PressTV:
What Obama told us at West Point, by Paul Craig Roberts
June 2, 2014 by
Mon
Jun 2, 2014 1:25PM GMT
By
Paul Craig Roberts
At West Point Obama told us,
to the applause of West Point cadets, that “American exceptionalism” is a
doctrine that justifies whatever Washington does.
If Washington violates domestic and international law by torturing “detainees” or violates the Nuremberg standard by invading countries that have undertaken no hostile action against the US or its allies, “exceptionalism” is the priest’s blessing that absolves Washington’s sins against law and international norms.
Washington’s crimes are transformed into Washington’s affirmation of the rule of law. Here is Obama in his own words:
“I believe in American exceptionalism with every fiber of my
being. But what makes us exceptional is not our ability to flout international
norms and the rule of law; it is our willingness to affirm them through our actions.”
Actions indeed. In the 21st century “American exceptionalism”
has destroyed seven countries in whole or in part. Millions of people are dead,
maimed, and displaced, and all of this criminal destruction is evidence of
Washington’s reaffirmation of international norms and the rule of law.
Destruction and murder are merely collateral damage from Washington’s
affirmation of international norms.
“American exceptionalism” also means that US presidents can lie
through their teeth and misrepresent those they choose to demonize. Listen to
Obama’s misrepresentations of the Putin and Assad governments:
“Russia’s aggression towards former Soviet states unnerves
capitals in Europe . . . In Ukraine, Russia’s recent actions recall the days
when Soviet tanks rolled into Eastern Europe .” Obama misrepresents Assad as “a
dictator who bombs and starves his own people.”
Did any of the cadets in Obama’s West Point audience wonder why,
if Assad is a brutal dictator who bombs and starves his own people, the Syrian
people are supporting Assad instead of the American-backed “liberation forces,”
the combination of imported … [militants] and al-Qaeda fighters who object to
Assad’s government because it is secular? The US military is taught to respect
its civilian commander-in-chief, but if West Point cadets actually do obtain an
education, it is remarkable that Obama’s audience did not break out in
laughter.
The reference to Soviet tanks rolling into Eastern Europe is a
reference to the Hungarian (1956) and Czech (1968) “revolutions” when the
Hungarian and Czech communist leaders attempted to assert independence from
Moscow. It is doubtful that Washington’s response to countries attempting to
exit NATO would be any different. A few months ago, Washington responded to
political talk in Germany and England about leaving the EU by informing both
governments that it was not in Washington’s interest for them to depart from
the European Union.
Obama used the image of Soviet tanks in order to color Russia
with the Soviet Threat, to mischaracterize Russia’s response to the Georgian
invasion of South Ossetia, and to misrepresent Crimea’s vote in favor of
reunification with Russia as “Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea.”
These lies are still a mainstay in the US media and in Washington’s official
propaganda.
Obama’s speech is probably the most disingenuous ever given by a
Western politician.
We could have fun for hours with all the crimes that Washington commits but
buries in rhetoric directed at others. Perhaps my favorite is Obama evoking a
world in which “individuals aren’t slaughtered because of political belief.” I
am sure Obama was thinking of this just world when he murdered without due
process of law four American citizens “outside of areas of active hostilities.”
Another favorite is the way Obama flushed the US Constitution of
its meaning. Obama said, with reference to bringing the Guantanamo prisoners to
the US, that “American values and legal traditions don’t permit the indefinite
detention of people beyond our borders.” No, Obama, the US Constitution
prevents the indefinite detention of US citizens by the US government anywhere
on earth, especially within our borders.
By detaining and by murdering US citizens without due process of
law, Obama has violated his oath of office and should be impeached. It was only a short time ago that [former]
president Bill Clinton was impeached by the US House of Representatives (the
Senate saved him from conviction) for lying about his sexual affair with a
White House intern. How times change. Today a president who violates his oath
of office to protect the Constitution from enemies foreign and domestic gets a
free ride. The Constitution has lost its power to
protect citizens from the arbitrary power of government. The US is the
Constitution. Without the Constitution, the US ceases to exist, and the country
becomes a tyranny, both at home and abroad. Today the US is a tyranny cloaked
in the garb of “freedom and democracy.”
Instead of laughing our way through Obama’s ridiculous
speech to what apparently was a dumbed-down West Point graduating class, lets
pay attention to Obama’s bottom line: “America must
always lead on the world stage. . . . The military is, and always will be, the
backbone of that leadership.”
In other words, Washington does not use diplomacy. Washington
uses coercion. The favorite threat is: “Do as you are told or we will bomb you
into the Stone Age.”
Obama’s speech is a justification of Washington’s criminal actions on the
grounds that Washington acts for the exceptional Americans whose exceptionalism
places them and, thereby, their government above law and international norms.
In this way of thinking, only the failure to prevail constitutes failure.
Americans
are the new ubermensch, the new master race. Inferior humans can be bombed,
invaded, and sanctioned. Obama’s West Point speech asserts American superiority
over all others and Washington’s determination to continue this superiority by
preventing the rise of other powers. This arrogant
hubris was not enough for the Washington Post editorial board. The newspaper’s
editorial damned Obama for binding US power and limiting its use to “a narrow
set of core interest,” such as direct threats to America.
The American “liberal media” object that Obama’s claim of
exceptionalism is not broad enough for Washington’s purposes. Obama’s address,
the Washington Post wrote, bound “US power” and “offered scant comfort” to
those militarists who want to overthrow Syria, Iran, Russia, and China.
The world should take note that the most militarily aggressive
American president in history is considered a wimp by the neoconized American
media. The media drives wars, and the American media, firmly allied with the
military/security complex, is driving the world to the final war.
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