Obama's "Clueless" Non-Apology Apology in Hiroshima

Obama may not have extended an official "I'm sorry" during his visit to Hiroshima. But, as Claudia Rosett writes, considering how he stripped the dropping of the A-bomb of all historical context, his words ended up being tantamount to an apology:

As Obama frames the tale, Japan's Dec. 7, 1941 surprise attack on Pearl Harbor disappears from the picture. So does the Rape of Nanking, the alliance with Nazi Germany, the Bataan Death March; so do the battles of Saipan, Leyte, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and the hideous toll that would surely have come of a land invasion, had the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki not led within days to Japan's surrender. We are left to infer -- Obama invites all mankind to believe -- that none of these specifics are really relevant to Hiroshima.

In this alternate universe, we can forget Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman, who led America to victory in a Second World War that America did not seek. Never mind that America dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, and, three days later, on Nagasaki, not to start a war with Japan, but to end it.

On Obama's clock -- as he made clear at Hiroshima -- it is not Pearl Harbor, but August 6, 1945, the day the first bomb was dropped (by America), that is the real date which will live in infamy. Unless, of course (there is always a twist to Obama's rhetoric) the human race takes his advice to be inspired to moral perfection by the horror of Hiroshima.

In the words of that great American sage, Cher Horowitz: As if!