When Words Mean Something

By Steve Hynd

Post of the day from Bob Fertik at Democrats. com.

Today President Obama declared,

Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something.

I couldn't agree more. And that's exactly why President Obama must tell Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate torture, warrantless wiretapping, and other egregious crimes of the Bush Administration.

Otherwise rules are not binding, violations are not punished, and words mean nothing.

Nice. Simple to understand. Accurate. The rule of law must be upheld without fear or favor otherwise it is nothing.

My friend Russ Wellen has a signature on his email which expresses the same idea, this time about rhetoric over nuclear weapons. The quote is from Philip Stevens of the Financial Times.

"Most people in the US, or for that matter Britain and France, have forgotten that the NPT requires them to work for the destruction of all nuclear weapons, including their own. ... Tehran is far from alone in complaining that the NPT has become a device to preserve the nuclear hegemony of the US and its allies."

Obama at least appears to get this bit of "words mean something". And I applaud him for it.

Obama vowed to immediately seek U.S. ratification of a ban on nuclear testing, convene a summit in Washington to stop the spread of nuclear material within four years and create a nuclear fuel bank to allow peaceful development of nuclear power.

"I state clearly and with conviction America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons," Obama said to a crowd of about 20,000 packed into the historic square in the Czech Republic's capital city. "This goal will not be reached quickly -- perhaps not in my lifetime. It will take patience and persistence. But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us that the world cannot change."

Now we'll find out if his eloquent, ground-breaking words really mean something - will he fund it? Policy is what gets funded, the rest is just clever talk. But I think he will - it would be too much of a humiliation to step back from the brink of the first big, real change and hope Obama's been able to offer us.

Comments

[Bill H]

“Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something.”

Somebody please tell me those are not the exact words George W. Bush used in the buildup towards the Iraq invasion. No, I don't believe our current President is planning some sort of redux, but we do not need that kind of bs rhetoric again.