Hurricanes, Hatred and Hypocrisy

Freedom Alliance ^ | 09-01-05 | Oliver North--Commentary

[smoothsailing]

   

Hurricanes, Hatred and Hypocrisy

by Oliver North

September 1, 2005--Washington, D.C. –

At one time in the history of our grand republic, political discourse was a much more civil endeavor. While politicians have disagreed, debated, argued, and even on occasion, fought on the floor of Congress, there has generally been a certain level of decorum between the two major political parties and among the three branches of government. Sadly, that no longer seems to be the case – and it's hurting our country.      

           "Mr. President, congratulations. You're a tough adversary," Tip O'Neill said in a 1981 telephone call to President Ronald Reagan after Congress voted to approve the President's economic package. The very liberal Mr. O'Neill had strenuously opposed the Reagan tax cuts, but the Speaker went on to say, "I want to wish you all the success in the world."    

           Who in today's Democrat party would offer such words to President Bush? Who on "the Hill" – which liberal pundit – what Democrat party leader – would adhere to what once was an unwritten rule of mutual respect between political rivals? Extremists in today's Democrat Party are so full of anger that even the horrific devastation and human suffering brought on by Hurricane Katrina have failed to produce any discernible détente in their torrent of viscera.          

       Katrina has created a humanitarian crisis worse than any natural disaster in U.S. history. Yet, while hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens in New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast are mourning dead family and friends and trying to comprehend their losses in the flooded streets, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., is blaming Haley Barbour, the Republican governor of Mississippi, and the GOP for the devastation caused by the hurricane.                

     "Now we are all learning what it's like to reap the whirlwind of fossil fuel dependence which Barbour and his cronies have encouraged," read Mr. Kennedy's post on Arriana Huffington's anti-Bush website. The eco-evangelist went on to suggest to his disciples that God may have been offended by a memorandum Mr. Barbour – former Chairman of the Republican Party – had written to President Bush about flaws in the United Nations Kyoto Protocol on global warming. "Perhaps," Mr. Kennedy wrote, "it was Barbour's memo that caused Katrina, at the last moment, to spare New Orleans and save its worst flailings (sic) for the Mississippi coast."     

        Set aside for a moment whether the people of New Orleans consider themselves "spared" the worst of Katrina. The Kennedy screed is not only theologically offensive – it is at best, outrageously insensitive to the plight of countless Americans now searching through waterlogged rubble for the bodies of loved ones and treasured belongings. At worst, it ranks with Senator Richard "Dick" Durbin's likening American soldiers to the armies of Hitler, Stalin or Cambodia's Pol Pot.  

           Regrettably, Mr. Kennedy is not alone in ignoring the humanitarian and refugee crisis occurring along America's Gulf Coast to further a narrow political agenda. On Wednesday, as government, Salvation Army and Red Cross officials were appealing for every possible kind of help, a coalition liberal activists brushed aside the plight of Katrina's victims to demand media attention for their opposition to John Roberts, Mr. Bush's nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court.      

           This is the kind of press-prompted, vitriol that has been evident for much of the summer outside the President's ranch in Crawford, Texas. Aided and abetted by the so-called mainstream media, Cindy Sheehan, the bereaved mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, has been reduced to the role of center-piece for aging, '60s-era, anti-military radicals. Surrounded by a coterie of sound-bite savvy activists, she deviated from her "Get Out of Iraq Now" script this week to join Mr. Kennedy in blaming President Bush for the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina.  

All of this in the midst of the Katrina crisis is enough to make one wary of what Washington will be like for administration officials when Congress returns from their month-long vacation next week. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has already been summoned to appear before the Armed Services committees to "answer questions" about the war.  

Mr. Rumsfeld, a regular target of rhetorical abuse from the left, has been through this before. When he last testified before Senate Armed Services Committee on June 23rd, the Defense Secretary was subjected to a disgusting verbal barrage from Senators Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Robert Byrd (D-WV) that was shamefully personal. Had it not taken place in "the world's greatest deliberative body," it could have been branded as "hate speech."  

The record of the hearing is replete with rancorous character attacks against a man who has worked tirelessly to prosecute a war against enemies who behead hostages and kill innocents.  Senator Kennedy's hypocrisy was boundless: "I'm talking about misjudgments, gross errors and mistakes. Those are on your watch. Isn't it time for you to resign?" he shouted. "Our troops deserve better, the American people deserve better." The Massachusetts liberal concluded his diatribe with a comment that might have been introspective: "They deserve competency and they deserve facts. In baseball, it's three strikes and you're out."  

Senator Byrd was equally shrill and contemptible, but he may simply have forgotten that Mr. Rumsfeld once served as a naval officer and a member of Congress. "I've just heard enough of your smart answers to these people here who are elected. We are elected. You're not elected," said the West Virginia Senator who never served in any uniform except the white cloak of the Ku Klux Klan. He then ordered the Defense Secretary: "So get off your high horse when you come up here…Have a little respect for what we try to do."  

As they used to tell us in the Marines: You cannot demand respect. You have to earn it.

Oliver North is a nationally syndicated columnist and the founder and honorary chairman of Freedom Alliance.

[goldstategop]

The Democrats are the Rodney Dangerfield Party of American politics. They have not earned the country's respect - let alone its trust.

(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)

[359Henrie]

Democrats and respect... I just can't put the two together

[weegee]

The Vietnam War protestors divided this country.

The 2004 election divided this country like little else in recent times.

John Kerry was a leader in the movement both tines, and he thinks HE could have brought this country together?

[TheBattman]

Now THIS is definitive proof that it's ALL Bush's fault ---- it says so right here:

http://community.netscape.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?webtag=ws-newsforum&nav=messages&tid=201026

[ladyinred]

BRAVO!

[smoothsailing]

There is one thing the Democrats,the media and all the other assorted leftist hatemongers have earned:

MY UNWAVERING CONTEMPT

[workerbee]

"Now we are all learning what it's like to reap the whirlwind of fossil fuel dependence which Barbour and his cronies have encouraged," read Mr. Kennedy's post on Arriana Huffington's anti-Bush website. The eco-evangelist went on to suggest to his disciples that God may have been offended by a memorandum Mr. Barbour – former Chairman of the Republican Party – had written to President Bush about flaws in the United Nations Kyoto Protocol on global warming. "Perhaps," Mr. Kennedy wrote, "it was Barbour's memo that caused Katrina, at the last moment, to spare New Orleans and save its worst flailings (sic) for the Mississippi coast."

What a POS. I wonder how much fossil fuel Little Bobby will burn up flying around the country in private jets over the next year spewing this BS?

[singfreedom]

Unfortunately, Kennedy and Byrd are both blissfully ignorant of just how irrelevant they have rendered themselves.

I still think one of Kennedy's funniest diatribes was regarding the "waterboarding" allegedly occurring at Abu Graba*s. To hear this, the "Hero of Chappaquiddick" talk about "almost" drowning terrorists, was just too "theater of the absurd".

[sydbas]

Kennedy wrote, "it was Barbour's memo that caused Katrina, at the last moment, to spare New Orleans and save its worst flailings (sic) for the Mississippi coast."

This is a disgusting comment from the total elitist Robert Kennedy Jr.. He should stop living off his name and fortune and get a real job like the rest of us because when it comes to the ways of the world he doesn't know jack sh_t. I doubt that he has even ever stepped foot in either Louisiana or Mississippi.

[Unam Sanctam]

At one time in the history of our grand republic, political discourse was a much more civil endeavor.

The Adams v. Jefferson election of 1800 was incredibly nasty and vicious.

[smoothsailing]

The Kennedy's all have one thing in common other than their name.

The natural ability to be totally disgusting rich white trash.

[KosmicKitty]

Remember a time when politicans actually cared about the United States of America more than their own party.

[Frank_2001]

Agreed!

[Just Lori]

I'm so glad I saw the light. Well, it wasn't a "light" actually. Observation, common sense, & my patriotism told me to get the he!! out of the Democrat party.

[Roccus]

Although many still love him here, Robert C. Byrd is ripe for the taking. The problem is that the WV State Rep. Committee is in debt and disaray and the RNC is too incompetent to see just what an opportunity is at hand. This is a state that has voted in Pres. Bush twice but in which Dems outnumber Reps. by 2 to 1. A great number of people in WV are registered as Dems just to be able to accomplish anything locally. Still, the RNC ignores what could be a windfall.

[Mr. Jeeves]

Republicans are still adhering to the old rule of refusing to dignify preposterous mischaracterizations and insults with a respone.

The problem is, to today's undereducated voters, silence in the face of unjustified criticism equals not dignity but assent.

Lee Atwater and Dick Morris understood that.

[Ryan Spock]

The Adams v. Jefferson election of 1800 was incredibly nasty and vicious.

It's true that there are countless examples in the past of very vicious and combative goings-on in the political arena, but at the end of the day, there was an underlying understanding that we're all on the same team. You fight to see your political beliefs and principles win out in the arena of ideas, and take your case to the people to decide by elections whose ideas they favor.

But I do think that Oliver North's observation is perfectly valid as it relates to today's Democrats. For some reason, they were a fun bunch of good ol' boys during all those years and years of absolute power, and the Republicans (as still seems to be the case too often) were perfectly content to be the loyal opposition, and when the day was done, to honorably accept political defeat and gracefully consider the outcome to be "the will of the people".

But with the Democrats, the hatred is real, palpable, and consumes them. It is a full-time preoccupation with discrediting Bush, demonizing conservatives and Christians, and blaming America for all the ills in the world.

[AZ_Cowboy]

Bingo. Now if we could just get the other fraction of the GOP and Conservatives in general on board, we'd be set.

[Zack Nguyen]

The very liberal Mr. O'Neill had strenuously opposed the Reagan tax cuts, but the Speaker went on to say, "I want to wish you all the success in the world."

That was gracious, but as I recall O'Neill in his biography claimed that the election of Ronald Reagan was a "sinful thing." Perhaps someone could confirm.