Was Dinesh D’Souza right? Mr. D’Souza is a political commentator who proposed that the best explanation of President Obama’s behavior was not to be found in Obama’s seeming embrace of the radical socialism of Saul Alinsky but in the anti-colonialism of his father. Mr. D’Souza’s theory has been heatedly dismissed by the White House with the admonition that in America we do not judge people by their father’s political beliefs and that Ronald Reagan’s father was an alcoholic.
Fair enough, but then Ronald Reagan never wrote a memoir titled, Dreams from My Father, in which he measured his own life by both the achievements and failures of an alcoholic father that had abandoned him.
The reason that Mr. D’Souza’s 2010 book comes back into focus is Mr. Obama’s Iran deal. If we had doubts about Mr. D’Souza’s hypothesis before, Mr. Obama in recent weeks has gone a long way toward lending confirmation to it.
If you begin with the reasonable supposition that Mr. Obama is not an anti-Semite, then how do you explain his trafficking in contemptible blame the Jews rhetoric in order to promote his dangerous Iran deal? And for those who cannot bring themselves to accept Mr. Obama’s contemptible behavior, even longtime Obama supporter Abraham Foxman said, “Obama was using language—saying those opposed to the deal were cynically motivated to bomb Iranian nuclear sites—that fueled the anti-Semitic stereotyping of Jews as warmongers.”
One would think that after a lifetime of fighting anti-Semitism Mr. Foxman would know anti-Semitic references when he heard them.
So, how do you explain Mr. Obama’s sinking to this level of bullying to promote a deal that is so flawed it loses support daily?
Well, open the pages of Mr. D’Souza’s, The Roots of Obama’s Rage, and things start falling into place. Barack Obama’s view of the world is derived from that of his father’s anti-colonialism.
Mr. Obama accepts the leftist fiction that Israel is the last outpost of colonialism, an accusation too absurd to be considered serious. This is in keeping with Mr. Obama’s relationship with the late Edward Said and Rashid Khalidi, two Middle East scholars who promulgate that idea, and why to this day, the Los Angeles Times will not release the tape of Mr. Obama’s remarks at Mr. Khalidi’s farewell dinner.
This also explains why Mr. Obama joined the Rev. Jeremy Wright’s congregation, a congregation that broke its ties with mainstream white Christianity and embarked on a mission of black power and liberation theology. Wright took a dying congregation and rejuvenated it. His liberation theology and sense of black pride, along with his anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism, spoke to thousands of black Chicagoans who felt alienated and marginalized in white society.
The Rev. Wright’s rage was Mr. Obama’s rage. The Rev. Wright’s theology was Mr. Obama’s theology.
When the Rev. Wright upped the ante of outrageous comments and Mr. Obama had to part company with him, it was “them Jews” that the Rev. Wright blamed for Mr. Obama putting daylight between them. Are we to believe that Mr. Obama sat at the feet of his mentor for twenty years and never knew his sermons were flavored with anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism?
The Rev. Wright simply reinforced Mr. Obama’s view of colonialism. More important, in the black power ideology, colonialism applies to the white domination of the black ghetto.
Obama senior’s inspiration, as his son interpreted it, was to fight colonialism. It is why Obama backs the Palestinians over Israel. As he told the editor of the Electronic Intifada, Ali Abunimah, he was backing Israel as a political necessity to secure support from the Jews in the Democratic Party. As Mr. Abunimah put it, “He (Obama) is merely doing what he thinks is necessary to get elected and he will continue doing it as long as it keeps him power.” As these remarks became public, they appeared so threatening to Obama’s senatorial campaign that David Axelrod quickly denied them.
To reduce America’s power in the world is to reduce America’s potential for strategic dominance, i.e. colonialism, in Obama’s vision. The rise of an Obama-nourished Iranian hegemonic power in the Middle East is an impediment to American colonialism. America is not exceptional—in this vision—and should not be. The Iran deal reduces America’s strategic power and makes its prospects for interfering in the rest of the world less likely. Obama is not afraid of a stronger Iran as much as he fears a stronger America.
And the same mindset applies to the inner city. It is why three members of the administration were sent to pay respects at the funeral of a thug who fought a policeman for his gun and lost. The thug was perceived as a victim of the colonial police force.
It is why the minor altercation between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and the Cambridge police is worthy of the attention and prestige of the White House. Mr. Gates was a victim of the colonialism that oppresses black people daily.
In the end, Mr. Obama is remaking the Middle East, not in America’s interest, but in accord with a vision of America as a colonial power that projects power too easily. If his Kenyan father had a dream, Mr. Obama is fulfilling it both at home and abroad.
