Any speech in which President Obama announces a change in policy follows the same basic format of denouncing Bush’s policy, taking long thoughtful pauses, then adopting Bush’s policy.
Well known conservative Rachel Maddow said Mr. Obama claimed even more dictatorial power for himself than did President Bush, or any president in history for that matter.
Meanwhile, Published today, elsewhere:
For the last eight years, a sort of parlor game has been played listing the various ways the Bush anti-terror policies supposedly destroyed the Constitution. Liberal opponents — prominent among them Sen. Barack Obama — railed against elements of the Patriot Act, military tribunals, rendition, wiretaps, email intercepts, and Predator drone attacks. These supposedly unnecessary measures, plus Bush’s policies in postwar Iraq, were said to be proof, on Bush’s part, of either paranoia or blatantly partisan efforts to scare us into supporting his unconstitutional agenda.
Now, thanks to President Obama, the verdict is in: All of the Bush protocols turned out to reflect a bipartisan national consensus that has kept us safe from another 9/11-style attack.
How do we know that? Because President Obama — despite earlier opposition and current name changes and nuancing — has kept intact the entire Bush anti-terrorism program.