Marco Rubio Uses Obama's Own Words Against Him After Former President Calls for 'Decency'
Former President Barack Obama’s speech Friday at the University of Illinois has dominated several news cycles. This isn’t surprising since it represents the first time the former president has really addressed the sitting president by name instead of skirting around him using innuendoes, treating him as if he were Voldemort.
What has been surprising are the rapturous plaudits Obama’s speech received. I understand most of what Obama does gets plaudits in the mainstream media — but there was an unusual audacity to pretty much everything he said, and it didn’t involve the audacity of hope.
Four times during the speech did a president who intentionally divided America for eight years in the White House talk about “divisions,” according to a transcript from Vox; and each of those “divisive” instances involved Republicans.
It didn’t take much to notice the incongruence. Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida certainly did, and he went to Twitter to expose it.
Pres. Obama is right. It is wrong for a President to use divisive language, such as:
1. Call all opponents of same-sex marriage bigots
2. Call the Pro-Life movement a "War on Women"
3. Call all immigration enforcement advocates racists
4. Call the GOP the enemy of Hispanics— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
Yes, Obama did all of that. And so much more, too!
How about when he made a joke about former First Lady
Nancy Reagan conducting seances? https://t.co/pVgBUXEw1b— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
Ah yes, not divisive at all. And then Rubio brought out what was arguably Obama’s most divisive hit, released before he even took up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania.
Barack Obama on people left behind by new economy: “And it’s not surprising then they get bitter,they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
This is how the same man who talked about how “the politics of division and resentment and paranoia has unfortunately found a home in the Republican Party” on Friday explained those people who disagreed with the Democrats on issues like trade or immigration: guns and religion. I didn’t find that quote mentioned a whole lot after Friday’s address.
And there were more of Obama’s greatest hits to remind people of. Much more.
Barack Obama justifying ignoring constitution limits on the power of President: “Middle-class families can’t wait for Republicans in Congress to do stuff. So sue me.”
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
Barack Obama in a Univision interview calling on Hispanics to vote against GOP “enemies”: “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…”
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
Barack Obama at a speech at American University accused those who opposed #IranDeal of making common cause with those in Iran who chant “Death to America”.
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 8, 2018
The media seemed to have collective amnesia about these comments on Friday. And Obama did, too.
“I am here to tell you that even if you don’t agree with me or Democrats on policy, even if you believe in more libertarian economic theories, even if you are an evangelical and our position on certain social issues is a bridge too far, even if you think my assessment of immigration is mistaken and the Democrats aren’t serious enough about immigration enforcement, I’m here to tell you that you should still be concerned with our current course and should still want to see a restoration of honesty and decency and lawfulness in our government,” he told the audience.
How wonderful it would have been if the spirit “of honesty and decency and lawfulness in our government” been evident in all the years Obama was in office or his party maintained any of the levers of power in Washington. Today, if you wanted to see the real spirit — or, dare I say, “lodestar” — of the Democrats in action, you need only have watched the Kavanaugh hearings.
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