Obama Isn’t Charlie
Published in Le Point
(France) on 12 January 2015
by Michel Colomès (link to original)
(France) on 12 January 2015
by Michel Colomès (link to original)
Translated from
by Jessica Loizou.
Edited by Bora Mici.
The U.S. will need to soften the effect, as dissonant as it is damaging, of the U.S. president's absence at the amazing demonstration that was the Jan. 11 march for freedom against intolerance: a popular demonstration that saw more than 3 million French people descend into the streets, and marching side by side in a demonstration that is without a doubt unique in history, 44 heads of state and government who had come from all over the world, from Angela Merkel to David Cameron, from the king of Jordan to the president of Mali, from the Israeli Netanyahu to the Palestinian Mahmoud Abbas.
For this, Obama can certainly count on John Kerry. His secretary of state, who presented himself in Paris on Thursday Jan. 8, coming from India and countries of the East, and who, as soon as the news of the terrorist attack against Charlie Hebdo was known, made a marvelous declaration of solidarity in French: “We stand with you in solidarity and in commitment both to the cause of confronting extremism and in the cause which the extremists fear so much and which has always united our two countries: freedom.”
But there are moments when words are not enough as Merkel, Rajoy, Renzi, Junker or Samaras showed they understood by meeting in Paris. The heat of a presence supports public solidarity.
Many False Excuses ...
Of course, the White House pointed out that as well as the ambassador of the United States to Paris, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, Victoria Nuland, came from Washington to participate in the march, contrary to Eric Holder, Bernard Cazeneuve’s counterpart, who came to discuss new security measures with European ministers of the interior and who, strangely, did not consider it useful to extend his stay in Paris by a few hours in order to participate in the republic’s demonstration to the nation.
Evidently, the drastic security measures that protect an American president probably led those who are in charge of Obama's close guard to dissuade him from going to France. But after all, Benyamin Netanyahu is without a doubt also threatened and protected. Indeed, his bodyguards were so present that during the march, one often had his hand on the Israeli prime minister’s shoulder while the other held his hand, as we do for a child.
Regarding the first reason why Obama didn’t come to Paris, it is without a doubt necessary to look elsewhere: President of a country that remains profoundly puritan, he does not feel comfortable with satire, ridicule and desecration like what Charlie Hebdo has always practiced full scale, especially regarding religion. Maybe there are only very few countries where one can write what is attributed – seemingly falsely – to Voltaire, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
... And Curious Mixtures of Ideas
New York Times Executive Editor Dean Baquet acknowledged that he hesitated for a long time about publishing Cabu or Charb’s cartoons on the day of the attack and that he ended by giving up. As for the television channel CNN, it spent the day showing pictures of the artists who fell to defend a certain idea of the press by framing its images in such a way that only the Charlie Hebdo banner appeared in the image and never the caricature that was the cover of the magazine.
Besides, in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly in 2012, Obama himself didn’t hide his personal reservations regarding cartoons that make a mockery of religion: “The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam [but] to be credible, those who condemn that slander must also condemn the hate we see when the image of Jesus Christ is desecrated, churches are destroyed, or the Holocaust is denied.” Indeed, a curious mixture of ideas from the president of the United States, between what is in the domain of satire and therefore freedom of thought or art, and that of an unfortunately tragic reality. No, obviously, Obama isn’t Charlie!
For this, Obama can certainly count on John Kerry. His secretary of state, who presented himself in Paris on Thursday Jan. 8, coming from India and countries of the East, and who, as soon as the news of the terrorist attack against Charlie Hebdo was known, made a marvelous declaration of solidarity in French: “We stand with you in solidarity and in commitment both to the cause of confronting extremism and in the cause which the extremists fear so much and which has always united our two countries: freedom.”
But there are moments when words are not enough as Merkel, Rajoy, Renzi, Junker or Samaras showed they understood by meeting in Paris. The heat of a presence supports public solidarity.
Many False Excuses ...
Of course, the White House pointed out that as well as the ambassador of the United States to Paris, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, Victoria Nuland, came from Washington to participate in the march, contrary to Eric Holder, Bernard Cazeneuve’s counterpart, who came to discuss new security measures with European ministers of the interior and who, strangely, did not consider it useful to extend his stay in Paris by a few hours in order to participate in the republic’s demonstration to the nation.
Evidently, the drastic security measures that protect an American president probably led those who are in charge of Obama's close guard to dissuade him from going to France. But after all, Benyamin Netanyahu is without a doubt also threatened and protected. Indeed, his bodyguards were so present that during the march, one often had his hand on the Israeli prime minister’s shoulder while the other held his hand, as we do for a child.
Regarding the first reason why Obama didn’t come to Paris, it is without a doubt necessary to look elsewhere: President of a country that remains profoundly puritan, he does not feel comfortable with satire, ridicule and desecration like what Charlie Hebdo has always practiced full scale, especially regarding religion. Maybe there are only very few countries where one can write what is attributed – seemingly falsely – to Voltaire, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
... And Curious Mixtures of Ideas
New York Times Executive Editor Dean Baquet acknowledged that he hesitated for a long time about publishing Cabu or Charb’s cartoons on the day of the attack and that he ended by giving up. As for the television channel CNN, it spent the day showing pictures of the artists who fell to defend a certain idea of the press by framing its images in such a way that only the Charlie Hebdo banner appeared in the image and never the caricature that was the cover of the magazine.
Besides, in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly in 2012, Obama himself didn’t hide his personal reservations regarding cartoons that make a mockery of religion: “The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam [but] to be credible, those who condemn that slander must also condemn the hate we see when the image of Jesus Christ is desecrated, churches are destroyed, or the Holocaust is denied.” Indeed, a curious mixture of ideas from the president of the United States, between what is in the domain of satire and therefore freedom of thought or art, and that of an unfortunately tragic reality. No, obviously, Obama isn’t Charlie!
I think too many journalists in the so called capitalist democracies have deluded themselves about the ideal of FREE SPEECH in these societies. May I recommend leftist professor Howard Zinn’s ” People’s History of the United States ” for a more sober perspective on all civil liberties here ? Was McCarthy era paranoia all about FREE SPEECH rights even for moderately liberal scholars or political activists ? It is well documented how a leftist party with which I was a presidential elector in 1980 , the Socialist Workers Party, was harassed, sabotaged , and illegally spied on. It did finally win its law suit against the FBI . But the damage was done.
Presently numerous activists who protested Bush’s criminal war in Iraq and Afghanistan have their own tales of persecution to tell.
And Talk Radio in America is particularly odious for its 24 hour right wing thug view of the world. They always rant about creeping socialism in the United States . But they would also silence any intellectually honest-and courageous- militant socialists.
Yes, if they could, the American FBI would love to obliterate my comments here rather than defend to the death my right to say this.
The talk of FREE SPEECH is mostly cant. When the ruling class does not like it they call it HATE SPEECH or just un-American and subversive and unpatriotic.
Even the famous Ralph Nader-now associated with the Green Party- can barely get a fair hearing in the capitalist news media.
And I must point out that too many individuals – even conservative types -have lost their jobs here just over something they said.
As Professor Zinn pointed out, free speech is very problematic here. After suggesting that our Memorial Days just might glorify war more than they honor our war dead, he lost his column in a major newspaper. So much for FREE SPEECH in America !
And with the president of Israel coming to America to address the Congress can anybody here criticize Israel’s war crimes against the Palestinians without being branded anti-Semitic ?
And so I hear : ” Karl Marx was a self-hating Jew ! ”
Forget about democratic DIALOGUE in the United States. Uncle Sam isn’t Charlie. He is Orwell’s Big Brother !
( http://radicalrons.blogspot.com/ )