In the ongoing debate over the seven attorneys hired by the Department of Justice after working pro bono to defend terrorists is drifting away from what I think is the main point of the issue — the ardent desire of Barack Obama to surround himself with people who either hate America or are intent on fundamentally changing everything America has traditionally respected and honored.

I was fortunate enough to attend Catholic schools for most of my education and one of the most important lessons I recall was offered in second grade by a little nun named Sister Mary Lawrence. “Class,” this good lady said to us on many occasions, “over your life you will be known by the company you keep.” Now approaching my dotage, Sister Mary Lawrence’s lesson has been among the most accurate I have encountered. So, using Sister’s guidance, what to make of Barack Obama?

1. He worshiped for many years — until the media found out — in a church whose pastor, the Rev. Wright, seems to be a racist who quite clearly hates America.
2. He appointed as his chief of staff, Rahm Emmanuel, a man who deserted America to stand with Israel’s armed forces during the 1990-91 Gulf War, and has now given this man access to the nation’s most sensitive national security information.
3. He wanted to appoint a self-avowed communist to work on his staff in the White House, and would have had not the media exposed him.
4. He appointed Attorney General Holder, a man whose major life accomplishment seems to have been selling pardons for Bill Clinton; who has declared legal war on the CIA/U.S. Intelligence Community at a time when our military and intelligence services are fighting overseas; and who has hired lawyers who devote their spare time and charity to defending terrorists.
5. He appointed a woman to the Supreme Court who out of her own mouth admitted she was a bigot — Latina’s are better judges then white guys — and whose rate of overturned decisions must make one question her basic judicial competence.
6. He sent Cass Sunstein to the Department of Justice, a man who the media report champions legal representation for dogs in court; regards unborn human beings as a “handful of cells;” and believes the government should decide about who and who does not get life-preserving health care.

These are just a few of the high-profile folks Mr. Obama feels most comfortable around and whose mindset, judgment, and ideas he concurs with. We have no way of knowing, of course, what others of similar types he has appointed at lower levels of the bureaucracy.

Fifteen months into Mr. Obama’s administration it seems clear that in 2008 American voters unknowingly elected their first anti-American president — and that Sister Mary Lawrence long ago gave her students a simple and seemingly infallible means with which to identify that fact.