I’ve noticed a recent trend among Obama’s opponents to further the idea that Obama is not an American. Since they have failed to prove that he was not born in American, they have resorted to putting into the minds of people that he is not an American, regardless of what his birth certificate states. How are they doing this? They are using language that suggests that he is not an American after all; “foreign ideas,” “does not understand American values” and “un-American interest” to name only a few. Actually, this tactic is not new, but started during the presidential campaign of 2008.

Republicans started labeling President Obama un-American during the 2008 presidential campaign, and through various subtle and not-so-subtle statements, have perpetuated the myth that the President is not an American and has no idea of what it means to be American. [http://www.politicususa.com/demand-gop-held-accountable-un-american-attacks-obama.html]

This tactic is not only to further the Birther movement’s claim that Obama is not an American citizen and therefore not eligible to be president, but to also further the notion that Obama is a traitor to the United States. Here is where the scare tactics come in full force to paint Obama as a radical socialist, Marxist and Muslim, with an anti-American agenda.

The latest person to label Obama as un-American was former Vice President, Dick Cheney. Simply unbelievable to hear him call another un-American. Cheney and Bush have been found guilty of war crimes for un-American acts of torture at the foreign detention camps. On February 14, 2010, in an appearance on ABC’s This Week, Vice-President Dick Cheney reiterated his support of waterboarding and enhanced interrogation techniques for captured terrorist suspects, saying, ‘I was and remain a strong proponent of our enhanced interrogation program.'” The Bush administration made sure to hold and torture prisoners on foreign soil so that their foreign ideas of acceptable treatment of detainees would not fall under US law. “In 1999 a U.S. court found that the Fifth Amendment does not apply in the case of overseas torture of aliens. (Wikipedia)

Cheney also spearheaded the invasion of Iraq with the un-American idea of attacking a country without provocation. The Bush administration’s philosophy of preemptive invasion is foreign and un-American. If there is a threat of imminent invasion, then it is justifiable, but that was not the case with Iraq. The Bush administration has redefined what is American, by making what was once un-American, American, and vice-a-versa. Somehow, taking care of the citizens of America is now un-American. This saddens me, because this means that other countries embody American ideals more than we do.