State Department: “We condemn the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims.”
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: “The U.S. deplores any intentional effort to denigrate the religious beliefs of others.” “Our commitment to religious tolerance goes back to the very beginning of our nation.”
President Obama: “While the United States rejects efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others, we must all unequivocally oppose the kind of senseless violence that took the lives of these public servants.”
Our Government denigrating the 1st Amendment?: 
Do we not understand the difference between deploring someone’s speech and actually attempting to create laws preventing that speech?
Or should the state department and the white house go up there and simply say “We have no opinion on the film which is ostensibly at the heart of many of these protests.” Really? Is that what you want? Do you really need someone to ALWAYS have the caveat that “We deplore this film, but also I believe in free speech.” On some level this SHOULD be a given.
Maybe our entire discourse should be this way. Romney can give his speeches saying “While I deplore Barack Obama’s characterizations of me as a money-grubbing vulture capitalist who received funding from Central American death squads, let me also say that I nonetheless applaud his and his campaign’s free speech rights.”
That being said, there are REAL issues at stake here, none of which your above quotations get at, notably pressure by the Obama Administration on Google to remove the videos:
See Glenn Greenwald for more on the actual questions w/r/t free speech:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/16/conservatives-democrats-free-speech-muslims
Most disgusting in those quotes is the implied and tacit acceptance of the notion that the rioters had good and valid reason for their lawless actions. There is no reason to mention the purported source of the rioter violence, that our government did so demonstrates a commitment to appeasement. Follow that with the showy arrest, oh, sorry, escorting, of the supposed film producer and we have our government fully participating and accepting the notion that “we” somehow harmed the Muslim faithful.
I’m not really sure which is worse: a government that thinks we are so foolish as to believe that the violence committed at our embassies on 9/11, including the murder of Christopher Stevens, is the result of a movie trailer, or that the government actually believes that to be the case.
Are you kidding me?
“that our government did so demonstrates a commitment to appeasement.”
Are you serious? Tell that to the tens of thousands of dead Muslim civilians in our wars. See Iraq, see Afghanistan, see Yemen, see Pakistan, see the unending drone strikes across the region from. Tell that to all those families who have lost loved ones in this Endless War.
Yeah, you’re right, I can definitely see the Obama administration pulling its punches in order to “appease” those monolithic Muslims in the Middle East. Yeah I definitely noticed that appeasement when dozens and dozens of civilians are killed in these drone strikes in order to hit a few Al-Qaeda leaders, some of which are even American citizens. Yes, appeasement seems to be the driving philosophy here.
When Morsi was elected in Egypt we should have sent in the Marines to tell them how a democracy should really function.
Maybe we should just send in the troops and just start massacring the crowds, just kill as many people as we possibly can. Yes, that’s a better course of action.
You’re RIGHT, Obama’s so committed to appeasement. Odd that Guantanamo Bay remains open, that dozens of people are still held without charges, that a Yemeni man died in that prison last week after 9 years without any formal charges brought against him. Odd that we still seem to back the autocrats in the region just as long as we possibly can, see Saudi Arabia, see Yemen, see Bahrain.
You’re right, this one statement, this one soundbite snippet denouncing a hideous film clearly represents a watershed change in American foreign policy. You’re so insightful.
The official position of the US Government, as exemplified in those quotes, is to attempt to appease the identified perpetrators of violence and protesters who say they are attacking and protesting because of an offensive film. Either that or it is an obvious attempt to distract the American public from the fecklessness of the Administration in ignoring the threats against our embassies. Or do you have some other explanation?
If you define soundbites and rhetoric as the ‘official positions’ of the US Government then godspeed and goodluck.
If the Obama Administration had immediately launched Hellfire missiles at the crowd after making that statement, would that have dissuaded you that the actual position was not appeasement? How many people have to die before you are finally won back to the Administration’s side?
Also, more hilariously and pathetically, which part of these statements do you actually disagree with? Is it just the timing?
Is the US “official position” that we we don’t reject efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others? Is the US “official position” that we don’t oppose the senseless violence that takes the lives of our public servants.
Soundbites and rhetoric when issued publicly by officials of the government are, by definition, the official position of the government.
I would rather my government affirm its commitment, and the President’s oath, to the ideals of the rule of law and to freedom of thought, of worship, and of expression that are embodied in the Constitution of the United States. Talking about the movie, and how offensive and derogatory it is, whether true or not, serves only to legitimize the complaints and actions of those who claim to be offended.
[Yes, you are right I should have clarified my distinctions between official propaganda and actual policy]
You don’t appear to disagree with the substance of what was stated, only the timing.
And also, complaining about having one’s religion denigrated should be legitimate as free speech, the protests are legitimate, violent actions are not legitimate.
I mean the hilarious bit here is that you and Grover up there only seem interested about the “official” positions…which are, demonstrably, NOT a reflection of actual policies. Thus your entire position is functionally facile except for serving as fodder in our left/right, binary bs political discourse. The internet needs more of that!
I mean my God, there are literal issues at stake here (Obama using the office to exert pressure on Google, a reckless and counter-productive foreign policy advanced through massive drone warfare, etc) and all this “libertarian” blog has to do is post about non-issues?
You see, there is much on which we agree! The kowtowing of mentioning the film is meant to appease all while drone strikes are launched across the Middle East killing bad guys and good guys so casually. The more I think about it the more it seems obvious the Administration is bowing to the faux anger at the film to cover up the incompetence of not responding to an expected threat by securing our embassies and working with the local governments to protect people like Christopher Stevens.