In Laos, Obama Bashes Americans as “Lazy” on Environment

The media made a big deal out of Barack Obama being the first American president to visit Laos, but they didn’t tell us that he was going there to bash his fellow countrymen.

No, not Kenyans, silly rabbit.

At a townhall meeting, Obama said that it was due to the laziness of Americans that not everyone was on board with the Democrat Doctrine of Climate Change. “Usually when you see the environment destroyed, it’s not because it’s necessary for development,” he said. “It’s usually because we’re being lazy and we’re not being as creative as we could be about how to do it in a smarter, more sustainable way.”

Not quite satisfied, Obama continued on the theme of American laziness, sprinkling in a few broad-brush stereotypes that might appeal to foreign citizens.

“The United States is and can be a great force for good in the world. But because we’re such a big country, we haven’t always had to know about other parts of the world,” he said. “If you’re in the United States, sometimes you can feel lazy and think we’re so big we don’t have to really know anything about other people.”

To be fair, there is some of that in our great country, though it probably has less to do with the physical size of the U.S. and more to do with our extraordinary abundance and our relative isolation from the rest of the world. And until recently, we didn’t cling to our ethnic backgrounds the way people in other countries do. We’re still just an infant among the elderly, and we have always embraced our youthful energy. We certainly don’t see ourselves as Britain, Part 2.

So, no, most Americans do not have more than a passing knowledge about Laos, but we do know that it is the height of betrayal for our president to go abroad and bad-mouth the country from afar. Especially when that president is using that criticism to prop up his own agenda. There’s nothing wrong with a Democratic president expressing left-wing views, of course; why would we expect anything else? But there’s a way to have your little opinion without shaming the men and women you’re supposed to be representing. There should be a clear difference between Obama the politician and Obama the President, especially when traveling  to other countries.

Even if they’re countries that we don’t know jack squat about.