Posted on 12/15/2001 7:18:08 PM PST by Jean S
"And sometimes our differences run so deep, it seems we share a continent, but not a country," said George W. Bush in the most poignant line of his Inaugural.
The new President had identified the San Andreas Fault of American society. And as he took his oath, not a year ago, his country seemed hopelessly divided, not only on issues of morality, politics and race, but on whether George W. Bush even ought to be standing there.
And for our unity, the President is not responsible. That was the achievement of the murdering fanatics of September 11. Like the Japanese torpedo bombers at Pearl Harbor, it was they who "awakened a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve."
What President Bush did was to step masterfully into the role history thrust upon him. Since that awful day, he has been a peerless war leader.
Magnanimous toward foes who had lately mocked him, he welcomed every Prodigal Son into his war coalition, from Hollywood to the Hill, from CBS to Geraldo.
For three months, he has labored to maintain our rare unity and canalize our rage and resolve behind a battle plan to bring justice to the men who came into our home and massacred our brothers and sisters.
He ignored the defeatists demanding mass intervention with U.S. troops and dismissed the war whoops of the little magazines for carpet-bombing Kabul and marching on Baghdad under General Perle. Instead, he and his War Cabinet moved, systematically, to round up the terrorists, cut their communications, seize their funds, run them down, and kill the Taliban who harbored them.
With Colin Powell, he stitched together a coalition as impressive as his father’s in Desert Storm, while rightfully reserving for America absolute and undivided command.
War is a dirty, ugly business, but in keeping our casualties, and Afghan casualties, to the minimum consistent with early victory, President Bush has fought a just war in an honorable, moral way, in keeping with the highest Western traditions.
So doing, he is Human Events Man of the Year.
Even before September 11, President Bush had transcended media labels of "unilateralist" and "isolationist" by pursuing a foreign policy marked by the quality the Founding Fathers most desired: independence. Repeatedly, he has put America first.
While discarding the ABM treaty, he has reached out to pull Russia back to the West, then informed the "global governance" crowd at Turtle Bay that American sovereignty would not be surrendered to Kofi Annan’s World Criminal Court, nor would U.S vital interests be sacrificed on the high altar of Albert Gore’s Kyoto Protocol.
"He has grown in office" is the sputtered explanation for his success by those who used to sneer. Nonsense, they were simply as wrong about him as they were about Ronald Reagan. What September 11 did was call to the surface the character and capacities already deep inside the man.
Yet today, as after Desert Storm, great questions are making their way to the Oval Office that will define the Bush presidency, determine its longevity, and establish its legacy. Unfortunately, these are not "essay questions," such as we had in college. They demand a "Yes" or "No" of the President, and either answer must divide his coalition.
Will he attack Iraq? Will he push land-for-peace in the Middle East, or throw up his hands and disengage? Will he lead traditionalist America in the culture war, or declare victory and get out? Will he name Scalias to the court, or play ethnic politics with his appointments? Will he oppose affirmative action, or let it stand in the name of the Big Tent?
By his reversal on Russia and Putin, the President has shown his feet are not planted in concrete. But if he recognizes he cannot win the war on terror with open borders, cannot stop the gutting of U.S. manufacturing without jettisoning free trade, can he change? We shall see.
Like other successful Presidents, President Bush has been dealt some aces by fate. He succeeds a President who was as rich in talent as he was devoid of character; his First Lady is a lovely contrast to Mommie Dearest; and he has been given a foil and foe in Osama bin Laden, who, for sheer evil, makes Saddam Hussein look like Jimmy Stewart. He enters his second year with the approval of nine-in-ten of his countrymen, and deservedly so.
What a perfectly turned phrase, though I thought it was spelled mommy.
Buchanan's rallied behind Bush beyond my wildest expectations. He, too, is magnanimous.
He is loyal to this country. I've never doubted that.
"Repeatedly, he has put America first."
I don't mean this as a slam, though I guess it could be interpreted as such... but the farther away Pat is from campaigning for elective office, the more I like him. I liked him (with rare exceptions) as an essayist, as as a TV commentator (Crossfire and elsewhere). And I had no problem with his running for the GOP Presidential nomination. I will go so far as to say that his neo-isolationism struck some real chords with me, even though I remain an advocate of free trade. He said some things -- sometimes polically incorrect things -- that damned well needed to be said, and discussed, on the national stage.
But his continued pursuit of the Presidency, both as a Republican and later under a flag of convenience, after it was abundantly clear that his continuing efforts served only to diminish the GOP's chances, greatly rankled me, as it did thousands of conservatives.
So I'm glad to see Pat back to doing what he does best. This was a great article, and I hope it is a precident for many more.
Pat Buchanan wouldn't understand history if it bit him in his ass. His vile, worthless piece of dog crap from last week, about how WWII was our fault because we weren't nice to the po' lil' Japanese Empire, was riddled with factual errors and tremendously misleading omissions of critical info, just so he could twist it all into fitting his argument.
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