May 22, 2009

Raves on Torture Speech, Awaiting Action

Update II: McClatchy: Cheney talk full of well lies

Update: Text of Obama address on national security

No thinking American wants President Obama's performance to merit Charles Krauthammer's making a valid point in his Obama in Bush Clothing column. That would be unusual for Krauthammer.

Progressives are waiting. Reaction can be summed in Glenn Greenwald's piece:

Obama's speech this morning, like most Obama speeches, made pretty points in rhetorically effective ways about the Constitution, our values, transparency, oversight, the state secrets privilege, and the rule of law. But his actions, in many critical cases, have repeatedly run afoul of those words. And while his well-crafted speech can have a positive impact on our debate and contained some welcome and rare arguments from a high-level political leader -- changes in the terms of the debate are prerequisites to changes in policy and the value of rhetoric shouldn't be understated -- they're still just words until his actions become consistent with them.

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