Rudy Giuliani has been taking a lot of flack for questioning whether President Obama loves America. The left and the mainstream media (pardon the redundancy) have been denouncing everyone who dares to not join in their auto-da-fé of the former mayor. And they are using the uproar to smear anyone who does not toe their party line, such as Governor Scott Walker, for transparently political reasons. This is just one more instance of why Republicans should not play the MSM’s game. When they are in this mode they are DOWBs (Democratic Operatives With Bylines) and should be treated as such—and called out as such—with the contempt they deserve for prostituting their profession.
But is it unreasonable to have doubts about the president’s love for this country?
The president is on record as saying he’s a Christian and so most people simply accept the assertion. To be sure, it’s not exactly unprecedented for people to say things that aren’t true (ask Brian Williams), and one can only wonder how many of the tenets of the Nicene Creed Obama actually takes seriously. But because we are not given the power to see into other men’s souls, we accept his assertion and move on.
But has he ever said he loves this country? Perhaps, especially as a prelude to criticizing it for some lapse from perfection, but I don’t know of an instance. He is very much on record as denying American exceptionalism, which is pretty startling for the head of state of a country as exceptional as this country actually is (a topic for another post).
He has openly expressed his contempt for tens of millions of his fellow citizens who are not part of the liberal intellectual and financial establishment, mocking them for clinging to “God and guns,” which is a pretty startling statement for a Christian.
And he is the only head of state in all human history, as far as I know, and I know a fair amount about history, whose core foreign-policy operative principle has been to diminish the power and influence of the country he heads. He wants to lead from behind if we lead at all, and he clearly thinks that America is more often a part of the problem than a part of the solution.
So perhaps he loves this country and perhaps he doesn’t. He reminds me of the sort of parents who say they love their children, but only criticize them, while holding other children up as examples to be emulated. Parents like this, when their children are grown-up, wonder why they never come to visit them. They don’t understand that love is a two-way street. As someone who aspires to be a “world transformative figure,” Obama might want to consider that. But I doubt he will.
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