The Bush administration (and other Republicans) may finally be responding to the endless assault on its legacy that began many years ago. One of the most frustrating aspects of being a supporter of President Bush during his two terms was witnessing the failure of the administration (and the Republican leadership) to defend itself when attacked by the Left on all manner of issues. It should be said that congressional Republicans opened the door for plenty of this criticism (and paid the requisite price in 2006 midterm elections) by spending like Democrats for a decade.
However, the recent foreign policy excursion by President Obama to the G20 meeting and other locales served as a harsh reminder of the divide that separates liberals and conservatives on principles of leading with strength. The United States has no business apologizing to Europeans for its policies of the last eight years. Rick Santorum made this point yesterday and I’m it sure resonates with many Americans:
Watching President Obama apologize last week for America’s arrogance – before a French audience that owes its freedom to the sacrifices of Americans – helped convince me that he has a deep-seated antipathy toward American values and traditions.
There is in the Obama administration a deep seated antipathy for the truth also. The recent month of domestic policy duplicity by the administration on the issues of deficit spending and bank bailouts should disabuse any observer of the notion that principles rooted in honesty guide this presidency and the Democrat Congress. Just when we think we have seen it all something familiar occurs to amaze us even more….which brings me to Vice President Joe Biden.
The Vice President has been performing true to form of late and Karl Rove and others have called him out. Biden recently shared this canard:
“I remember President Bush saying to me one time in the Oval Office,” Biden began, “‘Well, Joe,’ he said, ‘I’m a leader.’ And I said: ‘Mr. President, turn and around look behind you. No one is following.'”
And, before that, this,
When I speak to the president – and I have had plenty of opportunity to be with the president, at least prior to the last election, a lot of hours alone with him. I mean, meaning me and his staff,” Biden said on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” in April2006. “And the president will say things to me, and I’ll literally turn to the president, say: ‘Mr. President, how can you say that, knowing you don’t know the facts?’ And he’ll look at me and he’ll say – my word – he’ll look at me and he’ll say: ‘My instincts.’ He said: ‘I have good instincts.’ I said: ‘Mr. President, your instincts aren’t good enough.'”
Sounds pretty convincing, huh? But none of it is true. Biden is the master of recalling stories that not only reflect favorably on himself but denigrate his opponent. Rove and others have again exposed Biden as a stranger to the truth:
I hate to say this, but he’s a serial exaggerator,” Rove told FOX News. “If I was being unkind I would say liar. But it is a habit he ought to drop.”
Rove added: “You should not exaggerate and lie like this when you are the Vice President of the United States.”….The exchange is purely “fictional,” said Rove, who was Bush’s top political adviser in the White House.
“It didn’t happen,” Rove, a FOX News contributor and former Bush adviser, told Megyn Kelly in an interview taped for “On The Record.” “It’s his imagination; it’s a made-up, fictional world.
“He ought to get out of it and get back to reality,” Rove added. “He’s making this up out of whole cloth.”
If conservatives want to gain any traction against the Obama message machine they need to start with Rove’s approach against Biden and take it to the next logical step: question everything the President says and measure it against reality. The last few weeks have shown that there is a wide valley between the president’s rhetoric and reality.
