I just finished listening to the president address the nation on the Christmas bombing, and unfortunately, it was about what I thought it would be...with one exception.
The President actually got through a speech without blaming his predecessor and believe it or not uttered the phrase 'ultimately, the buck stops with me'. I almost fell over.
Obama acknowledged that this was 'systemic failure' and pledged a "a continued and sustained" effort to improve intelligence gathering and security screenings at airport.
Obama claimed he has ordered officials to act more quickly and decisively in adding terrorist suspects to no-fly lists and collating evidence that could lead to an attack.That was the first part of the speech.
The last part of the speech was, to be blunt, problematic and could have been vetted by CAIR. Obama stressed that the nation is "at war" with al-Qaeda, which once again shows he has no idea what we're up against, especially when he made a point of emphasizing the contributions of our Arab partners...many of whom sponsor, fund, and support jihad terrorism as long as its not directed against their own ruling cliques.
No modern terrorist movement has ever sustained itself without safe havens to train, fund and shelter and al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood or any of their various offshoots are no different.President Obama simply doesn't understand that, ironically just like his predecessor.
If Obama actually believed we were at war, he wouldn't be releasing enemy combatants or mirandizing them.
Obama made a huge deal out of saying that the majority of Muslims 'reject al-Qaeda'( as if they were our only problem) but acknowledged that they were making substantial efforts to recruit. he reiterated that the US would continue to 'reach out' to Muslims to convince them to reject 'extremism' which to paraphrase Obama, led to a limited future and the death of fellow Muslims.
Note that last....he wants potential jihadis to abjure their ways not because it's evil, or because there might be retaliation on our part as we defend ourselves, but simply because it's to their personal benefit and they'll avoid possibly killing a few Muslims in amongst the infidels. That kind of weak stance is guaranteed to result in exactly the opposite of what Obama intended.Unfortunately, I doubt he sees that.
He then made a point of calling for an end to partisan criticism (remember, that's only allowed if the Democrats do it) and urged Americans to stay united and 'preserve our open society' rather than "hunker down" in fear.
The President's attempts to improve are security are well and good, but the problem continues to be the attitude behind it.
The attitude is crucial - and that's where the real security failure is.
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At first I thought that this was not the speech he intended to give, perhaps he wanted to tell us of a sucessfull retaliation strike, that turned out not to be... After thinking further, I fear this is his response to critics asking 'where's the beef?
This is stepped up tough talk.
This is really the best he can do.
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