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Straight Talk ***************************************************** Please Mr. President, "We spit in their eyes and they call it dew." Remember when Nikita Khrushchev used this crude boast to describe how much he enjoyed his verbal bullying of then-American President John F. Kennedy? JFK was a heavyweight champ compared to the current occupant of the White House. Barack Obama seems intent on setting a new record of apologizing for his country to every Marxist murderer and tinhorn dictator around the world. At the recent meeting of American heads of state in Trinidad, our President sat silent while Daniel Ortega, the leftwing revolutionary who rules Nicaragua (again), delivered a diatribe blaming the United States for a century of aggression in Central America. Asked afterward what he thought of the speech, Obama replied, "I thought it was 50 minutes long." That's telling them, Mr. President. Later on, another bully boy of the left, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, handed our President an anti-American screed. The polemic was titled, "Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of the Continent." Guess who it blames for 500 years of raping and robbing our southern neighbors? After accepting the "gift," Obama was photographed laughing and joking with Senor Chavez, who once called Obama an "ignoramus," but now says he wants to be the President's "friend." What's going on here? Pat Buchanan put it very well when he said, "Thus the nation that won the Cold War, contained the cancer of Castroism in Cuba, liberated Grenada, blocked communist takeovers of Guatemala and the Dominican Republic, and poured billions in aid into this region was left undefended by its own leaders at the Summit of the Americas." Just a couple of weeks earlier, Obama was in Europe, where he apologized for this country's past arrogance to our allies there. A few days later, he was in the Middle East, where he apologized to the Muslim world for our past actions and attitudes. He was even photographed bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia. As Dorothy Rabinowitz put it in her Wall Street Journal column, "No sitting American president had ever delivered indictments of this kind while abroad, or for that matter at home, or been so ostentatiously modest about the character and accomplishment of the nation he led." The President, she said, had gone to Europe "not as the voice of his nation, but as a missionary with a message of atonement for its errors." And how was this mea culpa received? Ms. Rabinowitz notes, "Mr. Obama dazzled ecstatic Europeans with citations of the offenses against international goodwill and humanity committed by the nation he leads." What about the noble and self-sacrificing parts of our history? What about the millions of lives and billions of dollars we spent defeating Nazism and Communism? Surely there is much in our history of which we can be proud — and for which Europeans and others should be grateful. But no, not a word was said. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is matching her leader, apology for apology, as she travels around the world. As the headline in last Saturday's New York Times put it, "Clinton Scores Points by Admitting Past U.S. Errors." The Times reporter described Hillary's "contrition tour" this way: "It has become a recurring theme of Hillary Rodham Clinton's early travels as the chief diplomat of the United States: She says that American policy on a given issue has failed, and her foreign listeners fall all over themselves in gratitude." It isn't just a bunch of leftwing foreigners who delight in seeing American leaders apologize for their country. There are many here at home who also applaud every denigrating remark. To quote Ms. Rabinowitz one more time: "Five decades of teaching in colleges and universities across the land, portraying the U.S. as a power mainly responsible for injustice and evil, whose military might was ever a danger to the world — a nation built on the fruits of greed, rapacity, and racism — have had their effect." Indeed they have. Clearly, there are many people, here and abroad, who want to see the United States chastised and humbled. Many of them work in the mainstream media. Even more teach at our colleges and universities. And at least one of them sits in the Oval Office at the White House. I miss the days when Ronald Reagan spoke so proudly about our country. Don't you? This Does Deserve an Apology While Barack Obama was gallivanting around the world, apologizing for his country to everyone who would listen, back home his Department of Homeland Security issued a very disturbing report on what it called a growing domestic threat. The source of the danger? No, not Islamic jihadists. The real threat, the agency says, comes from rightwing extremists. The report bears the ominous title, "Right-wing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment." It warns of potential terrorist acts from "groups that reject federal authority in favor of state or local authority," as well as "groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration." Do you get that? According to the folks charged with keeping us safe from terrorism, it's not Islamic jihadists we have to fear. It's pro-life, anti-tax, pro-gun, anti-illegal immigration, and pro-military conservatives who pose the biggest danger. In other words, most of us! What sort of actual evidence did the department's Office of Intelligence and Analysis have for its allegations? Believe it or not, virtually none. The report acknowledges in its opening pages that there is "no specific information that domestic rightwing terrorists are currently planning acts of violence." The report's most offensive intimation is that veterans returning from the battlefield might be susceptible to "recruitment and radicalization" by rightwing terrorists, especially if they are "disgruntled, disillusioned, or suffering from the psychological effects of war." What about the very real threat of terrorist acts from sleeper cells of Al Qaeda planted in this country? Or the Muslim radicalization that is taking place in American prisons and mosques? The report says not a word. Or what about criminal activities by leftwing agitators? How about going after the radical animal rights groups that bomb medical labs and threaten researchers with violence? Or the homosexual activists who attacked churches in California after voters passed Proposition 8 there, to defend traditional marriage? Or the anarchists and communists who stormed the streets of Minneapolis during the Republican National Convention last year? Yes, there are criminal activists at work in this country. But very few of them are to be found on the right. By the way, it's not just conservatives who were offended by this report. Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), who is chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he was "dumbfounded" by some of the allegations. He sent a letter to DHS, stating that the report "blurred the line" between extremism and freedom of speech. And he added that he was "disappointed and surprised that the department would allow this report to be disseminated." David Rehbein, the National Commander of the American Legion, was even more outraged. He sent a letter to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, blasting the report as "politically biased." He closed his letter by declaring, "I think it is important for all of us to remember that Americans are not the enemy. The terrorists are." Faced with all this outrage over her agency's report, Secretary Napolitano decided to beat a hasty retreat. Appearing on Fox News, she said, "To the extent veterans read it as an accusation, an apology is owed." Hey, Madam Secretary, that's a pretty mealy-mouthed attempt at an apology. If you really want to appear contrite, take a lesson from your boss. There's a guy who knows how to grovel. This Week in History Sad to say, the bad guys made more headlines in history this week than the good ones. Let's start with April 20, 1889, when a particularly heinous character named Adolf Hitler came into the world. As the world knows to its sorrow, he went on to become one of the most murderous tyrants in history. Strangely enough, although Hitler was a left-wing extremist (the very name of his movement, Nazi, is a contraction for "national socialism") somehow the left has managed to turn the word into a pejorative against the right. It sure is easier to sell a lie when you dominate the mass media, isn't it? (Not to mention most seats of higher leaning … er, learning.) If I had a buck for every time my colleagues and I have been called Nazis or fascists, why … I'd buy a lot more gold. More than 100 years after Hitler's birth, two demented high school students in Littleton, Colorado chose the anniversary of their hero's birth to conduct the Columbine High School massacre. The day before Hitler's birthday hasn't been great, either. It was on April 19, 1993 that Attorney General Janet Reno ordered the slaughter to begin at a religious retreat in Waco, Texas. Two years later, on April 19, 1995, Timothy McVey (and comrades?) blew up a government office building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. If we make it to the weekend without another fearsome incident somewhere, let's give thanks. Until next time, keep some powder dry. ************************************************* Straight Talk is a weekly commentary written by Chip Wood. For many years Chip was the host of an award-winning radio talk show in Atlanta, Georgia. He is the founder of Soundview Publications and serves as an MC at several investment conferences. His weekly rants and raves are free for the asking at www.straighttalkletter.com. Copyright 2009 Soundview Communications, Inc. To ask a question or to comment on something you've read in Straight Talk, please write to Chip@StraightTalkLetter.com We have a strict anti-spam policy. We know how important your privacy is to you. That's
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