‘We Are
Here Not to Apologize for America” ‘Far too much institutionalization of grievance and
victimhood’
(Politico) – News Corp CEO Rupert
Murdoch, in a discursive speech Monday evening, blasted Secretary of State John
Kerry and attacked the left for creating an “identity crisis” that he charged
has undermined American strength and fostered terrorism around the world.
And he drew a connection between
U.S. foreign policy and domestic culture, arguing that “in recent years, there
has been far too much institutionalization of grievance and victimhood.”
The Australian-born media mogul, a
naturalized U.S. citizen, also touched on the Republican presidential primary,
which he said “has articulated a deep distaste for the slow descent of our
country.”
“Before delivering my modest
message,” Murdoch joked at the outset of his address accepting the Hudson
Institute’s Global Leadership Award, “I feel obliged to alert college students,
progressive academics and all other deeply sensitive souls that these words may
contain phrases and ideas that challenge your prejudices — in other words, I
formally declare this room an ‘unsafe space.’”
After a few words of praise for
former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who had just introduced him to the
hawkish think-tank crowd, Murdoch quickly pivoted to a sweeping indictment of
U.S. foreign policy under Barack Obama, though he did not mention the president
by name.
“For a U.S. secretary of state to
suggest that Islamic terrorists had a ‘rationale’ in slaughtering journalists
is one of the low points of recent Western diplomacy and it is indicative of a
serious malaise,” Murdoch said, referring to Kerry’s recent mangled
attempt to draw a distinction between the assault on the French satirical
magazine Charlie Hebdo and the more recent Paris attacks. “For America to be
embarrassed by its exceptionalism is itself exceptional and absolutely
unacceptable.” (Kerry quickly walked back those comments, remarking the next
day that “such atrocities can never be rationalized, and we can never allow
them to be rationalized.”)
Murdoch also laid out a mission for
the next U.S. president, according to a copy of his prepared remarks. “For
America to have a sense of direction, two conditions are essential: A U.S. leader
must understand, be proud of and assert the American personality,” he said,
noting that Kissinger had offered a forthright defense of American
exceptionalism in his book “World Order.”
“An identity crisis is not a
starting point for any journey; and secondly, there must be clear goals
informed by values and by a realization of the extraordinary potential of its
people,” Murdoch continued.
He then offered a brief tour of 20th
century diplomatic and military history, hailing the U.S. role in defeating
Japan during World War II and standing up to North Korea — fortitude he said
the United States had lost in recent years in favor of a culture of
self-obsession.
“The left seemed to be happy for the
incarceration of millions, whether in Vietnam under Ho or in China under Mao,”
he said. “Why agonize over inhumanity when you could blithely celebrate
yourself?”
Praising Kissinger’s role in nudging
China toward a market economy, which he called “a modern miracle” that had
lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, Murdoch said, “this
fundamental, irrefutable truth must be denied by those who despise America and
detest economic freedom.” “The soft left,” he added, “cannot countenance that
remarkable human success.”
In a seeming digression, Murdoch also
weighed in on the U.S. domestic debate over hydraulic fracturing, which he said
“has become a litmus test of principle.”
“Those governments that forbid
fracking are the flat-earth fraternity, yes, including New York State,” he
said. “They believe that the Earth revolves around them.”
Environmentalists fail to recognize
the need for oil and gas to remain the dominant sources of energy, he charged.
“To deny that reality is to condemn the most vulnerable to the indignity of
poverty for the sake of an ideology — that being the ideology of self. The
triumph of the Me over the needs of the many.”
Liberal “self-indulgence” had
hobbled America’s sense of moral purpose, Murdoch suggested, asking: “How can
we in this room be content with poverty, intellectual or economic, and how can
we be content with a world defined by the ideologies of those who seek to
please and appease?”
“We are here not to apologize for
America, but to celebrate America,” he concluded. “We are here to reflect upon
the world as it might have been without America — a much, much lesser world.”
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/henry-kissinger-rupert-murdoch-fox-216294
http://www.teaparty.org/murdoch-unloads-obama-apologize-america-132241/
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