Barack Obama has already made it clear he intends to violate the unwritten rule which stipulates that a former president will withhold criticism of his successor. Hillary Clinton, who was never president — much to her chagrin — is under no such constraint from speaking out, which she did last night.
Taking to Twitter, she chided, “I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values & our Constitution. This is not who we are.”
I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values & our Constitution. This is not who we are.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) January 29, 2017
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
One might note glibly that if Clinton knew “who we are,” she would be president now. Her argument in any case is one of the less overwrought coming from members of her party.
Here is the over-the-top statement released by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer:
Chuck Schumer of Trump's 'extreme vetting' Exec. Order: "Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty tonight." pic.twitter.com/ONz3Ss6BJ5
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 28, 2017
Rep. [score]Nancy Pelosi[/score] issued a longer version of the same hyperbole, but her statement goes even further, accusing the administration of mistaking “cruelty for strength and prejudice for strategy.”
Pelosi blasts Trump's 'extreme vetting' Exec. Order: "This Administration has mistaken cruelty for strength and prejudice for strategy." pic.twitter.com/LNBnDTNvGe
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 28, 2017
Naturally Clinton, Schumer, and Pelosi are blissfully unaware that two presidents from their own party did precisely what Trump is now calling for but with one critical difference. To wit, both enacted bans for much longer periods of time.
The Daily Wire’s Joseph Curl writes:
After the 2009 discovery that two al Qaeda terrorists were living as refugees in Bowling Green, Ky., President Obama took action. “As a result of the Kentucky case, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets,” ABC New reported in 2013….
President Jimmy Carter took a similar action when he banned Iranians from entering the United States. After 52 Americans were taken hostage in 1979 Iranian hostage crisis, Carter cut diplomatic ties with Iran, kicked all diplomats out of the U.S. and banned Iranians from entering the country.
“The steps I have ordered today are those that are necessary now,” Carter said in announcing the move. “Other actions may become necessary if these steps do not produce the prompt release of the hostages.”
Carter also ordered federal officials to “invalidate all visas issued to Iranian citizens for future entry into the United States, effective today. We will not reissue visas, nor will we issue new visas, except for compelling and proven humanitarian reasons or where the national interest of our own country requires. This directive will be interpreted very strictly.”
It’s a truism that desperate times call for desperate measures, except when you’re a Democrat and the desperate measures are taken by a Republican, in which case all bets are off.
