Punish Your Enemies

You may have heard President Obama's comment a week or so ago that hispanics should "punish their enemies" at the voting booth. Much has been made about such a divisive comment coming from a president, particularly one who campaigned for president as a uniter. Here is the quote:

"If Latinos sit out the election instead of saying, ‘We're going to punish our enemies and we're gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us,' if they don't see that kind of upsurge in voting in this election, then I think it's going to be harder and that's why I think it's so important that people focus on voting on November 2."

Now Obama is trying to walk back his comment:

In Monday's radio interview with Michael Baisden, Obama said: "I had a conversation with a Hispanic radio outlet, Univision, and during the course of that conversation, one of the things that I had to say to the Latino community, which is frustrated that we haven't seen progress on immigration reform, was that they can't sit out of this election. There were arguments being made that because Democrats hadn't gotten this done, that Latinos should vote against Democrats or just sit out the election.

"And I said, well, you can't punish your friends when - the folks who've been supporting it. Now, I did also say if you're going to punish somebody, punish your enemies, and I probably should have used the word ‘opponents' instead of ‘enemies.' Now the Republicans are saying that I'm calling them enemies. What I'm saying is you're an opponent of this particular provision, comprehensive immigration reform, which is something very different.

Can anybody interpret these additional comments from Obama? Is he apologizing? I don't think so. Is he saying that Republicans are falsely accusing him of using the word "enemies"? He did use the word, right? Or is he saying that he was not referring to Republicans but rather to people who oppose immigration reform? Really? This from the same guy who told Republicans that they can come along for the ride, but they have to sit in the back? No, don't fall for this spin. Even in his spin Obama refers to the Democrats as the "friends" of hispanics. If, in Obama's mind, Democrats are the friends, who then are the enemies?

Obama was telling us how he really thinks by first using the word "enemies". For Obama, anyone who disagrees with him is the enemy . . not an opponent, but the enemy. And who are his enemies? Not Islamic terrorists, not people who want to see the United States destroyed, not even those who want to see our Constitution torn apart. No, Obama's enemies are those who don't buy into his policies or his politics . . namely Republicans and those people who identify with the Tea Party movement. Well Mr. President, right back at you.