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Obama Explains His Remark About Punishing "Enemies"
CBS News ^ | November 1, 2010 | Dan Farber

Posted on 05/17/2013 10:16:18 AM PDT by grundle

After House Minority Leader John Boehner chided him for using the term "enemies" in a conversation last week with Univision Radio, President Obama offered an explication for his remark in an interview today with talk radio host Michael Baisden.

Following is Mr. Obama's "enemies" quote from the Univision interview:

"If Latinos sit out the election instead of saying, 'We're gonna punish our enemies, and we're gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us' -- if they don't see that kind of upsurge in voting in this election -- then I think it's going to be harder. And that's why I think it's so important that people focus on voting on November 2nd."

Here is what Boehner said about Mr. Obama's use of the word "enemies" in prepared remarks for a speech Monday night.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have a president in the White House who referred to Americans who disagree with him as 'our enemies.' Think about that. He actually used that word. When Ronald Reagan, George Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush used the word 'enemy,' they reserved it for global terrorists and foreign dictators -- enemies of the United States. Enemies of freedom. Enemies of our country. Today, sadly, we have president who uses the word 'enemy' for fellow Americans -- fellow citizens. He uses it for people who disagree with his agenda of bigger government -- people speaking out for a smaller, more accountable government that respects freedom and allows small businesses to create jobs. Mr. President, there's a word for people who have the audacity to speak up in defense of freedom, the Constitution, and the values of limited government that made our country great. We don't call them 'enemies.' We call them 'patriots.'"

Mr. Obama told Baisden that he should have used the word, "opponents," rather than "enemies" (see below). According to his language parsing, presumably some Republicans candidates are "opponents," not "enemies," of provisions, such as comprehensive immigration reform. Understood?

"And you know, it's interesting right now, there was a -- I had a conversation with a Hispanic radio outlet, Univision, and during the course of that conversation, one of the things that I had to say to the Latino community, which is frustrated that we haven't seen progress on immigration reform, was that they can't sit out of this election. There were arguments being made that because Democrats hadn't gotten this done, that Latinos should vote against Democrats or just sit out the election."

"And I said, well, you can't punish your friends when -- the folks who've been supporting it. Now, I did also say if you're going to punish somebody, punish your enemies, and I probably should have used the word, "opponents" instead of enemies. Now the Republicans are saying that I'm calling them enemies. What I'm saying is you're an opponent of this particular provision, comprehensive immigration reform, which is something very different."

"But the key issue here is that if you are supportive of comprehensive immigration reform, if you are supportive of health care reform, if you are supportive of making sure that credit card companies are treating us fairly, making sure that banks are properly regulated so they don't end up getting taxpayer bailouts -- if you support those things, then you've got to support those who helped to put those provisions into law. And you've got to make sure that those who are opposed to that legislation, that they get a clear message that they shouldn't be standing in the way of the progress, but rather we should be moving this country forward."


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: punishgraphic; punishyourenemies
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To: Mark17
LOL!! So, "we gonna punish our enemies opponents, and reward our friends" makes it all better? It's also the word 'punish' that is out of line. This jerk was President when he said that and now we see his Chicago politics at work via all his agencies.
21 posted on 05/17/2013 10:47:57 AM PDT by GeorgeWashingtonsGhost
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To: grundle

Obozo... always with an explanation AFTER the fact. Always leading from behind.

The "Kenyan Clown Circus" continues.

22 posted on 05/17/2013 10:48:55 AM PDT by VideoDoctor
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To: grundle
If we can't use the power of persuasion, we'll use the persuasion of power.

Andy Stern, former SEIU president.
23 posted on 05/17/2013 10:50:29 AM PDT by cripplecreek (REMEMBER THE RIVER RAISIN!)
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To: grundle

Gettign about itme for Karl Rove to run an ad shwoing dear leader repeatign over and over again ‘punish them’ - this woudl be perfect right now with the irs scandal punishing folks who were conservative-


24 posted on 05/17/2013 10:54:50 AM PDT by CottShop (Scientific belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge)
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To: Slyfox

valerie jarret looks like an alien lizard from V and has the same morality.


25 posted on 05/17/2013 11:03:48 AM PDT by bravo whiskey (We should not fear our government. Our government shoud fear us.)
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To: grundle

26 posted on 05/17/2013 11:10:28 AM PDT by mirkwood
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To: grundle

The whole point, for a leftist, of attaining power, is to punish your “enemies”,

and for a leftist, it is absolutely INTOLERABLE that anyone disagree with you,
so even those who don’t go 100% with your ideology are considered enemies.


27 posted on 05/17/2013 11:12:55 AM PDT by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: V_TWIN

5/14/2012 @ 7:53PM |3,237 views
The Obama Campaign’s Nixonian “White House Enemies List”

The Obama campaign appears to have taken a page from Nixon’s reelection campaign playbook — and is now mounting attacks on private individuals.

On April 20th KEEPINGGOPHONEST.COM published a post titled “Behind the curtain: A brief history of Romney’s donors.”

KEEPINGGOPHONEST.COM was launched earlier this year as one of the three components of the Obama reelection campaign’s “Truth Team” – a new effort to engage Obama supporters online and in person, encouraging them to communicate with undecided voters.

While the stated goal of this effort was fact checking Republicans’ claims about their own record, the post was used to publicly identify and smear eight private individuals – or in their own words “high-dollar and special-interest donors” that “Mitt Romney is relying on…to fund his campaign.” Four individuals were listed under the heading Donors who benefit from betting against America while four were categorized as special interest donors. After each name, the campaign listed deeds that they find “less-than-reputable” or reflective of being “on the wrong side of the law” or making “profits at the expense of so many Americans.”

Each name was then tweeted out by the @TruthTeam2012 twitter handle with similar charges, and the list was also disseminated by email to a grassroots network of Truth Team volunteers – calling on their vast grassroots network of volunteers to spread the word and vilify the eight individuals.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/dougschoen/2012/05/14/the-obama-white-house-enemies-list/

.


28 posted on 05/17/2013 11:16:45 AM PDT by Para-Ord.45
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To: Para-Ord.45

What would be interesting is to know the list of punishments and to what degree he was going to use punishments on his enemies.


29 posted on 05/17/2013 11:29:21 AM PDT by Conserev1 ("Still Clinging to my Bible and my Weapon")
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To: Resolute Conservative
I want him punished.

With a child?

/humor

30 posted on 05/17/2013 11:48:26 AM PDT by Max in Utah (A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within.)
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To: bravo whiskey
I see what you mean:


31 posted on 05/17/2013 2:49:53 PM PDT by Slyfox (The red face of shame is proof that the conscience is still operational.)
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To: Slyfox

Bump!


32 posted on 05/17/2013 7:15:13 PM PDT by Tunehead54 (Nothing funny here ;-)
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To: grundle

What a weasel punk.


33 posted on 05/17/2013 7:16:36 PM PDT by TADSLOS (The Event Horizon has come and gone. Buckle up and hang on.)
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To: Paine in the Neck
Larry Grathwohl: The instructions I received from Billy Ayers was that the bombs to be used in Detroit must have shrapnel (fence staples, specifically) and fire potential (propane bottles). The intention was to kill police officers....

Sounds a lot like the Boston bombers.

34 posted on 05/17/2013 10:12:39 PM PDT by Slyfox (The red face of shame is proof that the conscience is still operational.)
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To: mirkwood

I feel really sorry for Jarrett’s six man 24-7 security detail.


35 posted on 05/17/2013 10:14:38 PM PDT by Slyfox (The red face of shame is proof that the conscience is still operational.)
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