colorado, I’ve heard from too many to count.

There was no excuse – none, except intellectual vanity – for the university to persist in its course. And Father Jenkins compounded a bad original decision with evasive and disingenuous explanations to subsequently justify it.

These are hard words, but they’re deserved precisely because of Father Jenkins’ own remarks on May 17: Until now, American Catholics have indeed had “a special expectation, a special hope for what Notre Dame can accomplish in the world.” For many faithful Catholics – and not just a “small but vocal group” described with such inexcusable disdain and ignorance in journals like Time magazine — that changed Sunday.

The May 17 events do have some fitting irony, though. Almost exactly 25 years ago, Notre Dame provided the forum for Gov. Mario Cuomo to outline the “Catholic” case for “pro-choice” public service. At the time, Cuomo’s speech was hailed in the media as a masterpiece of American Catholic legal and moral reasoning. In retrospect, it’s clearly adroit. It’s also, just as clearly, an illogical and intellectually shabby exercise in the manufacture of excuses. Father Jenkins’ explanations, and President Obama’s honorary degree, are a fitting national bookend to a quarter century of softening Catholic witness in Catholic higher education. Together, they’ve given the next generation of Catholic leadership all the excuses they need to baptize their personal conveniences and ignore what it really demands to be “Catholic” in the public square.

Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George has suggested that Notre Dame “didn’t understand” what it means to be Catholic before these events began. He’s correct, and Notre Dame is hardly alone in its institutional confusion. That’s the heart of the matter. Notre Dame’s leadership has done a real disservice to the Church, and now seeks to ride out the criticism by treating it as an expression of fringe anger. But the damage remains, and Notre Dame’s critics are right. The most vital thing faithful Catholics can do now is to insist – by their words, actions and financial support – that institutions claiming to be “Catholic” actually live the faith with courage and consistency. If that happens, Notre Dame’s failure may yet do some unintended good.

Read Catholic Online for Deacon Keith Fournier’s  take on Archbishop Chaput: ‘Notre Dame, the Issues that Remain’

Obama’s Speech at Notre Dame Commencement

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This is the part of Obama’s speech at the Notre Dame commencement that I found interesting:

“But as you leave here today, remember the lessons of Cardinal Bernardin, of Father Hesburgh, of movements for change both large and small. Remember that each of us, endowed with the dignity possessed by all children of God, has the grace to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we all seek the same love of family and the same fulfillment of a life well-lived.“

Who, indeed,  do we recognize in the disturbing graphic image of an aborted child, if not ourselves?  Unfortunately, this poor one and the millions of other unknowns will never know “love of family” or “fulfillment of a life well-lived” to quote President Obama.  Known but to God, they witness to the cold reality of a heart-dead age, that now scoffs at those who protest the dying of the unborn.  The sensitivities of this Age are roused not by the reality of abortion, flesh and blood, but by images that witness to the loss of generations.  In truth, the unborn are born, but not in the way that God intended.  They are born, burned by saline, curated, crushed. They come forth without breath or cry.  We see and hear them always before us in our future reckoning.

President Obama makes pretty speeches that belie the horror underlying benign sounding words such as Choice.

For pithy Michelle Malkin has the pithiest summation by Greg Mueller.


Obama’s Record Speaks for Itself

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Mixed messages will fly during these days of commencement flurry. Who is Notre Dame honoring?

Michelle Malkin sees a showdown in the making. I would perfer heavenly intervention (thunder and lightening would do.) I would be glad to settle for Catholics being Catholics. What are the chances?

President  Obama will give a speech in which his “gift” of gab will leave both sides of the Life issue thinking he gave them something.  In the end, for every 23 seconds of Obama’s speech, a human being will have died by abortion without audacious HOPE or  CHOICE.

Pope Patient Facing Misunderstanding,Prejudice

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Pope Benedict XVI is a man of patience and hope. God gave the Catholic Church one more giant in the face of mediocrity and meanness from those who look for reasons to find fault where there is none.  Rather than build for a future that supports true peace between men called to live as children of the One God of Abraham, some chose nitpicking.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office, responded to criticism in the Israeli press that in part misrepresented the Pope’s obligatory enrollment in the Hitler Youth during the war (clarified by the Pope in his book “Salt of the Earth”and also for using the word “killed” in his address at Yad Vashem instead of “murdered” and  the word “millions” (of Jews) instead of “six million.” The Pope had already referred to “six million Jews” in an earlier address on his arrival that day.

Zenit reports that Fr. Lombardi pointed out that the speech was not a treatise on the Holocaust and noted other discourses where the Pope has mentioned Germany and his past, and Nazism.

“Moreover in the morning, he had already said that six million Jews died and that we can’t forget, and that there is still anti-Semitism,” the spokesman said, referring to the Holy Father’s first address in Israel at the Tel Aviv airport, delivered just hours before his visit to the Yad Vashem.

Father Lombardi commented that Benedict XVI does not get offended when the press alters or takes issue with his words.

“He does not react superficially or immediately,” the spokesman said. “He is very patient and is ready to listen to the others — everyone can voice their ideas. It’s true, he feels that he has not been understood, and I feel the same, but we know how the world is and how attitudes are. There is not always a willingness to understand well; sometimes there are prejudices and not everyone is open to an attitude of readiness to listen.

The Unity of the Entire Human Family

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ADDRESS OF POPE BENEDICT XVI

DOME OF THE ROCK JERUSALEM

12 MAY 2009

Dear Muslim Friends, As-salámu ‘aláikum! Peace upon you! I cordially thank the Grand Mufti, Muhammad Ahmad Hussein, together with the Director of the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, Sheikh Mohammed Azzam al-Khatib al-Tamimi, and the Head of the Awquaf Council, Sheikh Abdel Azim Salhab, for the welcome they have extended to me on your behalf. I am deeply grateful for the invitation to visit this sacred place, and I willingly pay my respects to you and the leaders of the Islamic community in Jerusalem. The Dome of the Rock draws our hearts and minds to reflect upon the mystery of creation and the faith of Abraham. Here the paths of the world’s three great monotheistic religions meet, reminding us what they share in common. Each believes in One God, creator and ruler of all. Each recognizes Abraham as a forefather, a man of faith upon whom God bestowed a special blessing. Each has gained a large following throughout the centuries and inspired a rich spiritual, intellectual and cultural patrimony. In a world sadly torn by divisions, this sacred place serves as a stimulus, and also challenges men and women of goodwill to work to overcome misunderstandings and conflicts of the past and to set out on the path of a sincere dialogue aimed at building a world of justice and peace for coming generations. Since the teachings of religious traditions ultimately concern the reality of God, the meaning of life, and the common destiny of mankind – that is to say, all that is most sacred and dear to us – there may be a temptation to engage in such dialogue with reluctance or ambivalence about its possibilities for success. Yet we can begin with the belief that the One God is the infinite source of justice and mercy, since in him the two exist in perfect unity. Those who confess his name are entrusted with the task of striving tirelessly for righteousness while imitating his forgiveness, for both are intrinsically oriented to the peaceful and harmonious coexistence of the human family. For this reason, it is paramount that those who adore the One God should show themselves to be both grounded in and directed towards the unity of the entire human family. In other words, fidelity to the One God, the Creator, the Most High, leads to the recognition that human beings are fundamentally interrelated, since all owe their very existence to a single source and are pointed towards a common goal. Imprinted with the indelible image of the divine, they are called to play an active role in mending divisions and promoting human solidarity. This places a grave responsibility upon us. Those who honor the One God believe that he will hold human beings accountable for their actions. Christians assert that the divine gifts of reason and freedom stand at the basis of this accountability. Reason opens the mind to grasp the shared nature and common destiny of the human family, while freedom moves the heart to accept the other and serve him in charity. Undivided love for the One God and charity towards ones neighbor thus become the fulcrum around which all else turns. This is why we work untiringly to safeguard human hearts from hatred, anger or vengeance. Dear friends, I have come to Jerusalem on a journey of faith. I thank God for this occasion to meet you as the Bishop of Rome and Successor of the Apostle Peter, but also as a child of Abraham, by whom “all the families of the earth find blessing” (Gen 12:3; cf. Rom 4:16-17). I assure you of the Church’s ardent desire to cooperate for the well-being of the human family. She firmly believes that the fulfillment of the promise made to Abraham is universal in scope, embracing all men and women regardless of provenance or social status. As Muslims and Christians further the respectful dialogue they have already begun, I pray that they will explore how the Oneness of God is inextricably tied to the unity of the human family. In submitting to his loving plan for creation, in studying the law inscribed in the cosmos and implanted in the human heart, in reflecting upon the mysterious gift of God’s self-revelation, may all his followers continue to keep their gaze fixed on his absolute goodness, never losing sight of the way it is reflected in the faces of others. With these thoughts, I humbly ask the Almighty to grant you peace and to bless all the beloved people of this region. May we strive to live in a spirit of harmony and cooperation, bearing witness to the One God by generously serving one another. Thank you!