President Obama took time out from his busy social schedule to present a statement Wednesday afternoon on the ISIS (or ISIL) beheading of a kidnapped American photojournalist. It was unsurprisingly full of empty rhetoric without any reference to action.
He began by announcing that “the entire world is appalled” by the murder of James Wright Foley – or as Obama referred to him repeatedly and familiarly, “Jim” (this has to be the first speech by Obama in which he referred to someone else more often than himself). Foley’s murder was “an act of violence that shocks the conscience of the entire world.” I don’t believe the President of the United States is authorized to speak for the entire world, but in any case there is a significant portion of the world that not only wasn’t shocked but has no conscience about the butchering of infidels, and that’s the problem that needs to be addressed.
But first, Obama eulogized Foley: “Jim was a journalist, a son, a brother, and a friend.” Such an intimate, even maudlin statement would be entirely suitable among friends and relatives at a funeral service but is frankly unworthy of a presidential announcement to the world. But Obama wasn’t done expressing his unconvincing grief: “All of us feel the ache of his absence. All of us mourn his loss.” Apparently Obama mourns by heading straight to the links for another round of golf, because that’s what he did immediately after he delivered this statement.
“We keep in our prayers those other Americans who are separated from their families,” he continued. Like U.S. Marine Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi, who remains jailed in Mexico and has been separated from his family since late March? Keeping him in one’s prayers is a nice gesture but is no substitute for the President of the United States actually lifting a finger to bring that Marine home, something Obama hasn’t done.
He moved on to address the monsters behind Foley’s beheading and countless other sick atrocities. “Let’s be clear about ISIL,” said Obama, although we know by now that anytime Obama declares that he’s going to be clear about something, he’s just posturing at sounding authoritative. He acknowledged that “they have rampaged across cities and villages, killing innocent, unarmed civilians in cowardly acts of violence. They abduct women and children, and subject them to torture and rape and slavery.” Then he purposefully notes that they have murdered Muslims by the thousands and “target Christians and religious minorities, driving them from their homes, murdering them when they can for no other reason than they practice a different religion.”
Yes – a religion different from Islam, but Obama didn’t make that connection. Instead, he declared that “ISIL speaks for no religion.” No? The Islamic State speaks for no religion? “Their victims are overwhelmingly Muslim, and no faith teaches people to massacre innocents.” His language here is disingenuous, because of course Muslim fundamentalists have a different definition of “innocent” from ours, and they have never had a problem slaughtering less orthodox Muslims. “No just God would stand for what they did yesterday… ISIL has no ideology of any value to human beings.”
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/mark-tapson/obama-delivers-empty-rhetoric-about-isis/
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