The Arbiter Of ‘Who We Are As Americans’ Gets It Wrong Again

“Some of the actions that were taken were contrary to our values” said President Obama upon the release of last week’s Senate report on the enhanced interrogation techniques that were used during the Bush administration.

Obama has a habit of defining who we are as Americans and what our values are as Americans in speeches and interviews,  implying his left-wing values are the correct, quintessentially “American values.”

Keith Koffler of White House Dossier and Andrew Ferguson of the Weekly Standard both wrote about the president’s annoying conceit in posts, today.

Often Obama’s comments about “who we are as Americans” have, as Ferguson notes, “a friendly lilt to it, as though the president were giving us a pat on the back. You hear him at the 9/11 museum saying, “Nothing can ever break us. Nothing can change who we are as Americans,” and you think, Thanks, Obama!”

But more often than not – the president uses the phrase in conjunction with his preferred liberal policies. 

“We shape our destiny . . . that’s who we are.” So, number five, we are destiny shapers who always go get our prisoners of war, even if we have to let loose a bunch of Taliban first. Remember the underwear bomber? He proved that “we will be guided by our hopes, our unity, and our deeply held values. That’s who we are as Americans.” So we’re hopeful, united, and festooned with those values, unspecified. Extending unemployment benefits past 99 weeks is “who we are as Americans.” We’re big spenders when it comes to public funds. Income inequality “challenges the very essence of who we are as a people.” We can all make lots of money, as Americans, but not too much.

Koffler points to a new CBS poll that reveals that the nation’s opinion of Bush-era interrogation techniques is not what Obama had in mind when spoke on our behalf, last week.

According to the just-released survey, which doubtless won’t get much play on . . . CBS . . . the number of Americans who think “water boarding and other aggressive interrogation tactics” are “sometimes justified” solidly exceeds those who think they are not justified, 49-36 percent.

Unlike Obama, who toasted the report’s release, Americans by 52-33 percent believe the report “poses a threat to the security of the U.S.”

Obama’s mushy use of the language is meant to brow-beat the majority into thinking they’re anti-American troglodytes who need to join the civilized society of those who share his “deeply held American values.” Of course, Obama’s definition of “who we are as Americans” is what he wants to force us into becoming as Americans.