Giuliania plain wrong about Obama
We are surely blessed to be citizens of the greatest country on earth.
President Barack Obama, Sept. 6, 2012
Oh Rudy!
“America’s Mayor,” Rudy Giuliani, thinks he knows President Obama better than Obama knows himself.
Rudy’s wrong. Come to think of it, he’s really no longer “America’s Mayor.” He’s becoming “America’s Fool.”
Two weeks ago Giuliani blurted out, “I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe the president loves America.”
JULY 28TH, 2008 – “I know how much I love America.” – Sen. Barack Obama, presidential campaign speech in Berlin, Germany.
Giuliani’s self-inflicted rhetorical error ignited a firestorm of criticism across America’s political landscape.
Giuliani isn’t stupid. He knew he’d gone too far. The next morning he rushed to Fox News to “clarify” his previous day’s statements.
“I’m not questioning his patriotism. He’s a patriot, I’m sure,” Giuliani told Fox & Friends, ignoring the fact that a person who doesn’t love their country, by definition, couldn’t be a “patriot.”
AUGUST 28TH, 2008 – “So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this country…and so does John McCain.” – Sen. Barack Obama during a presidential campaign speech.
With a Fox News audience hanging on every one of Giuliani’s ill-conceived words, he continued to attack Obama’s supposed antipathy toward America.
“To say, as the president has, that American exceptionalism is no more exceptional than the exceptionalism of any other country in the world, does not suggest a becoming and endearing modesty, but rather a stark lack of moral clarity,” Giuliani claimed in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. That’s an oft-repeated, oft-refuted claim. In fact, the fact-checker politifact.com rates Giuliani’s statement FALSE.
Here’s why.
MAY 28TH, 2014 – “I believe in American exceptionalism, with every fiber of my being.” – President Obama, during a speech on foreign policy at West Point.
Giuliani blindly waded into this muck without bothering to listen anything the president has really said about his love for the country.
He, like many Republicans on the right wing fringe, always return to Obama’s childhood, as proof he secretly wants to transform the United States into Kenya.
“He wasn’t brought up the way you were brought up through love of this country,” Giuliani told that group of Republican bigwigs on Feb. 17.
For the record, Obama was mostly raised by a grandfather who served with merit during WWII. Obama’s uncle helped liberate Buchenwald.
By contrast, Giuliani’s father served time in Sing Sing, after he held up a Harlem milkman, while he was described as the “bat-wielding” enforcer for his brother’s bar. Rudy’s father, and his five brothers avoided service during WWII.
But Giuliani’s self-generated contempt for Obama has done more than reveal him as a crotchety old former-mayor with an ax to grind. It’s caused his fellow Republicans to veer from their serious critiques of the president’s handling of foreign policy.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who appears to be in the early stages of his run for the presidency, sat nearby when Giuliani made his initial statements.
He was later asked if he thinks the president loves America.
“I’ve never asked the President, so I don’t really know what his opinions are on that one way or another,” he told a reporter.
He punted.
He did that same thing a few weeks ago when he was asked if he believes in evolution. “For me, I’m going to punt on that one,” he said
America’s voters don’t want punters. They want quarterbacks. They support presidential candidates who’ll stand up for what they believe – no matter how controversial – like, well, Obamacare.
By comparison, Louisiana’s Republican Gov., Bobby Jindal, another possible presidential candidate, might have tried to punt when he was asked if the president loves America.
He agreed with the “gist” of Giuliani’s controversial statements, and he also added, “If you are looking for someone to condemn the mayor, look elsewhere.”
Jindal has exhorted Republicans to avoid using inflammatory remarks, and to stop being the “stupid party.”
What’s the “stupid party?”
Instead of agreeing with Giuliani, Jindal should use him as Exhibit “A”.
Edward A. Owens is a three time Emmy Award winner and 20 year veteran of television news. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net