Bush supporters' aftermath thread

Isn't it about time again for that crying baby picture?

It's only been posted a thousand times, after all...

Now here's something original:

"There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people for a purpose which is unattainable." -- U.S. historian Howard Zinn, 1993

FREEDOM? NO THANKS

If you can believe this, President Bush's Inaugural speech is catching flack from some quarters, particularly American leftists and Euro-weenies, because he used the "F" word 27 times. This is an "F" word that is even more offensive to the left than the "F" word. Yup ... Bush said "Freedom" at least 27 times during the speech.

Evidently Bush didn't get the booklet of instructions for Presidents making State of the Union or Inaugural speeches. You're supposed to talk about security, not freedom. Bush was talking about spreading freedom around the world, and much of the world was having none of it.

What is the problem with freedom? I think that the biggest problem is that people realize that along with personal freedom comes personal responsibility. To be sure, Americans will say nice things about freedom ... right up until the time that personal responsibility rears its ugly head. Freedom of speech? Sure, that takes no real effort. Freedom of religion? No problem there. It doesn't really require you to actually do anything. Introduce responsibility and consequences for irresponsibility, and the love of freedom suddenly wanes.

I saw a good example of the limited American love affair with freedom yesterday on CNN. Three women from three generations were being interviewed; grandmother, mother and daughter. They were being questioned on President Bush's privatization plans for Social Security. The grandmother was against it. She said that this would be like the government teaching people to gamble. She equates investing in the stock market to gambling, and has decided that it is wrong. Let the government take your money, and then dole it out to you later. Now that's just fine.

The daughter was particularly troubling. On the one hand she said that she had no confidence at all that there were going to be any Social Security benefits for her when she reached retirement age, whatever that retirement age might be. On the other hand she said that she wasn't in favor of privatization because she didn't want to have to go to the trouble of making decisions on how her retirement money should be invested. She would just rather have the government do it for her.

More examples? They're not difficult to find. Just go to the basic levels of our society. Should you be free to negotiate with an employer on the basis of salary? No ... we need a minimum wage. Should you be free to buy a health insurance policy that doesn't include pregnancy benefits? No .. the government stands in the way. Should you be free to chose who is going to come into your home and tell you what drapery fabric would look good with your throw pillows? No. The government tells you who you can and can't hire for that job. Do people complain? Do they protest? Not a bit. Just accept the government controls and regulations and move on.

There is another troubling aspect of our lost love for freedom. When freedom isn't cherished people are opposed to paying a price to make freedom secure. The United States is trying to introduce freedom into the heart of the tyrannical Arab World. As in the past, people are dying in the effort. Now we have people saying that it's peace, not freedom that matters. That might sound good until you realize that by "peace" they simply mean the absence of armed conflict. Tyranny? Fine. Not even the most basic of freedoms? No problem ... as long as there's peace. Today an astounding number of people, principally on the left, believe that peace without freedom is just fine, thank you very much.

I've been watching Inauguration and State of the Union speeches for years. I've read almost every State of the Union speech ever delivered. Over the decades there were some obvious changes. Take the word "democracy," for instance. You never saw that word in a State of the Union speech until sometime around the 1930's. The idea of "democracy" suddenly became popular when politicians sought to expand the power of the state beyond anything imagined by our Constitution. To do this they needed to cite the "will of the people." Majority rule moved the rule of law aside, and our modern "democracy" was born. Along with the arrival of the "D" word came disappearing references to freedom and more emphasis on security ... government provided security. George Bush's speech yesterday was a market difference from this trend. Too bad it fell on so many deaf and unwilling ears.

The United States is trying to introduce freedom into the heart of the tyrannical Arab World.

Bush's Breakthrough
The president's second inaugural address smashes the wall between the idealists and the realists.
by Fred Barnes
01/20/2005 4:17:00 PM

WHAT WAS SO GREAT about President Bush's inaugural address? First, it was eloquent, noting that freedom lights "a fire in the minds of men" and represents both "the hunger in dark places [and] the longing of the soul." More important, the speech laid out an extraordinarily sweeping and ambitious foreign policy for the nation. In doing so, Bush broke down the barrier between the foreign policy idealists, of which he and President Reagan are the most notable, and the realists, who include his father and his father's two chief advisers on foreign affairs, Brent Scowcroft and James Baker.

The most significant statement in the speech was simple and not lyrical at all: "It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world." That's quite a declaration, one likely to unnerve tyrants and autocrats and even a few allies around the world. But Bush wasn't kidding or just riffing.

What the president added to his crusade for democracy made the policy all the more important. Bush said the creation of more democracies would have the effect making the United States more secure. Indeed, the need to seed freedom in as many countries as possible "is the urgent requirement of our nation's security and the calling of our time." In the same vein, he said: "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other
lands." Though he didn't say so in the speech, the president believes the ouster of Saddam Hussein and the creation of a democratic Iraq will make America safer in the world. Likewise, the fall of dictators in other countries.

Nor did Bush flatly insist he'd smashed the barrier between the idealists--or moralists as they're often dubbed--and the realists. But he had. In fact, British prime minister Tony Blair has told him so. The idealists have as their ultimate goal in the world the spread of democracy. And Bush said he would wage a full-blown campaign for democracy, that now being "the policy." Democracy is a noble goal by itself, but the president said it carries the added value of making America more secure.

Security, of course, is the goal of the realists. They prefer democracies, but they're not adamant about it. If an autocratic country is friendly to the United States and opposes America's enemies, the realists are quite satisfied. Transforming such a country into a democracy would not be part of their foreign policy agenda. Think of Saudi Arabia in this regard, or Pakistan.

Bush rejects this thinking. The best way to achieve the realists' goal of maximum security for America, he believes, is for there to be more democracies in the world. In effect, Bush said the policy of idealists will lead to the goal of realists. "America's vital interests and our deepest beliefs are now one," he said. Boom! The wall between the two schools is gone, at least in the president's formulation.

This would be merely an intellectual breakthrough if Bush were, say, a political science professor at Rutgers. But because he's the leader of the world's only superpower, it's a major step in the right direction for the world. Now, he's got four years to pursue the policy into make the spread of freedom and democracy a reality.

This would be merely an intellectual breakthrough if Bush were, say, a political science professor at Rutgers. But because he's the leader of the world's only superpower, it's a major step in the right direction for the world. Now, he's got four years to pursue the policy into make the spread of freedom and democracy a reality.

Blatham, I am anxious to hear your "plan" as it would regard the US' foreign policy stance towards the nations you have listed.

Ticomaya wrote:

Blatham, I am anxious to hear your "plan" as it would regard the US' foreign policy stance towards the nations you have listed.

Odd coincidence. I'm anxious to see you attempt even the shallowest analyses of Boortz, Coulter and the other folks you paste in here regularly.

As to Barnes' approach to speech-critique...

I see a family dining table, Tico in the big chair beneath the chandelier, everyone's hands on laps and their heads dutifully, almost worshipfully tilted Ticowards. He will talk today, they all know, on the family's direction for the next year. The family leader begins, voice low and authoritative. "We shall, this family shall, reach for the very stars. It is our destiny, our duty, our place in the neighborhood."

At the slightly dimmer end of the table, Mrs Tico is thinking about the huge credit card debt racked up over 2004, the ongoing legal battle with the neighbors next door, how half the kids think Dad is the biggest doofus on the block, how he simply cannot admit the Lada was a lousy purchase, and she's wondering why, whenever she attempts to talk about these matters, he calls her a traitor.