He bows to the King of Saudi Arabia. Excessive respect.

But he gives Prime Minister Gordon Brown a batch of DVD movies, and pointedly misses a joint press conference scheduled to take place when the British leader visited the U.S. in March of this year. Blatant disrespect.

He bows so deep to the Emperor of Japan that he seems to be looking for a lost contact lens. Excessive respect.

But he fails to even show up for the celebration of the fall of the onerous Berlin Wall – a major diplomatic blunder that causes a ripple of derision among America’s British and European allies. Clear and galling disrespect.

It would be easy to say that these disparate incidents have no relationship to one another. I disagree. I think they are disturbingly symbolic of the cultural contradictions that guide Mr. Obama’s erratic course through his presidency.

What could cause these curious clues to surface? Why would Obama have an Asian/Arab complex?

There may be some tantalizing clues in this excerpt from Biography.com:

Barack Hussein Obama was born Aug. 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii. His father, Barack Obama, Sr., was born of Luo ethnicity in Nyanza Province, Kenya. He grew up herding goats with his own father, who was a domestic servant to the British. Although reared among Muslims, Obama, Sr., became an atheist at some point.

Obama's mother, Ann Dunham, grew up in Wichita, Kansas. Her father worked on oil rigs during the Depression. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, he signed up for service in World War II and marched across Europe in Patton's army. Dunham's mother went to work on a bomber assembly line. After the war, they studied on the G.I. Bill, bought a house through the Federal Housing Program, and moved to Hawaii.

Meantime, Barack's father had won a scholarship that allowed him to leave Kenya pursue his dreams in Hawaii. At the time of his birth, Obama's parents were students at the East–West Center of the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Obama's parents separated when he was two years old and later divorced. Obama's father went to Harvard to pursue Ph.D. studies and then returned to Kenya.

His mother married Lolo Soetoro, another East–West Center student from Indonesia. In 1967, the family moved to Jakarta, where Obama's half-sister Maya Soetoro Ng was born. Obama attended schools in Jakarta, where classes were taught in the Indonesian language.

Four years later when Barack (commonly known throughout his early years as "Barry") was ten, he returned to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents, Madelyn and Stanley Dunham, and later his mother (who died of ovarian cancer in 1995).

He was enrolled in the fifth grade at the esteemed Punahou Academy, graduating with honors in 1979. He was only one of three black students at the school. This is where Obama first became conscious of racism and what it meant to be an African-American.

The problem with this president is he shows a distressing tendency to carry these early negative impressions, perceived insults and fancied slights into adulthood, into the presidency, and finally into the very crucible of international diplomacy, where he awkwardly acts out his resentments and favoritism, dragging the United States of America into the muck. He seems driven by his own demons.

Barack Obama is not stupid. Far from it. I think he’s very intelligent. But he doesn’t seem to have a clue how to be head of the most powerful and influential nation in the world. (And the greatest, by the way.) He’s still campaigning, looking now to 2012, while still in the infancy of his first term.

Along the way, he is leaving the impression of suffering from a political and cultural schizophrenia that keeps us all wondering when the real Barack Obama will stand up.

*** The claim that Barack Obama was born in the United States is disputed. 

Sorry, Mr. President. Too many false starts. Go ahead. Go through the motions. But somehow I think you have far too many conflicted emotions, divided loyalties, and trackless cultural wanderings to be believed. At this moment you are merely emulating former U.S. presidents who did the right thing, parroting their tributes, taking cues from their actions, and reading heartfelt statements from your teleprompter.

Next week, you’ll be somebody else.

The liberal U.S. media essentially buried the first real clue to how Obama would react to this tragedy. I happened to see it in a live broadcast as Obama addressed a much-ballyhooed Tribal Nations pow-wow  at the White House. Obama took pains to remind his audience of American Indians that they have much to be resentful about.

“We know the history that we share. It's a history marked by violence and disease and deprivation. Treaties were violated. Promises were broken. You were told your lands, your religion, your cultures, your languages were not yours to keep,” the president declared. (WH transcript)

It is difficult to know exactly at what point the President knew of the Fort Hood mass murders, as the White House transcript I saw did not include these remarks, and there was a Nixonesque “tape gap” reported on the “verbatim” log of the proceedings.

But the live television coverage said it all. For perhaps two minutes, as CNN displayed a glaring on-screen banner proclaiming ‘BREAKING NEWS: Rampage at U.S. Army Post, 12 dead, including gunman, 2 suspects in custody’, Obama continued to schmooze with the crowd – unaware that the television audience was already way ahead of him and wondering when the president would catch on.

It seemed he didn’t want this unwelcome news to rain on his party. One reporter called it “surreal”, and I agree.

He bantered playfully with his subjects before switching finally into the solemn mood required when announcing that something frightful has happened.

President Clinton had the same crippling self-awareness, and was said to “fix his face” before coming to the podium so that his appearance would match the flavor of the occasion.

Obama is more cleverly superficial. “Deep down,” someone has said, “he’s shallow.”

Toby Hamden of Telegraph UK puts it this way, describing Obama’s curiously detached manner as he finally began to address the terrorist act at Fort Hood:

“Completely missing was the eloquence that Mr. Obama employs when talking about himself. Absent too was any sense that the President empathised with the families and comrades of those murdered. Mr. Obama seems a curiously bloodless president. If he experiences passion, he seldom shows it. It is often anyone's guess as to whether an event or issue truly moves him.”

By the time he reached Fort Hood, Obama’s speech writers had paved the way for him, and his speech was actually a tidy bit of memorializing.

Obama did manage this near miss at a display of revulsion for the Fort Hood murders:

“It may be hard to comprehend the twisted logic that led to this tragedy.  But this much we do know -- no faith justifies these murderous and craven acts; no just and loving God looks upon them with favor.  For what he has done, we know that the killer will be met with justice -- in this world, and the next.” (WH transcript)  

David Warren of RealClearPolitics summed it up rather effectively:

 “This deadly enemy of the West -- the Islamist ideology which holds all Jews, Christians, other non-Muslims, and a considerable number of Muslims, too, to be human filth in need of extermination -- is well infiltrated. Events like that at Fort Hood prove this, and from what I can see, the problem can only grow with the passage of time.”

Since the president speaks for himself, his words clearly speak for him.

Here’s what left me reaching for a tongue depressor as Obama, seemingly unmoved bythe horror and betrayal most of us felt, spoke to the nation in the Rose Garden of the wanton slaughter of valiant U.S. soldiers at Fort Hood:  

“We don’t know all the answers yet. And I would caution against jumping to conclusions until we have all the facts.”

Well, is that sappy enough for you? Thirteen unsuspecting soldiers gathered in a readiness area are fiendishly shot dead in a heartbeat – and an officer of the U.S. Army is the accused killer. The officer is a Muslim. Whether or not this fact figures into the motive for the slayings is not known. Yet it is a fact.

Our president has Muslim influences in his background. Whether or not this fact figures into what he said and how he said it is not known. Yet it is a fact.

Obama, of course, soon fell into the obligatory condolences and utterances of respect for the fallen, but for me the damage was done.

Dare we ask – what conclusions was he so afraid that we might reach prematurely? That because the suspected murderer is a Muslim, we might somehow, as a nation implicate all Muslims?

I don’t know. I do know that I resist being tempted to fall into that trap, no matter how bitter I might be over this senseless loss. And I have confidence that most of us will not feel that.

In America, the accused are innocent until proven guilty. Yes. But our nobler inclinations may be tested by what we do know about this situation. And the implications are stunning. If Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan is brought to trial, and if he is found guilty, I can promise that the bitter gall and sense of betrayal I will feel will be profound.

President Obama knows this. He is viewed as a man chronically unruffled by the vagaries of life in a world of conflict. So he paid homage to the pillars of justice that mark our society, as well he should have. It was the prudent thing to do.

But his words somehow sounded hollow when he spoke of what had happened. Forgive me if I’m wrong, and too harsh in my judgement, but insincerity, I think, is one of the telling flaws in this President’s character.

But I learned fast, and pretty soon was getting a seat at the head table at top farm meetings. They liked my schtick. Pass the biscuits. It was a heady time.

That’s not the kind of free speech I’m talking about here. I mean the free speech that goes along with being an American. It belongs to everyone. Black men like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. Even white guys like Rush Limbaugh.

But Al and Jesse have conspired – not to deprive Rush of freedom of speech – but to use Limbaugh’s words and beliefs as a club to hurt and demean him. And in the end to make Rush so undesirable that he would be dropped from a group making a bid to buy the St. Louis Rams.

That stinks. But Rush handled the situation well.

The ugly smears are mine, though I draw them from the actual vocabularies of left-wing radicals whose spite often bubbles over like a pot of snake venom when they go after those with whom they don’t agree. The malady seems to affect all of the leftist gabbers to one degree or another. In that sense, it could be called an "Unchained Malady".

Suffice it to say that they waded in swinging – not with their fists, but with their well-exercised wagging tongues.

Fallstrom reported that Sharpton sent a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, charging that Limbaugh has been divisive and “anti-NFL” in some of his comments.

Jackson said in a telephone interview that Limbaugh had made his wealth ‘appealing to the fears of whites’ with an unending line of insults against black and other minorities.”  (FANHOUSE)

Some of the team members chimed in, twisting Limbaugh over the coals on a spit. But not everyone joined in the verbal lynching.

Cooler, more dispassionate comments were offered by Rams defensive end Leonard Little, who to his credit side-stepped probes by reporters salivating to draw him into the controversy.

He simply didn’t want to talk about it. Little concluded:

“We’ve got a lot more things to worry about than who’s going to be our owner.”

In America, of course, every citizen is entitled to his opinion. It’s just that, in this case, the Rams team member seems a little more entitled than glib race-baiting showboaters like Sharpton and Jackson. Leonard Little makes his living at the game.

Major sports leagues shouldn’t welcome owners who are divisive and incindiery, said the always divisive and incindiery Sharpton.

While the cunning reverends reached for the Prozac over who’s in charge in the front offices of NFL teams, I expect there was a reason they avoided the breaking news in tennis, where popular champions Venus and Serena Williams have bought into ownership of the Miami Dolphins.

All sweetness and light here. And why not? The two stars of the global tennis world have the two things they need to be qualified for reserved seats in the owner’s box at Land Shark Stadium in Miami. Money and motivation.

Rush brought the same qualifications to the NFL bargaining table. And more. He is a solid fan of the NFL. But the conservative broadcaster was up against a stacked deck. He was blackballed by jealous league honchos and vindictive players.

President Obama should not be spared here. He loves his Chicago, speaks glowingly of it, has his real power base there, and sacrifices unselfishly for his city – jetting to Copenhagen to do the presidential fist-bump with Michele and Oprah in celebration of personally bringing the 2016 Summer Olympics home.

Didn’t happen. Chicago, with Obama laying it all on the line, finished dead last. The president lost a lot of points for that miscalculation.  

So do we say that Obama shouldn’t take a position on the onerous murder of one innocent young man in Chicago? Or twenty? Thirty or more? Well, he stooped to take a personal swipe at a Cambridge police officer, Sgt. James Crowley, who arrested Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., for shooting off his mouth at a cop.

The Cambridge police “acted stupidly”, the president assured America at a White House news conference. Much of America wasn’t too sure. And White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs bristled at the suggestion that Obama had spoken inappropriately.

This is Mr. Mouthpiece at his bristling best:

"Let me be clear," Gibbs said, according to a pool report. "He was not calling the officer stupid, okay? He was denoting that . . . at a certain point the situation got far out of hand, and I think all sides understand that." (Brian Motopoli, CBS News Political Hotsheet)

Oh, yeah. Can understand why you might say that, Bob – especially where your boss is concerned.  But, you know, it’s high time the president gave serious consideration to realigning his priorities. He appears not willing to risk bringing public attention and derision to Chicago’s bloody reputation for murder, mayhem and gang brutality.

CNN was only one of many media outlets reporting on the murder of Alex Arellano of Chicago. He was struck down by his own.

One of the most disturbing slayings came (May 1, 2009) when the family of Alex Arellano found the 15-year-old's body. He had been beaten, burned and shot in the head.

"It's sad because they didn't have to torture him that way. He never did nothing wrong, never. He was a good kid. It just gets to me. It's crazy," Alex's friend Ashley Recendez said.

Indeed, police say the teen had no criminal record, no gang affiliation. His family says he was well-behaved and shy, almost fearful of strangers. They had recently taken him out of school to protect him after gang members threatened him. (Dave Mattingly, CNN)

 Another high-profile gang murder of a black teen-ager in Chicago was shocking for its brutality. It happened on September 27, 2009.

A videotape of the despicable incident, which took the life of high school honor roll student Derrion Albert, 16, mesmerized and horrified the nation as an amateur video of the murder splashed across the Internet, television, cable networks.

But “mesmerized” stops so far short of a noble goal. We’ve heard this empty lament before. “Galvanized” is what we should hope for.

Prosecutors charged four teenagers with fatally beating Albert, who was walking to a bus stop when he got caught up in the mob street fighting, authorities said. Their main weapon of choice – splintered pieces of railroad ties –  did the job efficiently, used as clubs to methodically pound Derrion Albert to death.

The White House --convenient barrier to personal involvement by the Maximum Leader -- sent mouthpiece Robert Gibbs into the fray. Gibbs, to his credit, at least labeled the incident a "heinous crime", and promised the administration would soon respond.

 Breathe deeply. Now hold it.

 Actually, it was habitual hearse chasers Lewis Farrakhan and Jesse Jackson who beat the president to the punch in statements served up with generous helpings of pablum.

 Farrakhan . . . said he was bothered to hear a father say on a TV report that young people were not salvageable. "I believe all of us can be saved," Farrakhan said.

 And, Jackson said, students have the right to attend the "closest and safest school possible" rather than have to take multiple buses to get home.

"Why send these children into harm's way every day?" Jackson asked. "These are war zones. This wasn't an incident, it's a pattern." (Kristen Mack, Chicago Tribune)

That’s all. No call to action. No bitter recriminations directed at the young black thugs who killed the young black man. If, as many black American “spokesmen” claim, the community at large cannot – does not – understand the plight and the needs and the frustrations of black America, then don’t pontificate – educate! Spell out the plan, going beyond the typical blustering at how society has failed. First, justice. Then solutions. Then reconstruction. And throughout -- personal responsibility. This will be the key to the vault. Apparently no one has been able to find that elusive key, or – even worse – able to recognize it when they see it.    

 It would be fair to ask – who permits the area where the young man was killed to remain a war zone? Well, the problem is not being attacked with any recognizable fervor or courage by community leaders or educators in the city.

Meanwhile, our president seems clueless as to what he should do. The delay is costing him big-time, and the public is getting impatient.

 If President Obama doesn’t respond as president to the issue of youth violence in America, then he should at least respond as a resident of his Chicago home-town community and work personally to stop the killings and violence here. (The Black Star Project)

The impression of this inaction points to a debilitating moral failure on Mr. Obama’s part. His curious refusal to stand up for the weak, and roundly criticize those who prey on them, must cause us all to wonder at his character, his honesty, and his real commitment to justice – in Chicago, Washington, and around the globe.

In short – who is this guy?

I have seen no personal quotes from Mr. America indicating his awareness that children are dying, children are being killed, and, most chilling of all, children are killing children.

Look, I have no interest in having the Professor Louis “Pearly” Gates issue  blow over. I know it’s petty and trivial, but that’s what I like about it. I mean, it’s like . . . well, it’s like I want this silly crap to distract Obummer’s ability to stuff a flaky budget-busting gummint health care plan down the throats of protesting Americans!

And if we didn’t have this trumped up idiocy to irritate and bumfuzzle him, I’d be the first to try to get him distracted by something else. Anything else.

There’s another thing. When someone says, “Hey, let’s move on,” it doesn’t show he’s being magnanimous (whatever that means), it really is hard proof that he knows his argument is shot full of holes and he’s embarrassed at what he started but can’t finish. Okay? Well, that’s what Pearly said, in so many words.

Then, our President-in-Chief, who tried to laugh the whole shemozzle off, turned on his best smile (only because his trusty teleprompter said “Smile Now”) and just pretended he’d be buddies with the combatants, or litigants, or whatever they may eventually turn out to be.

And then, for gosh sakes, the leader of the Free World said he thought he could broker a cease-fire if Sgt. Crowley and Pearly would come over to the White House for a beer. Is that rich? I mean, the Obummers are set to go off on a vacation fit for royalty at Blue Heron Farm on Martha’s Vineyard. You can reserve the 28.5-acre retreat for only $35,000 to $50,000 per week.

A news story said the First Family definitely plans to rent the property. Actually, the Obamas plan for us to rent the property, and, speaking for all Americans, I can truthfully say that they deserve the best – our failing, debt-ridden, jobless economy notwithstanding. But listen, these dudes live high. Michele, a fashion maven, has a reported twenty staff assistants who cater to her every whim. One of the lowest paid indentured servants is named Sally M. Armbuster, and she gets $36,000 salary. I think she’s underpaid. Rahm Emanuel has the same job, and he pulls down $172,200, at least according to Mrs. Emanuel. Really? Is he married? I’ll have to get back to you on that. I didn’t check it out.

But where was I? Oh yeah, Baroque had invited Sgt. Crowley and Pearly Gates to the White House for a beer. What? Given the president’s taste for the opulent, as long as somebody else is picking up the check, he should dig a little deeper, and maybe even break for a case of Dom Perignon each for Pearly and the Sarge. I mean get real! You can steal a bottle of this bubbly – vintage 1971 – for a modest $1,153 US if you play your cards right – maybe even less on Shopzilla. And I can’t guess what a deal you could get if you have friends on the black market. (Take it easy, I don’t mean to offend, okay?)

Anyway, let’s say they get together – President Obummer, Professor Pearly Gates, and Sergeant Crowley. What then? Can’t you just see it? The three of them sitting on the grass in the Rose Garden, and Barry axes, “Can’t we all just get along?” Crowley says, “I’ll call it even if Pearly will just pass the church key.” Gates, a black man (look, I just threw that in because it might offend Al Sharpton) retorts, “I will, law dawg, if you’ll get me out of these &%#@?! handcuffs! And don’t ever jive me about a key again. I hate keys to heck.”

Crowley (a white cop, once accused of being a racist) apparently forgot it was 2009. Twist-off tops on beer bottles had rendered the beloved church key obsolete. The president -- always the conciliator, delegator and cogitater -- calls Hillary on his Raspberry and tells her to be in the Rose Garden in ten minutes to mediate a squabble “And bring some 8-8-8 fertilizer for Michele’s vegetable garden,” the leader of the Free World snapped.

I don’t know if Hillary obeyed this order. She’s got a lot on her mind too. She vows she won’t run for president, so that means she probably will. And her personal life is rumored to be coming under scrutiny. Hillary, who’s pretty sharp, dispelled the rumors when she is said to have said, “I did not have sex with that man, Mr. Clinton.”  She also seems suspicious of Sally Armbuster. Can’t blame her for that. Hillary went through a lot of pain with that arm.

I’m tired of this story and have to bring it to a close. And I know you must feel the same way. Bottom line is, I hope that the dust-up between Sergeant Crowley and Professor Henry Louis “Pearly”Gates goes into extra innings. It’s the only way I know of to keep Baroque busy so America’s health care can stay healthy.

Here’s how Newsmax described it:

“The police officer at the center of a national racial firestorm triggered by President Barack Obama told an interviewer Thursday that he had nothing to apologize for in the arrest of a black Harvard scholar, and that the president he didn’t vote for should have more carefully considered his words.”

Am I liking this? I think it’s hilarious.

And Newsmax did some more digging, showing yet again how petty our Big Man Obama can be, and how hypocritical he is:

“One reason Barack Obama may have been so critical of the Cambridge Police Department is that he might have a grudge against the law enforcement agency.

“Obama, who attended Harvard Law School from 1988 to 1991, lived in Cambridge and apparently didn't like the fact he was frequently hit with parking tickets.

“In all, Obama received 17 tickets for parking violations, and he did not pay 15 of them until a local newspaper exposed him as a scofflaw.”

It’s clear that Barry didn’t settle accounts because he felt guilty. Or because he feared that if he failed to live up to his obligations, he might be deprived of his fourteen virgins when he croaks. No, the timing is too incriminating. He didn’t really get a desperate case of honesty until his presidential campaign launched in 2007.

Whatever the case, Obama didn’t hesitate to rush to the defense of idiotic Hahvahd perfesser Henry Louis Gates Jr. who was arrested for being a disrespectful jerk after he broke into his own house.

No, of course the door wasn’t jammed. Teacher had just returned from China, where he soaked up too much Maotai (been there, done that). It’s the PRC’s official drunk juice (or for those of you, and there are many, who don’t understand English and don’t want to: (Máotái jiu). This pecadillo caused Henry to get such a helluva headache that he dropped his house key into the Yangtze while trying to hand it to a comely lass from Shanghai, and the next thing he knew when he came to he was looking into the steely eyes of Sgt. Crowley of the Cambridge police force. The rest is history.

As you know, the perfesser’s neighbors had called the police to announce that some dolt was breaking the door down to get into Gates’ rented home. Heck, if that happened at my house, I’d be delighted if someone tipped off the cops.

But Henry, who was the aforementioned dolt, far from being grateful (at the admitted mistake – heck, the neighbors just wanted to help out) blazed off impetuously at Sgt. Crowley to the extent that the officer slapped the cuffs on Gates and hauled him off to the pokey.

Fast forward to President Obama’s “news” conference, where, in response to a question, our First Mate, understandably non-plussed because Robert Gibbs had not put a coherent answer up on the teleprompter, blabbed that the Cambridge law man – a white American male or WAM – was “stupid”.

Are you loving this? Obama is supposed to be settling the national debt, protecting the border, giving us all free health care, getting the New Jersey mayors out of jail, and finding out why Hillary is all of a sudden so frisky.

But instead the president is focusing the awesome power of America’s liberal press on a little local dust-up in the innocuous village of Cambridge, and turning it into an international brouhaha.

There is some speculation that Obama, commander in chief of the U.S. Armed Forces, might employ the discredited Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 Raptor, a fifth generation fighter aircraft that uses stealth technology, to drop water balloons on the Cambridge police headquarters building.

“We’re not shelling out any more money we borrowed from China to pay for this big ol’ airplane, so we might as well get some use out of it to spook Sgt. Crowley,” the president is said to have said.

Let’s go ahead and play this thing out. Fox News says that the last round in this beautiful saga came when Sgt. Crowley, now incensed at all the flap, responded.

Said the Fox news organization: “The police officer who arrested a Harvard professor for disorderly conduct said Thursday he wants President Obama, who is the educator's friend, to butt out of the incident.”

And now there’s word that Officer Crowley may sue somebody over the whole sorry mess. Who? Well, I’m not really sure. At press time the possible defendants might be President Obama, Joe Biden, or Sen. Stuart Smalley.

If it’s President Obama, there is a rumor that he will freeze things until Judge Sodomayor is confirmed, because she always votes against the white guys.

“I can’t take a chance on having my Harvard degree impugned by a black professor who is mad because I can’t make a white Cambridge cop shut up,” our USA president is said to have said.

Is it over? Not until the fat lady sings. Aretha Franklin is booked up until 2012.

Why would Richard Cheney want to keep top secret intelligence from Democrats? Because top party leaders have shown themselves to be unfaithful to U.S. needs, untrustworthy where our security is concerned, and psychotically partisan in matters regarding our plans, objectives and procedures in global affairs!

But our stupid liberal media disregard the dismal track record of many of our duplicitous Democratic bigwigs who exhibit puzzling tendencies to leak classified information to the press, thus endangering U.S. covert operations.

I have a lot going on in my life right now, so am limited on the opportunity to do in-depth research, but it doesn’t take much effort to locate information about the sneaky, underhanded dirty tricks of people who claim to be solid Americans.

All you have to do is Google up something along the lines of “Democrats leak top secret information to press”. There’s plenty to choose from. I just pulled out a short list, which I want to quickly mention here. There’s a goldmine of this scandalous blabber-mouthing by Democrats – which needs to be brought to the light of day. Please help me do it.  

Toronto Sun columnist Rachel Marsden lamented the takeover of both houses of the U.S. Congress. “She compared voting out the Republicans and voting in the Democrats to firing your babysitter and hiring Michael Jackson.”

Carrying this absurdity to the next level, political writer Jim Kouri delivered a broadside at the man he called Senator Patrick “Leaky” Leahy. Kouri is currently a vice president of the National Association of Chief of Police. He writes and appears on national news shows such as CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, and others.

He impressed me with his insight, candor, and grasp of the facts in a copyrighted article first published in 2006:

“When I watched U.S. Supreme Court confirmation process for nominee Judge Samuel Alito, a shiver went up and down my spine as I listened to Democrat Senator Patrick “Leaky” as he discussed the NSA top secret operations. At the start of that hearing, Senator Arlen Specter (RINO-PA) mentioned the expected hearings on the NSA spy program and it hit me that the biggest leaker in Washington, DC would be involved in investigating top secret information.

“While I’m certain the members of big media are overjoyed at the prospect of being spoon fed little tidbits of classified information by the left-wing Senator from Vermont, most intelligence and law enforcement officials are concerned about having a man – who admits if he disagrees with a classified operation he will spill the beans – given complete access to secrets.”

Leahy’s penchant for exposing U.S. intelligence secrets was also lambasted by former special forces officer and columnist George Metcalf:

“Senator Pat Leahy was annoyed with the Reagan administration’s war on terrorism in the 1980s. At the time he was vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Therefore, ‘Leaky Leahy’ threatened to sabotage classified strategies he didn’t like. Leahy ‘inadvertently’ disclosed a top-secret intercept during a 1985 television interview. The intercept had made possible the capture of the Arab terrorists who had hijacked the cruise ship Achille Lauro and murdered American citizens.

“In July 1987, it was reported that Leahy leaked secret information about a 1986 covert operation planned by the Reagan administration to topple Libya’s Moammar Gaddhafi. US intelligence officials stated that Leahy sent a written threat to expose the operation directly to then-CIA Director William Casey. Weeks later, news of the secret plan turned up in the Washington Post, causing it to be aborted.

“In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, Leahy headed the Senate’s negotiations on the 2001 anti-terrorism bill, the USA Patriot Act. He was more concerned with protecting the civil liberties of the enemy than providing protection for Americans.”

Here’s just one more example of how left-wing Democrats continue to play fast and loose with sensitive U.S. military and intelligence secrets. This excerpt is from a recent story in The Chicago Tribune”

“A senior U.S. lawmaker said that unmanned CIA Predator aircraft operating in Pakistan are flown from an airbase inside that country, a revelation likely to embarrass the Pakistani government and complicate its counterterrorism collaboration with the United States.

“The disclosure by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, marked the first time a U.S official had publicly commented on where the Predator aircraft patrolling Pakistan take off and land.

“At a hearing, Feinstein expressed surprise at Pakistani opposition to the ongoing campaign of Predator-launched CIA missile strikes against Al Qaeda targets along Pakistan’s northwest border.

“As I understand it, these are flown out of a Pakistani base,” she said of the planes.

You know what, my TH friends and associates? This kind of sophomoric crap by elected officials who should know better – and probably do – just totally makes me sick!

It’s no wonder Richard Cheney has kept super-secret security information from certain of our “leaders” – Democrats who abuse their privilege and spill classified information with impunity.

These people are scary. They are traitors. And they are not to be trusted. That’s why secrets are kept secret from them. They don’t deserve to know.  

Barack Hussein Obama.

Who is this man? Friend or foe? Saint or satan? American or no? There’s enough wrong here for me to feel justified in my concern.

He has Muslim roots, Muslim relatives. His most noteworthy brush with Christianity – apparently a horror for him – was when he was outed as a follower of the heretical Jeremiah Wright. On the world stage he speaks of American “arrogance”. He has covered his tracks so well that we know little more about him today than when he campaigned for office.

For every moment that he dazzles, there are two moments in which he disappoints, three in which he baffles, four in which he creates deep concerns by Americans whose views of their presidents are shaped by evidence of Americanism.

At the D-Day observance in France, he still had his mask on – seeming strangely detached, disconnected from the ghosts of the battlefield and their heavy insistent presence.

His demeanor is now a familiar distraction. It has gotten so all his speeches sound the same. The language is pious and lofty, but is delivered with a vapid malaise, his head wagging back and forth as he switches monotonously from one teleprompter to the other. I think it is partly that his speeches, and his life, are scripted. He says nothing, but reads all, with the enthusiasm of a husband checking his wife’s grocery list.

Bill Clinton suffered from somewhat the same malady – that of a serial poseur. He was always overly aware of himself. One network reporter remarked that, before he came into a room, he appeared to “fix his face” into an expression he felt would be suitable to the occasion.

I confess that I watched and listened jealously as Obama went about his duties in live broadcasts from the site where so many Americans, British, Canadians, Aussies, and other of our Allies, died 65 years ago. Yes, and some Nazis too. This was a clue to my lingering suspicion and distrust of Obama. I searched for signs of an absence of reverence and obligation on his part toward God and country. I do not think he is totally American. I do not think he feels totally American.

God almost didn’t make it into his speech. In the early going, he said something to the effect that, as the young Allied assault troops rode grimly toward the beach on that blustery day on the Channel, each one “prayed to his own god.” I don’t capitalize this because God is not a member of a “god” club, who is asked to take care of the devotionals each Thursday. He is God the Almighty and Omnipotent, maker of heaven and earth, whose hand was evident in the victory – though a costly victory for freedom.

It required a day or two of thought for this post to come together. I wondered first what to say, then how to say it. It took the memory of Ronald Reagan to firm up in my mind where Barack Obama fell so woefully short in his speech to the D-Day gathering above Omaha Beach.

Dr. Paul Kengor evoked that memory for me. No stranger to our own bloggers, he is a featured Townhall writer, and author of several respected books about Ronald Reagan and other leading political figures. Kengor writes almost reverently of Mr. Reagan, who in 1952 was a popular actor when he addressed a commencement event in Fulton, Missouri.

The movie star, noted Kengor, told the graduates that America is “less of a place than an idea.” The writer ventured that Reagan framed America as an idea that resided in the souls of men. Said Reagan:

“I, in my own mind, have thought of America as a place in the divine scheme of things that was set aside as a promised land.”

That was how Ronald Regan saw America and its place in history, concluded Kengor. He wrote that Reagan challenged future generations to pick up the torch, and ensure America shines amid the darkness of humanity as “a Shining City on a Hill.”

In gratitude, I wrote this to Dr. Kengor:

“What a marvelous and fitting tribute to a man who may well have been America’s greatest president. He said things that many of us (I am now 72) hold dear about God, about our nation, and the ideas and ideals that came together to create the land we call home. I only wish that President Obama had many of the same perspectives that our beloved President Ronald Reagan had – just a few would be a precious gain. Obama somehow has no real sense of the history of our country. It almost seems that this is not HIS country. Anyway, you sketched a beautiful and memorable portrait of the dear, late president. Thank you.”

Where are we left? My take is that the main differences between President Reagan and President Obama are that Reagan was the consummate optimist, the proud patriot, the trusted friend and leader, the steadfast defender of freedom, the inspirational leader of the Free World, and one who unashamedly accorded God credit for America’s greatness. Sadly, none of these things seem to describe Mr. Obama.

Where President Reagan’s speeches were stirring, Obama’s are – well, boring, devoid of passion. Where Mr. Reagan’s agenda was based on a foundation of individual initiative, Obama’s bugle sounds the call to collectivism. Where President Reagan fought for lower taxes and less government, Mr. Obama seeks the opposite. Where Mr. Reagan called for peace through strength, Mr. Obama seems adrift, but tilts toward a philosophy of appeasement through inaction. Where Obama’s persona seems a confused and confusing hash of loyalties, one always knew where President Reagan stood. His messages were simple, direct, clearly framed, and totally made in America. If you were enemy or friend, you knew where he stood.

President Reagan, too, paid homage to the fallen Allied liberators at Normandy. His address took place on the 40^th anniversary of the D-Day landing. It was called one of his most memorable speeches. Here is part of what he said:

“What inspired all the men of the armies that met here? We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith and belief; it was loyalty and love. The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or on the next. It was the deep knowledge – and pray God we have not lost it – that there is a profound, moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt. You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One’s country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it’s the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man.

“Here, in this place where the West held together, let us make a vow to our dead. Let us show them by our actions that we understand what they died for. Let our actions say to them the words for which Matthew Ridgeway listened: “I will not fail thee or forsake thee.” Strengthened by their courage, heartened by their valor, and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died. Thank you very much, and God bless you all.”

In a fitting twist of history, Ronald Reagan, a two-term U.S. president in the 1980s, slipped away on the eve of the 60^th anniversary of the D-Day invasion of Normandy.

Five years later to the day, history may recall, U.S. President Barack Hussein Obama had his own turn at the lectern.

One report said that Dr. Tiller was shot in the foyer. Another version claimed that he was hit in the torso. The gunman fled, but a 51-year-old suspect was arrested some 170 miles away in suburban Kansas City three hours after the shooting, Wichita Deputy Police Chief Tom Stolt said. “That old boy can flat drive fast, that’s for sure,” the chief allowed

The suspect's name was not released; police had been looking for a gunman who fled in a car registered in the Kansas City suburb of Merriam. Stolt said the man was being brought back to Wichita. “Why take him to Chicago or St. Louis, when he didn’t have any connections there?” the chief insisted.

“He died in a place of peace,” intoned the deceased child killer’s attorney. Tiller’s victims also died in a place of peace – the mother’s womb, a holy place in God’s eyes, where sanctity and security are an inalienable right – in America, if not in communist China, for example, where killing the unborn is not an option but a mandate.

The Guangdong Region was proclaimed champion of abortions in 1996, the last year for which local totals are available. Jiangxi came in second. Asked why there are no definitive statistics in recent years, an abortion expert said, “Who’s counting?”

On a worldwide basis, in 2003, 48% of all abortions were termed “unsafe”. It is likely that this is an understatement, since 100% of the abortions were not only unsafe, but deadly – for the unborn infant, of course.

So the beat goes on. Here in the USA, baby-killers with licenses continue to ply their deadly trade with abandon, despite protests and petitions by pro-life citizens. The Christian community is perhaps the most outspoken and committed to outlawing abortion – legally, and by non-violent means.

The word’s out. President Obama has figured out a combination that he feels will boiler-plate his nominee for Supreme Court Justice. Sonja Saddamizer. (That can’t be right. I’ll check out Merriam-Webster to see what the experts say and get back to it. Or not.)

Well, when the president announced his nominee, an admittedly bright lady of Puerto Rican descent, I was more than surprised, like a lot of people, at how he justified his choice.

“I picked her for several reasons, which I refuse to enumerate. First, she’s about the same hue as I am. That was key. She’s definitely not white. Hell, I’m more white than she is. So in some ways I resent what she said about honkies not having a richness of experience. Although she’s a little truculent, whatever that means, you can see for yourself that she is a tad porky. She seems to have good teeth, so she’s healthier than most babes of color. Since she is an outspoken racist, I have wondered if she might harbor secret harmful thoughts about people who are the offspring of Thai males and white American babes. But in a way I like her candor, because she says insensitive, racist things about a group that I happen to dislike – el gringos.”

Judge Soddenminor noted that the Supreme Court was uniformly white and male when it delivered historic rulings against racial and sexual discrimination. And she said she tried to question her own “opinions, sympathies, prejudices, and stuff.” She concluded that she had no bias, or scorn for people who aren’t like her, “although I could if I wanted to.”

Still, Judge Sarasota questioned whether achieving impartiality “is possible in all, or even, in most, cases.” She added, “And I wonder whether by ignoring our differences as women or men of color we do a disservice both to the law and society.”

By this time, the eyes of many in the crowd were beginning to glaze over and they transitioned into serious siesta mode because, while it was obvious that the judge knows a lot of big words, she was getting mucho boring.

“We really don’t need to know that much about her anyway,” said Nancy Pelosi. “She’s non-white, non-Republican, non-conservative, non-male, and Barack picked her out. What more do we want? We can’t go off invading her privacy, for gosh sakes. She’s got her dignity, after all. Know what I’m sayin’? And why can't I vote, by the way? I'm as important as any Senator and a lot prettier than Richard Byrd.”

Warning: There is a remote possibility that much of the foregoing “information” is in error, totally satirical, and probably irrelevant in the extreme. But I couldn’t swear to it.

I THINK BLOOMBERG HAS GOOD STUFF. A juicy tidbit by the news service recently dealt with the bizarre goings-on over selection of a replacement for David Souter on the High Court. Well, this decision goes beyond a routine political litmus test to ascertain the track record and credentials of Souter’s successor. Here are some of the other attributes this individual will have to offer, if you can believe it, and I do:

·        Must be a woman (definitely not a male and stuff like that)

·        Must be thin (i.e. not fat, obese, chubby, porky, etc.)

·        Must be healthy (not likely to die too soon for the party in power, or PIP)

Friends, is that not cool? And can you imagine the fireworks if such a scandalous development were to take place during consideration of a Justice by a conservative Republican president?

Well, that ain’t happening here. Instead of fireworks, there’s just a smoldering of sorts as news leaks out about these embarrassing revelations in the Democrats’ consideration process.

Oh, I’m just loving this. How politically incorrect can the Democrats be? What a zoo! But I think they overlooked an obvious choice – Twiggy.

THE HAMMER HAS FALLEN in the U.S. Senate confirmation of Obama pick Kathleen Sebelius as the nation’s Health and Human Services secretary. The 65-31 vote, said AP, propels the former Kansas governor “into the middle of the public health emergency involving swine flu.”

The wire service report consequently found a handy dodge to overlook one of the most compelling stories of the Sebelius confirmation – her appalling record on abortion.

North Carolina has senators on both sides of this struggle, and they voted according to their respective parties, and, it must be expected, their heartfelt beliefs – U.S. Senator Kay Hagan, a liberal Democrat (YES), and U.S. Senator Richard Burr, a conservative Republican (NO). I sent the following email to Senator Hagan, as part of an American Conservative Union vote monitoring campaign:  

“I am disappointed but not surprised at your vote in favor of confirmation of Abortion Queen Kathleen Sebelius. This move will directly cost the lives of many unborn babies. How could you do this? Have you stopped to think what a horror it is to be ripped from your mother's womb, then discarded in a dumpster? I know you do not consider what your fate would have been if your own mother had the urge -- for any reason -- to rid herself of the child that would be Kay Hagan. I will do all I can to assure your defeat in the next election. I wonder if you are worth saving, although innocent unborn children definitely are.”

Wow. That came off a little tougher than I thought. Do I sound insensitive? Well, I hope so. But our “leaders” who shrug off the real meaning of abortion should be subjected to the heat of public opinion on this vital issue.

Senator Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican, is getting into the short rows in his first term as a U.S. Senator. Due in part to his low-key approach in Washington, he is considered by Democrats to be a vulnerable target. But he is an honest and capable public servant. North Carolina, which has fielded such outstanding Republican Senators as Jesse Helms and Elizabeth Dole, must not allow both Senate seats to fall into the blue zone. National war chests will make this 2010 contest an important one, as well as an expensive and intensely waged battle. I'll keep you posted as things heat up.

IS BREVITY ALL IT’S CRACKED UP TO BE? YOU BE THE JUDGE:

The Lord’s Prayer         56 words

Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address   266 words

The Ten Commandments     297 words

The Declaration of Independence 300 words