KGB Thug Lectures Home Of The Free
It seems that new each day brings our beloved country yet another humiliation. Today Vladimir Putin, a former KGB thug who oversaw the mass murderers of Chechnya, a Russian autocrat still seething from the collapse of the Soviet Union, took to the pages of the New York Times to lecture the American people on what our proper attitude should be about our country and the world.
Back when America was the leader of the free world and we had an honorable president worthy of the office he held, Ronald Reagan would regularly go over the heads of the commissars in Moscow to remind the Russian people that liberty was their birthright too.
Reagan inspired them and the enslaved people of Eastern Europe to throw off the dead hand of their communist masters. They listened. And prayed. And marched. Walls fell. Tyrants were deposed.
Today Vladimir Putin, a walking dead zombie of the "evil empire" that Reagan helped to vanquish and Obama's new "partner" in the Middle East, without any shame or embarrassment presumes to lecture us in the pages of the Times about American exceptionalism and even about God.
"It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation," wrote Putin.
What is truly dangerous is when dictatorial states like the former Soviet Union convince their people that they are just slaves for the state to exploit, that their labor belongs to the state, that their money belongs to the state, that the state will give them what it thinks they deserve, and that no one dare excel because under socialism everyone is equally miserable.
Will Obama defend the idea of American exceptionalism from this attack by a moral midget who formed his values in the KGB? He might try out of political expediency, but it would be half-hearted and ineffective. Obama doesn't really believe in American exceptionalism either -- he believes in shrinking us, not elevating us as a "shining city upon a hill."
Traveling in Europe in 2009, Obama was asked if he believed in American exceptionalism. "I believe in American exceptionalism," Obama replied. So far so good. Then he continued, "Just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism, and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."
In other words, if everyone's special then nobody is special, including America.
America IS an exceptional country, not because of our military strength or our GNP. We are exceptional because America is the first country founded on the idea that human dignity and liberty come from God, not government. Our Founders believed, as do I, that America was forged with help from the hand of Providence.
Most of us in my generation grew up being taught that the happy "coincidences" of our founding -- the improbable military victories, the extraordinary surplus of leaders and heroes -- were gifts from the God of Abraham, not a cosmic accident.
Our first president chose to take the oath of office on the Bible. In his first inaugural address, George Washington praised the "invisible hand" of God for the creation of the United States of America. Successive presidents have concluded that America had a particular burden to advance liberty -- first to correct the shame of slavery and then to uphold the banner of liberty around the world.
That is why Winston Churchill, as horrified as he was by the attack on Pearl Harbor, wrote in his diary that after learning of the attack he "went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful." Churchill knew that with America fully in the war, and our people armed with moral courage engaged on the field of battle, Hitler and the Japanese warlords were doomed.
Ronald Reagan was a great believer in American exceptionalism. He said we had a "rendezvous with destiny," and spoke often of this nation as a "shining city upon a hill." Reagan's faith in America and the goodness of its people lifted the country from the malaise of the Carter years to victory in the Cold War.
Sadly, most of our elites and many of our fellow Americans appear to be losing confidence in who we are. To survive, I believe we must be devoted to ordered liberty under God.
Liberal Media Bashes Obama
Recent events have even members of the liberal media criticizing Obama's lack of leadership. Ron Fournier of National Journal described Obama's Syria performance this way: "The good news is we're not at war. The bad news is almost everything else… the fumbling and flip-flopping and marble-mouthing -- undercut his credibility, and possibly with it his ability to lead the nation and world."
One Democratic operative admitted to Fournier that, "This has been one of the most humiliating episodes in presidential history."
Of Obama's "leadership," the Washington Post's Dana Milbank wrote: "Obama's leadership … can most charitably be described as subtle. …so subtle that he sometimes appears to be a bystander."
And the New York Times' Maureen Dowd was downright scathing, writing that Putin "moved to neuter" Obama and Kerry. She lambasted Obama's "flip-flopping, ambivalent leadership," blasted Kerry's "bumbling," and described Obama's "fig leaf of force" against Syria as "mindfully uncertain."
Bikers vs. Muslims
These are challenging times. But those of us who believe that America remains the last, best of hope of man on earth should be encouraged by the results of two rallies.
A coalition of left-wing organizations and Islamists attempted to pull off a "million Muslim march" on Washington yesterday. Yes, you read that right -- a "million Muslim march" in Washington on the anniversary of 9/11. It was a total flop. About two dozen people showed up.
A group of patriots organized the "Two Million Bikers" rally as a protest. The name was a tongue-in-cheek response. They never intended to get 2 million bikers to Washington. But thousands of patriots did show up and their presence made quite an impression!