Posted on 10/29/2005 12:38:08 PM PDT by wagglebee
I was not enthused by Harriet Miers nomination to the Supreme Court. We’re spending way too much money at the federal level on non-essential programs. If it were just to prosecute the war on terror, I would be content. We must win that battle. But that is not where the bulk of the spending is going.
Many conservatives engaged in a mini-revolt against President Bush because of these things over the last few weeks.
When I was a little boy, before I had even started school, I was upset one evening because I had listened to my dad and my uncles gripe all night at a family gathering about President Kennedy. (I was a peculiar lad, fascinated by the idea of a president. I watched Kennedy on TV every time I could. I still remember his speech to the nation on the Cuban Missile Crisis. My mother thought this a strange fascination for a pre-schooler.) They had thrown out quite a few pejoratives, the mildest of which was ‘bum.’
I was astonished when, after his assassination, the man they called a bum in life suddenly became St. John, whose every decision was heroic and inspired.
Ronald Reagan helped form my conservative sensibilities. I am bemused now to hear conservatives speak as if Reagan could do no wrong. I remember, during his tenure, often harsh criticism from the right.
At various times it was posited that Chief of Staff James Baker had hijacked the Reagan agenda. Others blamed Nancy Reagan. Remember the plaintive conservative battle cry, “Let Reagan be Reagan”?
Lawyers who practiced with Abraham Lincoln occasionally expressed astonishment at his style. Lincoln would concede point after point in court and yet still usually win his case. A friend with more insight into the man offered an explanation: that Lincoln’s genius was his ability to zero in on what was fundamental. He would concede everything that was not central to his main point, but would not yield an inch on what was key to it.
It is a characteristic that George Bush has in common with Lincoln. Since 9/11, his presidency has been focused entirely on the great challenge of defeating an ideology that uses depraved tactics in an effort to enslave the entire world.
In the early 90’s I was beside myself at talk of a ‘peace dividend’ in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union. Historically, after a great power falls, there is a brief period of quiet followed by an increase, not a decrease, in turmoil. It was a good thing to topple what Reagan called the ‘evil empire,’ but only a Pollyanna could believe it meant the end of history.
Rummaging through some old scripts I wrote for my radio commentaries the other day, I saw that it was in September of 1993 when I first began to publicly worry that global terrorism would be the great challenge of the next generation.
There has never been a shortage of evil men with designs for world domination. Through most of history, for any of them to pose anything other than a local threat they had to amass great armies and take over great societies. It was a gauntlet few could survive. Those that did generally got a serious reality-check in the process. Few ascended without taking heavy losses along the way.
That led many of the most committed madmen to understand that they could not take over the world unmolested. Even such a heavily ideologically-driven society as the Soviet Union scaled back from the notion of attacking endlessly after its masters realized it could be destroyed with a miscalculation.
The exponential rise of weapons technology meant that tin-pot dictators and small-time operators could now pose a global threat. Again, there is no shortage of evil and ambitious men in the world.
It seemed to me 12 years ago that we needed to do several things if we were to prevent global terrorism from becoming the greatest threat to mankind and freedom in history. First, we needed to respond swiftly, ruthlessly and with overwhelming power to any terrorist activity in order to make clear to all that the cost of terrorist tactics was far greater than the gain. Second, we needed to treat nations which harbored and nurtured terrorists as belligerents. I’ve always believed it is not enough to swat mosquitoes; it is necessary to get serious about draining the swamp.
While I knew most terrorists came from the Middle East (and Ireland), I did not foresee the fusion between the tactic of terrorism and the desolate ideology of Islamofascism. That fusion has only made it all the more dangerous.
For most of the 90’s I adopted a fatalistic outlook. It must come, but there was little to be done until it did. People would not believe how dangerous the world had become - and had adopted the almost surreal sense of invulnerability that characterized much of Eastern Europe as storm clouds gathered before World War II.
On 9-11 lightning struck and the first loud thunderclap was heard. For a time, our attention was united, focused and serious. For some it remained that way. For others, there was a retreat within a year back to political carping and business as usual.
One whose attention remained focused was George W. Bush. The man was transformed by the attack. He understood almost immediately the nature and scope of the threat. That evening he promised on national television that, henceforth, we would go after terrorists and the nations which harbor terrorists.
Since that day, Bush has remained focused on that great challenge. Everything in his presidency has been designed to protect our national will. He has been bold, steady, and resolved under the most withering undeserved criticism that any president has suffered since Lincoln.
What he knows that the nation at large does not yet understand is that this war has barely begun. Before it is finished it will be a struggle for survival for the entire western world and for the concept of freedom, itself. When one side is utterly determined to murder all the ‘infidels’ there is no splitting the difference.
Bush understands that and is determined to leave this nation prepared for the conflict to come. When he is gone, we will miss him dearly. He does not have long enough to win the war on terror, but the wrong man could already have lost it.
Lincoln understood that before anything else good could be accomplished, the survival of the union must be assured. If it collapsed, despite all its warts, the last, best hope that mankind could live free would perish from the earth.
Bush understands that we face the same stakes in our confrontation with global Islamofascism. Though he has never said it quite so well, Bush’s determination that…”that nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal shall not perish from the earth” is why this great, and occasionally flawed man will be remembered as one of the greatest presidents in our history.
It is why I am inclined to give him a lot of leeway. He’s got the big one right while so many around him dither.
It is a characteristic that George Bush has in common with Lincoln. Since 9/11, his presidency has been focused entirely on the great challenge of defeating an ideology that uses depraved tactics in an effort to enslave the entire world.
Great observation.
Yep. Interesting that many of those who hail Reagan as the end all be all in Presidents would of been as angry with him in the late 1980s as they are with Bush now.
BTTT
Excellent read, Thanks for posting it
Excellent summary of the reality not the beltway mentality.
Ping for a must read
"At various times it was posited that Chief of Staff James Baker had hijacked the Reagan agenda."
I recall, actually it was written in a U.S. Government (the academic class, book by Lowe & Ginsburg), that Baker was a George Bush Sr. man, as was the appointed head of OMB (whose name I forget). I was totally astounded, and dismayed, when Bush was chosen as V.P. for Reagan. Recent history has not changed my opinion.
The walk on water conservatives were constantly mad at Reagan as a governor and as a president.
Like GW, he was savaged by the MSM and the real true conservatives. It seems that his approval rate in his second term at one time was about 30%.
Yet, like GW, President Reagan kept focused, kept the walk on water conservatives and the MSM from electronically lynching him. In the end he restored confidence and pride in America with over 50% of us and destroyed the USSR.
Everyone wants to know why Bush is so hated. The reason is because the leftists, socialists and media recognize that George W Bush is one of our greatest Presidents. Many of his own party do not even know it, but all of his enemies know it. To the left, this fact causes total fear. It is fear that creates the kind of hatred they display. It will be many years before his real greatness is understood by many; but the left know it now.
Focus. Attention to what matters most.......... These are the things that will put George W. Bush in the history books as a great President who was the right man for this hour.
(Good thing he doesn't waste his time reading most of the threads on FR.......)
He has expanded the federal budget, and created new and unnecessary entitlements.
He ignores a very serious border issue.
God bless him for being strong enough to take on the terrorists on their own turf, rather than waiting for them to come here, but domestically, I'm not impressed.
Reagan is more deserving of getting on Mt. Rushmore than GWB, IMHO.
Excellent read. Thanks. :)
Great opinion piece, the writer, for the most part, nailed my view on the importance of the WOT and Bush's role and beliefs. It was also good to see the admittance, that like all of us, Bush has flaws, I also agree with the writer that Bush has the big picture right.
The WOT is this generation's, and maybe the next's, cold war. It is one we can not afford to lose, it is one we cannot be distracted from by peripheral issues that would become irrelevant if we were to lose the WOT. It should be the one issue that stretches across the conservative/progressive divide, but sadly, the progressive left seems incapable of rising above partisan politics, which leaves the burden squarely on the shoulders of the conservatives. The public is behind us, and Bush, when it comes to leading the fight against global terrorism, 55% to 29% according to the recent Battleground Poll. Conservatives have the responsibility and duty to fulfill and live up to that trust. If we lose this war, conservative or progressive will not matter.
1 prosecute the war on terror zealously (declare an actual war) and hold nations immediately accountable for their actions/inactions
2 establish a national program to vigorously pursue energy independence: 50% in 10 years and 100% in 20
3 absolutely secure the border, expel all ILLEGAL aliens, and then establish a guest worker program to bring some back in an orderly manner
4 massively cut non-military federal spending and make his tax cuts permanent
5 nominate qualified constitutionalists to the court
Great reading!! Thanks!
LOL. Yup, too busy.
Amen.
Thanks for posting this outstanding article. How very true this is. If only most of our Senators and Congress people would realize what's at stake and begin to act like representatives of America vs their own selfish agendas.
God bless George W. Bush.
"Ronald Reagan helped form my conservative sensibilities. I am bemused now to hear conservatives speak as if Reagan could do no wrong. I remember, during his tenure, often harsh criticism from the right."
Did Reagan increase the rate of federal spending the highest it had been since the New Deal?
No. It took another "Republican," George Walker Bush, to do that.
Bush is a Great Society Democrat, like that other Texan, Lyndon Johnson. At *best* he's another Nixon.
Any way you look at it, he's a failure.
With Republicans like him, who needs Democrats?
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