Former CIA agent Michael Scheuer spares neither Bush nor Obama in this hard-to-argue-with assessment of President Obama's decision to remove "harsh interrogations" from that diminishing set of tools we use to protect our children from the grisly deaths that Islamic terrorists have in store for them:
Americans should be clear on what Obama has done. In a breathtaking display of self-righteousness and intellectual arrogance, the president told Americans that his personal beliefs are more important than protecting their country, their homes and their families. The interrogation techniques in question, the president asserted, are a sign that Americans have lost their "moral compass," a compliment similar to Attorney General Eric Holder's identifying them as "moral cowards."
Mulling Obama's claim, one can wonder what could be more moral for a president than doing all that is needed to defend America and its citizens? Or, asked another way, is it moral for the president of the United States to abandon intelligence tools that have saved the lives and property of Americans and their allies in favor of his own ideological beliefs?
Before enthroning Obama's personal morality as U.S. defense policy, of course, some dirty work had to be done. Last Sunday, Obama's hit man and White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel led the charge by telling the American people that the interrogation techniques are a major recruiting tool for al-Qaeda and its Islamist partners. Well, no, Mr. Emanuel, that is not at all the case. The techniques surely are not popular with our foes and their supporters -- should that be a concern in any event? -- but they do not even make the Islamists' hit parade of anti-U.S. recruiting tools. That list is headed by Washington's support for Arab tyrannies in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, its presence on the Arabian Peninsula and its unqualified support for Israel.
Still, Emanuel's statement surely sounded plausible to Americans who have received no education about our Islamist enemy's true motivation from Obama, George W. Bush, Clinton or George H.W. Bush.
True enough. It's ironic that among the favorite complaints of the Left about the religious Right is that they seek to impose their morality upon the rest of us and have no business doing such a thing. Yet Obama ratchets up the danger to all Americans by imposing his moral beliefs concerning the proper treatment of terrorists, and that's evidently just fine with the Left. I guess whether shoving one's beliefs down the throats of others is acceptable or not depends on the belief and who's doing the shoving.
Read the rest of Scheuer's blistering column at the link.
RLC
