It seems some on the left, including the President of the United States, just can’t help themselves. They seem to feel it necessary to politicize everything, including Memorial Day. In his radio address Saturday, Obama took time off from saluting our servicemen and women to take a swipe at his predecessor:
Our fighting men and women – and the military families who love them – embody what is best in America. And we have a responsibility to serve all of them as well as they serve all of us.
And yet, all too often in recent years and decades, we, as a nation, have failed to live up to that responsibility. We have failed to give them the support they need or pay them the respect they deserve. That is a betrayal of the sacred trust that America has with all who wear – and all who have worn – the proud uniform of our country.
Even if his predecessor failed to show service members the respect they deserve (and there is no evidence he did), a Memorial Day message is not the place to make political statements. It is the time to honor the troops.
That’s what I, like so many columnists and bloggers (on both sides of the political aisle), did yesterday. In my post, I made no political statement, attacked no Democrat, praised no Republican (politician). I saluted only those who sacrificed, singling out the last surviving World War I veteran for praise. Yet, one of our perennial critics felt it incumbent upon himself to use the comment section to that post to snap at us and, like Obama, take a shot at the immediate past President of the United States.
With Obama, such cheap shots belie his rhetoric of being a post-partisan leader. With our critics, is is the mark of a strange obsession. Some feel they just have to attack us–and by extension all conservatives. Others feels compelled to badmouth Bush whenever they can, bringing up the former President in comment threads attached to posts where we don’t even mention the Republican’s name nor refer to him in any manner whatsoever.
Some folks just weren’t raised right by their mommas. Or if they were, arrogantly ignored it.
I’m gonna give the benefit of the doubt, as I tend to do, and guess it’s the latter. Some folks, though, are just assholes no matter what.
Say Kevin. I took my folks to Ikea yesterday. Saw a Korea vet there. Obviously he wasn’t marking the holiday in a way you would find fitting. Still, I shook his hand and thanked him for his service. I do know the meaning of Memorial Day, but I honor all soldiers living or past. That’s just me.
BTW, a local movie channel had a Blaxploitation movie marathon all day yesterday. I watched Buffett U on FBN instead.
GPW, you’re usually not guilty of the creative reading that so many others are but this time you’re seeing what isn’t there. There is nothing in the quote from Obama that points to GW specifically, or even hints at it. It’s exactly the same kind of statement that many a conservative has made – we do not value our vets as we should.
[ADIffDave, okay, you leveled the charge, now back it up. Please show when in a Memorial Day message, a Republican President accused his predecessors of “failing” to honor vets and a “betrayal of trust” toward them (or similarly harsh language. Should you do that, I will issue a correction. Until you come up with examples, you’re using imaginary Republican rhetoric to excused the incumbent Democratic President. –Dan]
By conflating kevin with Obama, It would appear that you are a conservative who insists on politicizing everything. and remarkably petty.
Yes, it all depends on what the meaning of “recent” is. What a schmuck.
you can say that again!
A different Dave, no, I don’t think it’s the same kind of statement many conservatives have made. If so, who? Pres. Obama’s statement obviously was directed at GWB, but even if it was directed at Pres. Clinton as well, would that make it more classy?
The problem with Pres. Obama is that he is in permanent anti-Bush campaign mode. Winning in November and being treated graciously by GWB during the transition process seems to not have affected Pres. Obama.
Memorial Day is a time to solemnly celebrate the troops. It’s not a time to say “I rock! Bush sucks!” The troops, and the troops alone, deserve the spotlight on Memorial Day. Using the occasion to attack GWB is not only insulting to GWB but also to the troops.
GPW: Clearly a disfunctional Dave in #3 is correct.
Obama was referring to the rabid statements he made, that Dick Turban made, that John F’n Kerry made, that Harry Reid made, that John Murtha made, than SanFran Pelosi made, that St. Teddy of Kennedy made and the KOS Kids are still making.
One can forgive conservatives if they do occasionally exaggerate what they perceive as bias; it is, after all, a conservative trait to err on the side of what they know to be true. In this case, GPW is right. Obama is truly pathetic, attempting to burnish his nonexistent credentials with the military by criticizing previous administrations (hint: “…recent years…” is code for “George W. Bush”), especially the bit about betraying those that wear the uniform he would never, ever deign to wear.
Jesus Christ – how is that a dig against George Bush? You’re getting overly sensitive in your insanity. I don’t know how this country is going to make it with people like you in it, quite frankly.
what’s really pathetic and obvious is that you are identical twins of the idiot left wing bloggers you claim to be better than. The only attack is in your f’in hallucinations and it’s sickening to watch. Flush you down with the scumbags you mirror right and left and the world will be a better place. Any semblance of integrity or ability to rise above has been shot down by the asinine comments. Not that I should have expected anything better.
And yet, what’s funny is that we see adDave encouraging and supporting the Kos Kidz, but attacking the conservatives.
Maybe when adDave goes over to Kos Kidz, posts the same kinds of attacks that he does here there, and gives us a link, he would demonstrate that he actually DOES view both sides the same way.
For now, though, I daresay this is the typical Obama Party rhetoric, where liars like Obama claim that attacks on peoples’ families are wrong while sending his pet faggots like Barney Fag and Andrew Sullivan to claim Sarah Palin faked her pregnancy and that her husband is having incestuous sex with their daughters.
Dave, you’ve leveled the charge, now, as a I said, in the parenthetical above, back it up.
Just find a Republican President’s Memorial Day message when he accused previous Administrations of betraying vets.
Holy Crap,
Surely you don’t believe that GWB is blameless for:
Allowing 3,000+ people to die during the worst terrorist attack on this country while ignoring the warnings.
Leaving the country in the worst economic shape since the great depression.
Landing us in 2 wars that may never end.
Supressing science and attempting to replace it with religion.
Abandoning New Orleans after Katrina with a helping of ‘heckuva job, Brownie’.
Setting up Guantánamo that is such a mess that it may take years to get rid of.
The list goes on and on, GWB was an unmitigated disaster on our country.
Um, NJLiberal, do you realize that with your comment, you kind of, sort of, help make my point.
Issue here is politicizing Memorial Day and you feel it incumbent upon yourself to offer a general attack on W.
Are you trying to make it easier for me to make my points?
Just find a Republican President’s Memorial Day message when he accused previous Administrations of betraying vets.
How about you find a Democratic President’s Memorial Day message when he accused previous administrations of betraying vets first? This is how you work, GayPatriotWest. You get yourself all worked up about something that Obama says that isn’t anything that a reasonable person would allow themselves to get all worked up about, then you request that liberals go back and find a comment by George Bush that is similarly outrageous. This is a conveniently impossible task, of course, when it’s up to a blind ideologue to determine what is and is not appropriate to be outraged about.
The Bush years saw the military used and abused. It featured extended deployments, inexcusably poor war planning, inadequate supplies and training, the Walter Reed scandal, and there’s more. We’ve lost 4,000 personnel and another 30,000 have been wounded for absolutely no reason. The Bush administration is the worst thing to happen to the United States military since Vietnam. The little statement there by Obama that’s got you so riled up is so tame and generic compared to what he could have said that I would be grateful if I were you.
Just find a Republican President’s Memorial Day message when he accused previous Administrations of betraying vets.
How about you find a Democratic President’s Memorial Day message when he accused previous administrations of betraying vets first? This is how you work, GayPatriotWest. You get yourself all worked up about something that Obama says that isn’t anything that a reasonable person would allow themselves to get all worked up about, then you request that liberals go back and find a comment by George Bush that is similarly outrageous. This is a conveniently impossible task, of course, when it’s up to a blind ideologue to determine what is and is not appropriate to be outraged about.
The Bush years saw the military used and abused. It featured extended deployments, inexcusably poor war planning, inadequate supplies and training, the Walter Reed scandal, and there’s more. We’ve lost 4,000 personnel and another 30,000 have been wounded for absolutely no reason. The Bush administration is the worst thing to happen to the United States military since Vietnam. The little statement there by Obama that’s got you so riled up is so tame and generic compared to what he could have said that I would be grateful if I were you. s
Me worked up, slurply? LOL, ROFL!! C’mon.
You’re quoting me responding to a critics who leveled a charge. that’s the issue here. Let me repeat, he’s the one who said Republicans do the same thing. All I’m asking him to do is back himself up, but I guess, as you put it, that’s an impossible task.
You, like NJ Liberal, then proceed to slam W instead of defending Obama with whom I take issue in the post. Wonder why that is. Can’t defend your own man?
So, quite your name-calling and defend the Democrat
name that speaker:
“And when our government forgets to honor our debts to you, it is a stain upon America’s honor. The Walter Reed scandal recalled, I hope, not just government but the public who elected it, to our responsibilities to the men and women who risked life and limb to meet their responsibilities to us. Such a disgrace is unworthy of the greatest nation on earth.”
so candidate mccain can say it, but heaven forbid president obama say it? and if you ask me, it was more a swipe at the vietnam era reaction to veterans than at GWB.
r, is that a Memorial Day message of a President of the United States?
i see you didn’t read the second part of my post.
I’m posing a separate question to you–is it ok for a candidate for president to say it but not the president?
And why assume it is about GWB? Like I said, perhaps it is about the Vietnam era (hence the reference to “decades”)…it seems like it could be an attempt to create a new era of liberal respect for the military after the 1960s and 1970s style reaction of liberals to those veterans (and the shocking number of veterans who are homeless or struggling over the past decades).
or, it could be a swipe at Bush. I see you’re quick to assume the worst in this case. But you’re the one making an assumption here, not me.
Oh, and comment #2 says “conservative”, not “conservative president” and you responded with “republican” not “republican president”.
and to be clear–McCain said that on memorial day in 2008.
addendum to 20: you’re right…you did set up a (bad, imo) comparison to only republican presidents in your response to comment 2, so disregard that critique.
I will say that that comparison is horrible. Only Presidents matter? And again, prove that the quote was about Bush and not about the past generation of liberals.
did you even read the post, r? The issue here is simply this–how certain liberals have tried to politicize Memorial Day.
It’s one thing when a left-wing critic does it on a conservative blog, it’s quite another when the President of the United States does it, particularly one who claimed to be post-partisan (whatever that means).
I’m not going to waste my time addressing the second part of your post until you address the challenges I have offered above.
GPW – Obama made NO mention of previous administrations, you are reading it that way because it is important for you to paint him in a bad light as much as possible. He’ll give you plenty of opportunities why create one?
Labarbera, get therapy.
LOL–so now the critique is that it was a liberal PRESIDENT and not a liberal. ok, see how important it is to be specific?
Or is it liberals writ large–at which point, I have to ask: is John McCain a liberal? because his criticisms of Bush were significantly more specific and sharp compared to the rhetoric posted by President Obama.
So we have two problems here for your general thesis:
1. Is it liberals in general, or only liberal presidents that piss you off by politicizing memorial day? If only presidents, then is it ok for a candidate to do it? why one and not the other? If only liberals, why is John McCain allowed to do it (or should he be criticized as well, at which point, it isn’t only liberals who do it?)
2. Can you prove that Obama’s comments are directed @ Bush and not at past generations of liberals (hence the decades line) who bashed servicemen returning from Vietnam?
In short, it seems like you’re crying wolf about liberals politicizing memorial day (which is, in and of itself political. but i’m personally fine with that…our servicepeople do deserve far more than one day could provide in terms of honor and recognition).
I’m not defending whatever some random person did @ a blog…but Obama’s comment seems perfectly reasonable as part of a memorial day message. We as a country have over the past number of decades been far less respectful than we could be of the men and women of our armed services (mostly from the left). And over the last number of decades, we have not given good enough support for veterans, an embarrassment that began long before W and will continue long after.
you’re reading quite deeply into the tea leaves.
A different Dave, is it your failure to meet my challenge which causes you to insult me?
You have yet to find an example of a Republican President using a Memorial weekend message to blame others for past failures. I’ll grant that perhaps the President didn’t mean to implicate his predecessor (but given his recent rhetoric, I think I’m on pretty solid ground here in assuming he did).
But, with the verb, “failed,” and the noun, “betrayal,” he certainly politicized his message.
Instead of insulting me, why don’t you just try to answer my challenge. It should be easy if I’m as wrong as your rhetoric suggests.
sorry, r, you’ve missed the point of my post, and, in your accusations you have, to a certain extent, helped make it.
excellent condescending avoidance technique, there GPW, really well done. i’ll take it you’re not going to answer either of my questions.
r, this is my blog to which you chose to respond. I made a point and issued a challenge. If you wish to respond, fine.
I’m not going to bother address you points since you offer them as an excuse for refusing to address mine.
Me worked up, slurply? LOL, ROFL!! C’mon.
You’re quoting me responding to a critics who leveled a charge. that’s the issue here. Let me repeat, he’s the one who said Republicans do the same thing. All I’m asking him to do is back himself up, but I guess, as you put it, that’s an impossible task.
I don’t care what he said. Republicans don’t do the same thing, they do worse. You’re outraged because you’re holding Obama and his statement to a ridiculous standard, then telling others that unless we can get you as outraged about something George Bush said, nothing that we say could possibly matter. You hand out ridiculous little tests like this all the time, like when you had a fit over Obama saying ‘people waving tea bags around’ and insisted that I demonstrated a time when Bush insulted his critics. Here I am wondering how anyone could be insulted by a statement like that, and you go on thinking you’ve made some grand point.
You routinely call for people commenting here to debate, not insult. But nearly all of your posts and subsequent comments are designed around making any potential political debates dependent upon some absurd, GOP-serving premise. You do it because frankly, you can’t win political arguments without appealing to some manufactured authority – in this case, an insincere and overblown feeling of indignation. This goes on everyday on this blog and in other conservative circles. Republicans truly are wrong about everything, so you rig the game to have a chance.
You, like NJ Liberal, then proceed to slam W instead of defending Obama with whom I take issue in the post. Wonder why that is. Can’t defend your own man?
So, quite your name-calling and defend the Democrat
Here’s the thing – there’s nothing to defend him against. If you think your allegation is credible or meaningful simply because you made it… well again, that is not how debate works. It’s a simple statement of fact that we haven’t done enough for our troops, and that’s true about presidencies before George Bush’s. It’s also true that George Bush’s presidency was particularly disastrous for veterans and the active military. If you’re going to get all upset about Obama allegedly offending…um, someone…. then where is the outrage over Bush sending thousands of our soldiers to die in a war made hopeless by his bumbling incompetence?
yes, you do have a right not to respond. I just find it highly amusing that you use that right here, but feel the need to note that such a right exists.
I can’t find a republican president taking a swipe at a predecessor. But that challenge is a completely arbitrary and tangential one because you aren’t criticizing Obama alone as a president who shouldn’t have politicized it (a claim that I would argue is ambiguous at best. We don’t know if it was directed at Bush or at the old, tired left that is still angry about Vietnam–a left that Obama’s been clear he’s trying to separate his idea of progressivism from), you’re making a wide claim about liberals who politicize memorial day (and anything else they can get their grubby hands on).
Except it was not hard at all to find a leading conservative politician (unless you want to excise McCain from the GOP) politicizing memorial day all of one year ago. So it seems like, at least in terms of memorial day, Obama’s not alone on making a political point–and McCain’s was much fiercer and much more clearly political.
And beyond that, your original challenge is inaccurate. Obama said “we, as a nation” not “the president” or “the past administration” or “republicans” or anything else. You can criticize him for being too negative about America as a whole, I guess.
It’s actually funny… I never read the other post you wrote, but the second paragraph echoes to me what Obama said:
“Regretting that we do not remember military heroes as much as we once did, Peggy Noonan…believes a correction is in order:”
So we don’t honor/remember them enough and pointing that out is ok and apolitical. Yet saying we failed to serve them as well as they serve us is somehow fundamentally different and political and a cheap shot?
r, not sure, what you’re trying to say in the better part of your comment. Peggy is not speaking as President of the United States. Also note the difference in language, “failed” and “betrayed” as opposed to not remembering enough.
but am glad you did answer my challenge. When I saw that you had commented, I was prepared to say, “answer my challenge and I’ll address your point.” Since you did. I will.
So, here goes. Context is key. If Obama had made the very statement I quoted above one year ago today, while campaigning for President, then while disagreeing the validity of his claims, i would say it was entirely appropriate. So, if McCain made the statement (attributed to him in the thread above) on the campaign trail–or on the Senate floor in pushing legislation, then it would be in order.
Here, the issue is the President of the United States in his official function as Commander in Chief of our armed forces and Head of State of the United States of America trying to score political points in a statement which should be addressing to all Americans.
I actually think you raise a valid point; I just would appreciate that you first address my challenge. You did that. And I appreciate it.
a couple of things:
1. I would have stated explicitly that which was implicit (i couldn’t find a president saying it) earlier had you responded to the substance of my post as well as that “sin of omission”. I do appreciate your latest response for not just focusing on that aspect of my post.
2. I just don’t see it as “scor[ing] political points”. There’s an alternative theory of it (he was criticizing both the old liberal that distrusted the military and the inability of government to properly care for veterans) that isn’t Bush-centric at all. That you need to highlight the specific words “failed” and “betrayed” as codespeak for Bush-bashing seems evidence that your hypothesis is, at best, a hypothesis.
3. So if its that Obama as president should rise above petty politics , then others do not need to do so. In other words, McCain’s ok for saying what he said as is your persistent critic as is Peggy Noonan. I find that somewhat problematic…if the President is supposed to avoid politics, shouldn’t everyone? Everything the President does is, at some level, political, so why should his hands be tied when his critics’ hands are not? Had McCain said what he said this year instead of last year, should Obama have addressed it at all? Or just taken that political blow (and it would have been a big blow, possibly)?
I guess my point is this: your criticism is of Obama as a president and liberal politicizing memorial day not of Obama as a liberal policizing memorial day, because others have done the same politicizing but not been president at the time. I guess that *could* be a valid critique, but I don’t really think it’s a big deal at all, nor, as i’ve noted, do i think it’s political to claim that America has over the past decades, not been as supportive of veterans as it could/should be. And when Peggy Noonan, John McCain and myself agree, you should trust me that it probably isn’t a politically controversial stance:P
so it all hangs on those two words and whether or not they prove Obama’s a bush-basher. Call me apologetic, but i just don’t see it.
All that said, there’s another whole can of worms we could open up about what is and is not “political” (some would argue that the whole creation of memorial day is political in and of itself) and how that depends on whether or not one agrees that the statement is “true”. For example, when Bush spoke about the war on terror and veterans who died in Iraq, was that political? The left could argue it was because they didn’t see the war on terror as related to the war in Iraq, and that Bush had politicized memorial day in that case (like when he called Iraq a “terror regime” in 2005).
one’s view of what is political is defined, in large part, by where one stands.
well, r, we’ll have to agree to disagree on this one. I think there’s a time to be political and a time to be statesman-like. Obama has only rarely showed that latter quality. Ironically, he did show such a quality in the speech which caused his leap to stardom–at the DNC convention in ’04.
So, here goes. Context is key. If Obama had made the very statement I quoted above one year ago today, while campaigning for President, then while disagreeing the validity of his claims, i would say it was entirely appropriate. So, if McCain made the statement (attributed to him in the thread above) on the campaign trail–or on the Senate floor in pushing legislation, then it would be in order.
Here, the issue is the President of the United States in his official function as Commander in Chief of our armed forces and Head of State of the United States of America trying to score political points in a statement which should be addressing to all Americans.
Once again, that ‘reasoning’ is totally absurd. How is it possible that there is that much of a difference between the job of President and the job of running for President that a statement such as the one you’re quoting can change from being appropriate to wildly offensive? Anyone can see what you’re doing here. You easily say that you wouldn’t mind if Obama said this when he was a candidate, in an attempt to establish some sort of levelheadedness or objectivity about the guy. It’s easy for you to say that because it is by definition an unverifiable claim for which there is no way for anyone to hold you accountable. Then you go on and criticize Obama thinking you’ve established some sort of fair-minded credibility. Well, you haven’t. Yes, context is important, and in this case, the context is that you’re an angry, disillusioned Republican desperately grasping for straws.
GPW, I would not refer to you as Labarbera, there is only one on here sick enough to bear that name. ok so there’s a couple more who come darn close.
I haven’t “met your challenge” because it has nothing to do with what I said and it has nothing to do with what Obama said. If I had claimed that a Republican president had criticized his predecessor like you say that Obama did then you would have a valid challenge. But he didn’t say it and I didn’t say it so your challenge is based on a fantasy. Please explain how “we, as a nation” is an attack on GW. EVERY single sentence that you quoted is on that ANY conservative could also have said and would not have been falsely accused of inappropriate words.
If somewhere else in Obama’s speech he did as you claim then that changes everything. But I’ll never know because I have no use for the useless babbling of any politician, right, left or whatever on an occasion such as this.
As I said before, Obama is going to give you tons of opportunities criticize his attitudes, words and actions. Creating one just makes you look petty and you are one of a tiny minority of “conservatives” on here that cannot usually be described that way.
a different Dave, we’ll have to agree to disagree on this one.
I’ll just say this seems to be a pattern with Obama, saying that now that he’s President, the problems that existed in the past will just magically vanished if we do what he follow listen to him and adopt his policies. And before his advent, all was failure and betrayal.
As to the Labarbera comment, thanks for clarifying that. Acknowledged and appreciated.
This is just too damn funny watching these liberal cock bites fall all over each other to make excuses.
Too funny.
Wasn’t it last Memorial Day when Chairman Obama saw dead people?
What’s really sad:
Which warnings would those be? Further, could you imagine what today would be like if your beloved lord BJ wasn’t banging interns instead of allowing the CIA to shoot UBL?
And then ADD points out that Il Douche wasn’t bashing Bush, but the entire country.
Much better.
#14
GPW, I was not making a reference to Memorial Day but by your (and your pals’) amazement that GWB be held culpable for anything! I don’t understand why you are always ‘taken aback’ by the Left’s anger against him. I have nothing against GWB personally, I’ve never met the man but his policies are fair game. Almost all of President Obama’s time is being taken up by dealing with the heap of problem left by GWB. I’m also struck by the amnesia that you have. All you conservatives seem to have collective amnesia that 9/11 happened when GWB was president. People like Richard Clarke where doing their best trying to warn him about the imminent attack and were simply ignored. As a result of this monumental incompentence, the Bush administration overreacted and implemented a number of draconian policies that are now being debunked by the likes of Secretary Gates, General Petraeus and other prominent GWB appointees.
NJLiberal, first you’re making a lot of stuff up about our attitudes toward W. Your words notwithstanding, we have criticized him on numerous occasions.
I was making a point about you, not him–wondering why you feel it incumbent on yourself to bring him up in the comment thread to a post that wasn’t about him.
You really are obsessed. And if you so convinced how bad he is, please show how Gates and Petraeus have debunked W’s policies and compare those allegedly “debunked” policies to those Obama has affirmed once in office though he campaigned against when when a candidate.
Thanks.
And recall, NJ, I’m looking for specifics.
In the middle of your post you criticize President Obama for taking a ‘shot’ at his predecessor:
“Obama took time off from saluting our servicemen and women to take a swipe at his predecessor.”
That is what I’m reacting to. You conservatives are always amazed that progressives have anything to criticize GWB about.
I also resent you implication that Obama is another Bush. Bush and company overreacted to the horrific events of 9/11 because they paid absolutely no attention to any warnings that evil things were afoot. Obama is still committed to closing Guantánamo and has clearly stated that there will be no further torture of any captives. While I will agree that some of Obama’s recent decisions vis-a-vis the release of the photos and military tribunals and his seeming hesitance to deal with GLBT issues are greatly worrying, I can only come to the conclusion that these will be dealt with after clear and logical reasoning have been applied. After all he has not stated that he will not close Gitmo and there have been more positive statements from the administration about GLBT issues. GWB had 8 years to completely screw up the country, Obama hasn’t event been there for 6 months.
NJ, um, no, we’re not amaed that you guys have anything to criticize W about (heck we’ve criticized him ourselves–on numerous occasions). What amazes us is how you’re so quic to attack him.
Just contrast your comments with the content of this post. And bear in mind that you’re the one who chooses to chime in here. So, shouldn’t you address the content of the posts? Why do you need to attack W instead of defend Obama?
Obama is still committed to closing Guantánamo and has clearly stated that there will be no further torture of any captives.
Nope.
At last month’s Democratic debate in New Hampshire, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois declared, “America cannot sanction torture. It’s a very straightforward principle, and one we should abide by. Now, I will do whatever it takes to keep America safe. And there are going to be all sorts of hypotheticals and emergency situations, and I will make that judgment at that time. But we cannot have the president of the United States state, as a matter of policy, that there is a loophole or an exception where we would sanction torture.”
Despite the senator’s choice of words, this answer was anything but straightforward: Obama clearly sought to draw a line between official policy (“America cannot sanction torture”) and those thorny emergencies when the president has to act behind closed doors (“I will do whatever it takes to keep America safe.”)
While appearing to denounce loopholes, he was clearly carving one out.
And surely Obama, as a former editor of the Harvard Law Review, ought to know that if he intends to reserve the right to “make that judgment at that time” in an emergency situation, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel will have to write a secret memo outlining his presidential authority to do so – which seems to be exactly what Bush has done.