Regarding "Obama vows U.S. response to N. Korea" (Saturday Front Page), within days of the hacking of Sony Studios computers - allegedly over the opening of a movie that portrayed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in a bad light - President Obama blamed North Korea, promised that the United States would "respond proportionally” to those attacks, and criticized Sony for giving in to intimidation by cancelling the movie's release, declaring that such capitulation would encourage "other countries to sabotage documentaries, or news reports they don’t like.”
How different was his reaction to another movie that allegedly resulted not just in threats, but the murder of American diplomats in Benghazi two years ago. Within days of the murders, President Obama claimed that an obscure home movie produced several months earlier that ridiculed the Prophet Muhammad had provoked Muslims to mass protests in Libya, escalating into the attacks on Americans that left four dead, including ambassador Chris Stevens. Obama disavowed the movie, claimed that it was an affront to Islam, swore America had no hand in the venture, and had the director arrested.
Apparently, his concern for protecting freedom of expression depends on whose ox is being gored: Obama seemed perfectly comfortable stepping all over first amendment rights so as to keep from offending Islamists. I could wish that he applied the same standard to all bad actors, but mostly, I'd like him to focus his ire on the bad actors, and not moviemakers.
Pete Smith
Houston, TX
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