A barbecue bellwether of things to come

Riffing off the news that Obama intends to go ahead with a July 4 barbecue for Iranians, even though his guests hands are soaked in blood, a very upset Max Boot has this to say:

It’s bad enough that the president is deliberately refraining from being too outspoken in favor of the freedom fighters who are being beaten, shot, and tear-gassed in the streets of Tehran. But that he’s still prepared to have America’s diplomats break bread with representatives of the very regime which is responsible for this terrible oppression, and to do it on the holiday that celebrates our own struggle for freedom–that’s too nauseating for words.

It essentially confirms the analysis of those who have suggested that Obama is not going to deviate one iota from his previous course of “engagement” with Iran, no matter how absurd and immoral that course now appears to be. For a candidate who mocked the previous president for his supposed adherence to ideology over reality, Obama is displaying that very tendency–only, of course, his ideology is not the advancement of freedom but the advancement of negotiations in the vain hope that somehow we can find common ground with the world’s vilest regimes.

This engagement is especially sickening when one considers July 4th’s meaning.  It’s not just any old day with burgers and buns.  This is is special, since it’s a celebration of the great victory of liberty over tyranny.  Having the mullah’s blood-stained compadres be the ones celebrating this holiday with official US representatives is not just an ordinary political engagement.  Symbolically, it’s like having the mullahs dance on their victims’ graves.