Obama’s Ugly on Defense

Dick Cheney, whose popularity is on the rise,  has put President Obama in the position of playing defense.

Over the past few weeks, Obama has been back on his heels over torture and terror, issues on which he surely thought he had the upper hand.

And he spent Thursday battling charges from a man he surely thought he had vanquished in November, former Vice President Dick Cheney.

It took some worried calls from Capitol Hill Democrats, congressional aides said, to convince him otherwise – that he needed to give a speech defending his plan for closing the terror prison at Guantanamo Bay, and rebutting Republican claims that the move would endanger Americans where they live.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and others made clear “that we’re going to need a lot more cover if we’re going to be able to deal with this issue,” said one Democratic leadership aide.

 When playing defense, Obama’s showing he plays dirty, and downright ugly. The Commander in Chief used a commencement address at the Naval Acadamy to rap the Iraq war.

What makes this nod to politics at Annapolis’s commencement especially cheap is that John McCain, whose son graduated today, was in the audience. That’s the same John McCain who gave Obama cover last night on Fox News by reiterating his belief that waterboarding is torture, the same John McCain whom The One is counting on for further cover in closing Guantanamo, and the same John McCain who concluded, in all apparent good faith, that the Iraq war was necessary after all. And still, Obama couldn’t help himself.

This certainly won’t be the last time Obama’s on defense. I have a feeling it’s only going to get uglier.