Yesterday, Andrew Breitbart launched his newest web venture, Big Peace. It will do for national security, what Big Hollywood has done for culture, Big Journalism for the media and Big Government for domestic policy. It has also caused me to climb into the way-back machine.

In 1985, I was an exchange student at a gymnasium (high school) in Bremen, West Germany. It was an anxious time; with renewed leftist terrorist attacks and hijackings throughout Europe. (The TWA airplane which took me to Frankfurt was hijacked about a week later.)  The Middle East was, predictably, tense. The Soviet Union looked as strong as ever. America was coming out of an economic and psychological malaise, but much of Europe, and U.S. political and media elites, were openly worried about a “warmongering” US President who didn’t understand complex foreign policy and might just start a war for kicks.

For those readers under forty, the political debates at the time centered on MX and Minuteman missiles, nuclear disarmament and small dust-ups like the Contras in Nicaragua. One night over dinner, my otherwise gracious German hosts, along with some of their friends, berated me for US foreign policy. Most every problem in the world could somehow be traced back to the U.S. They were particularly incensed about US Government support for the Contra rebels, fighting the communist Sandinistas in Nicaragua.

America should stay out of the affairs of all other countries, I was lectured. It shouldn’t interfere in any of the domestic squabbles in other nations. I replied that I understood that, but the Sandinistas were communist dictators who were supported by the Soviets and Cuba, so it was probable we would be involved.

Support for the Sandinistas from other countries was immaterial, I was told. America should be better and never involve itself in another country’s affairs, they argued.

So, I replied, what about that Berlin Airlift?

Oh, America had to do that, my German hosts replied. That was totally different.

It always is.

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Three terror attacks on U.S. soil in their first year and the Obama administration dares lecture us?

It takes a special kind of arrogance to lecture the American people about terrorism. Especially when in the past year, your administration has allowed three al Qaeda-related terrorists to carry out attacks on U.S. soil.

But that’s what the Obama administration has done with Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan’s op-ed in today’s USA Today entitled We Need No Lectures.

Brennan even goes so far as to accuse critics of the Obama administration of aiding al Qaeda.

Brennan boasts of the Obama administration’s successes against global terrorism:

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Lost in the pre and post-election analysis out of Massachusetts has been the major policy differences between Martha Coakley and Scott Brown over foreign policy and defense.  The issue garnered some attention briefly during their final debate, when Coakley erred saying terrorists “were gone from Afghanistan.”  But then the attentions of the media quickly turned back to the health care debate.

In campaigning with Brown in the final days, Rudy Giuliani mapped out the battle lines: “This election will send a signal, and a very dramatic one, that we are going in the wrong direction on terrorism, and we need to change it, and change it now.”  Giuliani added: Scott’s background in the military speaks volumes about his understanding of what we face.  And frankly his opponent’s ignorance about the issues facing us is astounding.”

From the start candidate Brown was unequivocal on defense matters.  A 30-year Veteran of the National Guard, still serving as a lt. colonel, Brown unashamedly backed the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.    It’s notable that not once did he seek to separate himself from the Bush foreign policy agenda.

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By Barack Obama

It certainly was a holiday to remember.  Since I’m President of the United States, I was able to choose anywhere in the world to spend a long, lazy couple of weeks.  So, we got the 747 gassed up to head to Hawaii for the Holidays.  When I learned Health Care Reform might be held up in the Senate on Christmas Eve, many felt nervous that the holiday kickoff would hit a snafu.  Sure, it’s one of the most complicated and controversial bills in American history, but we had turkeys to baste and chestnuts to roast.

Great news, we cooked up a plan to slap a 10 percent tax on people who go to tanning beds — that ought to fix paying for all this!   Plus, Senator Harry Reid ensured the democrats who were going to bail on the bill were handsomely paid off, so we quickly squeaked out a win on that sucker before anyone had a chance to read it!  The partisan divide may now be bigger than ever, but I made it out of D.C. on time to head for some quality climate change —  to the land where palm trees sway for some holiday island fun — Mele Kalikimaka!

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