Grade Obama’s Cairo Speech

Today’s speech by an American president in an Arab capital was different from all previous ones in one particular fashion. To alter Marshall McLuhan’s famous dictum, the man is the message. Many have mocked Barack Obama’s considerable self-regard, but his private history–much documented and bizarrely twisted, if not debated, during the campaign–clearly embodies the opportunity for Arab leaders and citizens to listen. Perhaps not to trust. Perhaps not to act. But, surely, to listen. That, for me, might constitute the “new beginning.”

The forthright, scrupulous, and candid presentation of his argument was remarkably fresh. That, more than anything else, defines the president’s evolving moral authority, namely, the equitable discussion of reality. As in the Philadelphia race speech and the Notre Dame commencement speech, Obama makes a full accounting of grievances from many sides and shows a sensitivity to the many interpretations of the roots of those grievances. He acknowledges what few have in the past, that what is said in private is seldom expressed in public. That holds true in backyards in Haifa, in Gaza, and in Riyadh as much as it does in the backyards in Birmingham, Charlestown, or the four neighborhood quadrants of Washington, DC. Perhaps until now.

Whether it’ll lead to less war or even more peace in the Middle East remains to be seen, but speaking truth from power as well as to power…that’s leadership. In a region in which intransigent issue after intransigent issue has long been stalemated and mired, that leadership coupled with the president’s unique private history could create a climate for renewed dialogue at least. At least, perhaps, that. And if the president has engendered an openness to listen in the Middle East, that could prove the great breakthrough of today’s speech.

And yet in the Middle East, the “and yets” pile up.

Not for doubting the president’s oratorical capacity, however, nor for expecting that his own mind and frames of argumentation wouldn’t have a large imprint over the speech–it’s been reported that he wrote much of it–my anticipation for the speech was pessimistic. I feared he’d essentially say what every American president in recent memory has said, and that’s exactly what he did: that the U.S. is not embattled with Islam, that America respects Islam, that only a small band of extremists impede peace, that democracy must be earned and not forced, that Israel must exist, and that Palestinians must be freed from occupation. He said all of this–so did President Bush, as well as Clinton, Bush Sr., Reagan, Carter, and so on as far back as anyone can recall.

As I’ve been writing here recently, this is not surprising given how the Middle East community essentially sees one American foreign policy no matter who is president and from either party. That foreign view is not surprising because most of the time that’s actually the case. Today’s speech changes little in that respect and is little different. But President Obama might himself be the catalyst for new respect and an actual difference.

This post originally appeared on Politico

Tortured, Round 2

 

Cesar Conda

Republican strategist, former Romney and Cheney advisor

 

The 9/11 National Commission report concluded that both Presidents Clinton and Bush were not well served by the FBI and the CIA

David, there is a big difference between the 3,000 innocent civilians who were going about their daily lives when they were slaughtered on 9/11 and the 4,924 American military men and women who bravely gave their lives to fight for our country.

Your assertion that President George W. Bush’s “pre 9/11 policies made us unsafe” and that he “is responsible for the failure before on 9/10 and prior” doesn’t square with the bipartisan 9/11 National Commission report, which concluded that both Presidents Clinton and Bush were not well served by the FBI and the CIA. According to the Commission: “What we can say with confidence is that none of the measures adopted by the U.S. government from 1998 to 2001 disturbed or even delayed the progress of the al Qaeda plot. Across the government, there were failures of imagination, policy, capabilities, and management.”

On the question of whether America is safer, the 9/11 Commission concluded: “Because of offensive actions against al Qaeda since 9/11, and defensive actions to improve homeland security, we believe we are safer today. But we are not safe.”

President George W. Bush prevented another 9/11-type of attack, and made America safer today. We are not safe because our enemies with al Qaeda are plotting every single day to kill us. I believe dismantling the Bush anti-terror policies will make us less safe. You, Maria Cardona and others do not. If you get your way, let’s hope and pray that you are right, and I am wrong.

 

 

• David Biespiel

  Poet and writer, Attic Writer’s Workshop

   

  The 9/11 Commissioners did not know what we now know

  Cesar, I don’t think we’re that far apart in fact, but perhaps so in nuance and certainly emphasis.

  Our domestic actions to prevent terrorists and our military excursion in Iraq are part of the same strategic cloth. My point about success/failure characterizations of the Bush administration did not excuse the Clinton administration but I can see how you might see it that way by my not saying so. I’ll be clear: Officials in both the Clinton and Bush administrations bear responsibility for the failures that led to 9/11. Richard Clarke, who served in both administrations, has detailed these lapses.

  The 9/11 Commissioners did not know what we now know. The 9/11 Commissioners went to lengths not to report on the relationship between American safety and the war in Iraq–and the terrorist-related consequences that the war has engendered. 

  The 9/11 Commission Report was published in July 2004, even prior to President Bush’s re-election. It wasn’t until December 2005 that the New York Times reported that the Bush administration had conducted numerous illegal–for the sake of friendly debate, allegedly illegal–warrantless searches as part of its counterterrorism initiatives. 

  The 9/11 Commissioners did not know that, in 2007, the United Nations Commission on Torture would admonish the U.S. for our “enhanced interrogation techniques” and the use of secret prisons. 

  The 9/11 Commissioners did not know about the CIA’s destruction of video tape showing prisoners being interrogated by CIA agents–though I suspect they would have excused the destruction of videotape on the grounds that the U.S. does not want other nations to prosecute our agents for potential violations of international law. 

  To the deaths of Americans, both innocent and uniformed military, I would add the 10s of thousands (some estimates have it at 90,000) Iraqis who have died as a result of violent conflict since the start of the war in 2003. Do I ascribe all of those deaths to President Bush, absolutely not. Though the shopkeeper who was killed by a hand-grenade in Faisaliyah, Mosul on March 26, 2009, did not start a preventative war–or even a preventable one. His death does not make Americans safer, at home or abroad.

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Tortured

 

Cesar Conda

Republican strategist, former Romney and Cheney advisor

 

Bush’s polices made us safe

In her response to yesterday’s Arena question about the Bush Administration’s interrogation policies, Maria Cardona  asserted that “these misguided and dreadful policies have not made us safer…” and they have only provided “fodder” to our enemies. On 9/11, our enemies killed almost 3,000 of our fellow Americans before “these misguided and dreadful policies” were ever put into place. Our enemies in Al-Qaeda don’t need additional “fodder” or motivation; their hatred for America and the freedoms America stands for is absolute.

Interestingly, when lawmakers were briefed about these tougher interrogation policies, there was bipartisan approval and encouragement for them. Apparently, the Democrats who were briefed on these interrogation policies did not view them as “misguided and dreadful.”

Cardona’s assertion that the intelligence infrastructure created after 9/11 has “not made us safer” doesn’t square with the fact that there has not been another terrorist attack on American soil. Weakening that infrastructure will make America more vulnerable. 

Finally, there is another line from “conservative hero” Ronald Reagan that we should borrow and use to guide us in today’s War on Terror: “We must have the will to meet the challenges of an adversary who is constantly testing our resolve to defend our vital national interests.”

 

• David Biespiel

  Poet and writer, Attic Writer’s Workshop

   

  More Americans have died since 9/11 than on 9/11

  Cesar, you’re right to point out the culpability that Congressional Democrats share in approving the Bush administration’s dubious interrogation policies. These Democrats may not have viewed the interrogation policies, including torture, as “misguided and dreadful,” to use Marina Cordona’s words from the other day on the Arena, but that does not mean that the Democrats’ approval wasn’t itself misguided and dreadful. 

  Both the Bush administration and its supporters overt or tacit approval of torture as an interrogation method was misguided and dreadful. 

  Be that as it may, if supporters of President Bush’s post-9/11 polices can assert that his administration made us safer, then supporters must also affirm the corollary: President Bush’s pre-9/11 policies made us unsafe. If the Bush administration is responsible for the success that’s claimed after 9/11, then it’s responsible for the failure before on 9/10 and prior. While I believe that is the case–that culpability, I do not think it is absolutely so; except for a few spectacular occasions, it’s not like the American homeland has been under attack all that much from 1812 to 2001 anyway.

  Conservatives and Republicans assert that, after 9/11, President Bush’s interrogation policies and actions generally have made us safer because, as you write, “there has not been another terrorist attack on American soil.” I’m disappointed that you make this argument because, for one thing, it’s just the mother of all debate stoppers, to borrow an expression. Why? Because no one can prove a negative. 

  Just because there’s been no attack on American soil, doesn’t confirm that we’re more safe. As you say, terrorists don’t need “fodder.” Meanwhile, Americans have not actually been safer. The 4,924 American service men and women who have been casualties in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom were not safer. (In the spirit of disclosure, I was a supporter of Operation Enduring Freedom and the creation of the Homeland Security Department; I opposed Operation Iraqi Freedom; and as I have written on the Arena and elsewhere I am willing to admit that President Bush was right to conquer Iraq when I see an Iraqi and Iranian embassy in Jerusalem and an Israeli embassy in Baghdad and Tehran.) As far as the issue of American safety is concerned, more Americans have died since 9/11 than died on 9/11.

  Finally, to assert that Americans are safer because of the Bush administration’s interrogation policies is to assert that the rule of law is less important than American safety. That’s a debate that must be had again and again, now and in the future, about the relationship between the importance of American security and the importance of abiding by American laws. It is Machiavellian to assert that torture is justifiable because it prevents further attacks against Americans or because “there has not been another terrorist attack on American soil.” 

  I should like to add something to that fine quote by President Reagan you supplied this morning. Thank you, Cesar, for posting it; I hadn’t read it before. “We must have the will to meet the challenges of an adversary who is constantly testing our resolve to defend our national interests” and we must have the resolve to make sure that those challenges do not cause us to abandon our values about the relationship between freedom and the rule of law.

  from Politico

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A Cautionary Tale: LBJ, Guns, & Butter

“How Not to End Another President’s War (L.B.J. Edition)” by Robert Dallek

from The New York Times

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