Monday, October 25, 2004
Put it in perspective, folks...
Noemi Emery says it well:
George W. Bush is so terribly stubborn. He just won't admit a mistake. Specifically, he will not address the (liberal) press corps to tell it how terribly sorry he is about everything, from the war in Iraq to the Republican victories in the 2002 midterms to his own victory in the 2000 election, and perhaps his whole life.
For the moment, he has a very good reason. Should he express second thoughts on anything whatsoever, they would appear within minutes in an ad from the Democrats: "George W. Bush admits he was wrong about (name your field of interest). How many mistakes can we take?" No one in his senses would open himself to this kind of an attack, but there are other reasons, which are still more important: His missteps in Iraq are about par for the course for the start of a big, serious war against vicious opponents, under conditions not quite seen before.
Commanders-in-chief are not in the habit of indulging in lachrymose sessions in the middle of wars, and not often thereafter. George Washington did not apologize for his many missteps in the early years of the Revolution, which set back the cause badly, and cost many lives. Abraham Lincoln did not apologize for the rivers of blood that flowed in his many losing and badly planned battles, most of them under inadequate generals. And Franklin Roosevelt did not apologize for the massive losses sustained by his forces in the first years of the Second World War. They anguished, as Bush does, but they did not hand-wring in public, as they knew that the costs of not waging war would be even more onerous. They slipped up on details, but they grasped the big picture. As Bush grasps the big picture now.
read the rest here
George W. Bush is so terribly stubborn. He just won't admit a mistake. Specifically, he will not address the (liberal) press corps to tell it how terribly sorry he is about everything, from the war in Iraq to the Republican victories in the 2002 midterms to his own victory in the 2000 election, and perhaps his whole life.
For the moment, he has a very good reason. Should he express second thoughts on anything whatsoever, they would appear within minutes in an ad from the Democrats: "George W. Bush admits he was wrong about (name your field of interest). How many mistakes can we take?" No one in his senses would open himself to this kind of an attack, but there are other reasons, which are still more important: His missteps in Iraq are about par for the course for the start of a big, serious war against vicious opponents, under conditions not quite seen before.
Commanders-in-chief are not in the habit of indulging in lachrymose sessions in the middle of wars, and not often thereafter. George Washington did not apologize for his many missteps in the early years of the Revolution, which set back the cause badly, and cost many lives. Abraham Lincoln did not apologize for the rivers of blood that flowed in his many losing and badly planned battles, most of them under inadequate generals. And Franklin Roosevelt did not apologize for the massive losses sustained by his forces in the first years of the Second World War. They anguished, as Bush does, but they did not hand-wring in public, as they knew that the costs of not waging war would be even more onerous. They slipped up on details, but they grasped the big picture. As Bush grasps the big picture now.
read the rest here
# posted by Knitting a Conundrum @ 9:30 AM 
