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Jewish World Review Feb. 22, 2011 / 18 Adar I, 5771 Late to the freedom party By Jack Kelly
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer wondered if the much ballyhooed speech President Barack Obama gave in Cairo in June of 2009 had something to do with the massive protests that forced Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to resign.
The short answer, Wolf, is no. But you knew that.
In his Cairo speech, Mr. Obama explicitly rejected President Bush's "freedom agenda" for the Middle East:
"I know there has been controversy about the promotion of democracy in recent years, and much of this controversy is connected to the war in Iraq," the president said then. "Let me be clear: no system of government can or should be imposed on one nation by any other."
Mr. Obama reinforced that message when he gave the back of his hand to the masses of people who protested the dictatorship in Iran that summer, and when he cut in half the funds President Bush had budgeted for support of democracy movements in the Middle East.
That message was not lost on the protesters Tahrir Square. One of the most unintentionally hilarious scenes ever broadcast by CNN was when correspondent Nic Robertson tried to find a protester there who would say something nice about President Obama:
ROBERTSON: "Achmed, you've been down here on the Square for many days…What would be your message for President Obama?
ACHMED: "We don't know, actually, who he supports…"
ROBERTSON: "Mustapha is joining me now…What's your message for President Obama?
MUSTAPHA: "My message to President Obama is just 'We started this revolution without any outside help, and we're going to finish it without outside help."
ROBERTSON: "Are you pleased that President Obama has come out, however, now and said he supports this change…?"
MUSTAPHA: "Well, actually, President Obama's views were kind of conflicting in the last week…"
The president was caught by surprise by developments in Egypt, and couldn't decide whether to ride the wave or do nothing, wrote Harvard historian Niall Ferguson in Newsweek.
"The result has been a foreign policy debacle," Mr. Ferguson said. "The president has alienated everybody: not only Mubarak's cronies in the military, but also the youthful crowds in the streets of Cairo."
The protesters, said Marc Thiessen in the Washington Post: "waited in vain for Obama himself to speak out clearly and align America with the democratic revolution they had set in motion. Soon their hopes gave way to disappointment and eventually anger. Demonstrators began carrying signs that declared 'Shame on You, Obama,' and showed Mubarak depicted as Obama in his iconic 'hope' image -- with a caption that read 'No You Can't.'"
No American network showed those signs on television. When the facts conflict with their preferred story line, the facts are omitted. Despite having failed to find a single protester in Tahrir Square willing to say something nice about President Obama, Nic Robertson told CNN viewers: "The view from here is one of very happy to now hear that President Obama has swung behind the people."
Mr. Obama did make a nice speech in support of democracy in Egypt…after Mr. Mubarak resigned. He's had less to say on behalf of those protesting dictatorial regimes in Libya, Iran and China, and who are being violently suppressed.
Liberals have little interest in popular uprisings if those uprisings are against anti-American regimes. This would be odd -- if liberals really cared much about human rights -- since anti-American dictatorships treat their people more harshly than do authoritarian regimes allied with the United States.
Since the year began, Iran has been executing people at the rate of more than two a day. In Cuba in January, 268 peaceful protesters were arrested. The secret police even beat one woman in church. Ho hum. Few journalists consider this worth reporting.
The dictatorship in Iran was established in 1979, the one in Cuba in 1959. Dictatorships are durable -- if they are ruthless enough. If Muammar Qaddaffi survives in Libya, it'll be because he was willing to shoot people where Mr. Mubarak was not.
President Obama belatedly has come to support democracy in the Middle East. Now if only he and his fans in the news media would show as much enthusiasm for democracy in Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Libya as they do for democracy in Egypt.
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JWR contributor Jack Kelly, a former Marine and Green Beret, was a deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration.
© 2009, Jack Kelly |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||
