Posted on 06/14/2004 6:20:15 AM PDT by veronica
IT is hard to believe it has been only one week since the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the D-Day invasion that liberated France from the Nazis. A lot has changed in a mere seven days.
Let’s start with the international scene. George Bush, Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder took their act from Normandy to Sea Island, Georgia, where they were joined by other members of the G8 and assorted interested parties. There Chirac proved once again that a chasm exists between his words and his deeds.
Last Sunday in the Norman coastal town of Arromanches, the French president told some 6,000 D-Day veterans and assorted guests: “France will never forget what it owes America.”
A few days later he opposed America’s requests for deeper involvement of Nato in the pacification of Iraq, saying such a move would not be opportune. He fought to water down Bush’s programme to foster the growth of democratic institutions in the Middle East, stating that he opposed such “missionary work”.
And he responded with a vigorous “non” to Bush’s plea that Iraq’s creditors join America in forgiving the vast majority of the debts incurred by Iraq during Saddam Hussein's regime. Within the G8 nations, Japan is owed $4.1 billion, Russia $3.5 billion, France $3 billion, Germany $2.4 billion and the United States $2.2 billion.
And just to make certain that none of the anti-American voters at home gets any idea that he has moved too close to the Americans, Chirac decided to pass up President Ronald Reagan’s funeral to keep an unspecified “previous commitment” in Europe.
Gerhard Schröder is in a more difficult position than the French friend with whom he has formed an alliance of steel. He is riding a tiger: he has whipped up anti-American sentiment and ridden the wave of anti-Americanism to electoral triumph. But he now wants to open markets and investment opportunities in the countries that have recently joined the EU, and to cosy up to the delegates they will be sending to the various EU institutions.
Unfortunately for him, eight of these countries remember that it was American steadfastness in the cold war, and Reagan’s decision to replace containment with victory as his policy goal, that got them out from under the Russian boot.
So these countries, and the German business community, are telling Schröder to tone down his anti-American rhetoric — which he cannot do without antagonising the voters he has persuaded to hate America in general and Bush in particular.
To add to Franco-German discomfort, the UN Security Council unanimously approved the new Iraqi government, led by Ghazi al-Yawar, who was educated in America. And when, after a two-day stop in Ireland for an EU-US summit, the heads of state move to Istanbul for the Nato summit, Chirac is likely to find his resistance to Nato involvement in Iraq’s reconstruction ignored by an organisation desperate to prove that it is relevant to the 21st century.
All in all, it seems that in a single week the reputations of George Bush and Tony Blair have moved from the valley of despair to the bright uplands reserved for those who get it right in the tough world of geopolitics.
All this geopolitical toing-and-froing overshadowed some important developments on the economic front. With Japan now firmly on the path to growth, Europe is the world’s principal laggard. John Snow, US Treasury secretary, called on the EU to rely less on export-led growth, which adds to America’s trade deficit, and to take steps to accelerate domestic demand.
But the Europeans are engaged in a blame game. Schröder and Chirac blame the European Central Bank for keeping interest rates too high, while the ECB blames France and Germany for violating the fiscal rules of the Growth and Stability Pact, and for refusing to reform their labour and product markets.
The funny thing is that both the ECB and its critics are probably right. The one-size-fits-all interest rate set by the ECB is too high to maximise growth in France and Germany, and the two countries’ refusal to make economic reforms is holding back their economies.
The most optimistic forecast at present is that the European economy will grow at an annual rate of about 1.5% this year, about one-third that of the United States.
Not all the news from these meetings is gloomy. The heads of state did manage to pronounce themselves in favour of a resumption of trade-opening talks, and to promise to reduce trade-distorting agricultural subsidies and barriers to access.
Whether those pledges can survive the pressures of the American presidential campaign is not certain. Bush is showing commendable courage by defending free trade as a creator rather than a destroyer of jobs, and ridiculing calls to end outsourcing.
He has also had the Commerce Department cut anti-dumping duties on Chinese television sets to levels that will have minimal impact on China’s television-set manufacturers.
All this is a misfortune for John Kerry. His campaign rests on a three-legged stool. The first leg is that Bush is a job destroyer; but the economy has created almost 1m jobs in the past three months, and is probably adding more than 10,000 every day.
The second leg is that Bush has antagonised America’s allies and is isolated. The 15-0 Security Council vote to recognise the Bush-backed Iraqi government saws that leg off.
The final leg is that the Bush tax cuts have been a disaster. But Reagan’s death has reminded everyone that the late president’s tax cuts helped to end the recession he inherited from Jimmy Carter, just as Bush’s cuts kept the Clinton recession short and mild.
It has not been a good week for the president’s foes, here and abroad.
Irwin Stelzer is a business adviser and director of economic policy studies at the Hudson Institute
Excellent summary of the situation today. But needless to say few Americans will read it, and the leftist American media will be on the attack against Bush from now through next November. So today's tranquillity won't last long.
While there are still pockets of economic distress, the nation, at large, has recovered.
Yes, I'm afraid that you're correct on all counts.
It's up to Bush and his team to go over and around the press, as Reagan did, and make the case.
Yeah, but the key point is unavoidable - Kerry is entering the final stretch of the horse race with no legs (he's still got the face for a horse race though).
Pres. Bush is a genuis at the strategic level. He is less gifted tactically. In the bloody trenches--the newsrooms and sound stages of the media elites--he, and we, are getting trounced.
But what he was thinking was,
"France will never stop resenting what it owes America."
It's SUCH a b!tch being a third-rate country on a downward slide!
Good article, veronica!
The media is a real problem. Reagan was also faced with a hostile media (who seem now to have forgotten how much they hated and ridiculed him and even his wife).
But he may have had better people helping him confront the media, his acting experience and background with the entertainment industry probably helped him, and things were nowhere near as vicious. There was no Michael Moore out there passing off blatant lies and calumny as truth - and winning awards for doing so.
On the positive side, there is the Internet, where at least some of the truth can get out.
But you're both right, it still doesn't seem as if Bush has found away around the media blockades to really get out to the American people. He needs better advisers, I think.
Bill and Hillary could have done us all a great favor by making a similar excuse;
then we'd have been spared the spectacle of their falling asleep during President Reagan's funeral service.
Cojones of steel vs. the marshmallows of the left.
Lying, deceitful, manipulative, societal engineering Marshmellows of the left.
We shall see how this one plays out, but keep in mind that Bush managed to edge the VP of a popular president before it was clear to the electorate that the economy turned in November/October that year. That is no small achievement in my view.
Lots of people are demanding that Bush do this or that a long ways before Nov. The old saying don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes may hold here. Bush may be being very tactically smart holding back some reserve for the traditional election season.
He just needs to stay on task. Take the war into Syria and Iran before the election and he'll have plenty of opportunity to get the message to the American people.....
Nice article, but I don't see Bush's critics floundering at all. I watched the Sunday news programs and listened to the radio this AM and the liberal echo chamber was in full swing. Amongst the moving goal post statements and innuendo I heard this weekend were:
Bush should go to the UN in order to get more international aide. . whats that you say? He got a UN resolution and no more international aide is following? Well, then Bush should do more to internationalize this effort (read, suck Chiracs bleep) by being more international. Reagan is a prime example of a leader with whom the Eurowennies disagreed, but still liked. . nevermind all those massive protests in Europe against Reagan that we are hoping you have forgotten.
Americans are dying in Iraq for nothing since there will be no Iraqi government to hand power to and there is no exit strategy oh and every Iraqi hates us. . .whats that you say, an interim government is in place and fully supports the U.S. presence there? There is an interim government and there will be a hand over in power? Well, the terrorists are still being terrorists and blowing things up. That should just magically stop. If we had not invaded Iraq, Saddam could still be in power systematically killing his own people, rather than the terrorist doing it willy nilly and the terrorists would just be sitting around right now twiddling their thumbs. In other words, if we had not invaded Iraq and minded our own business the terrorists would have left us alone. Nevermind that is exactly what we were doing prior to 9/11, I will just pretend that you in the audience are too stupid to think of that point yourselves.
Bush's popularity is plummeting and all the news for him is bad. . whats that you say, there has been good news for him and his numbers are stabilizing, that nobody seems to have a reason to vote for Kerry other than voting against Bush? First off, the news is bad because we create the news and will ensure it is all bad, que up another Abba Dabba Do photo. Second off, he is unpopular, I have interviewed at least five of my closest liberal friends and they say Bush is unpopular, so he must be, especially since I agree with them. Also, the LA Times says so. echo. .echo. . echo. .
Bush led us to war on false pretenses, there are no WMD's and there are no Saddam Al Queda links. . whats that you say, the UN even says that Iraq smuggled the WMD's out before, during and after the war (hmmm, could it be the UN fan dance delay gave Saddam time) and that Iraqi documents say that Saddam had links to terrorism. .whats that you say. .eh, sorry, never heard it, fingers in ears, not reporting it. NO WMD's, NO AL QUEDA TIES, THOSE ARE OUR STORIES AND WE ARE STICKING WITH THEM.
The 9/11 families blame Bush for 9/11. . whats that you say, they don't? Well, the four Jersey Bimbs we have been talking to do and that is enough for us. . next up on Hardball. . .
Bush ordered torture to be used in Iraq and asked for memos to be written by the AG. . . what is that you say, the soldiers involved in the Abba Dadda Doo fraternity prank (read abuse) scandal are being prosecuted, that the Geneva Conventions don't apply to terrorists, the memos being referred to were to obtain a legal opinion as to how far we could go without violating treaties (that the terrorists could give one shyt about), and that the Abba Dabba Doo fraternity prank (read abuse)prison scandal has now morphed so that ligitimate techniques being used to interrogate terrorists (sleep dep, fear (call in the dogs), etc) are being called torture? Well, any mistreatment is bad. We must afford these terrorists an ACLU lawyer so that we can get no information from them and they can attack the U.S and we can blame Bush. We demand more be done to protect the U.S. without anything actually being done. Isn't it a cutesy wootsy political delimna we have created. Sure it may get a million Americans killed, but the capitalist pigs deserve to die just like we deserved 9/11.
American casualities in Iraq are down you say. . well, that was never the story you see, it was always about Saudi Arabia and the civilian casualites there.
Bush delivered an excellent eulogy at Reagan's funeral you say. . .well, Bush Sr. gave the better, more emotional eulogy and showed what a dunce Bush Jr. really is.
Bush is no Reagan. .what is that you say, he may not be, but he is facing challenges to this country that were similar to what Reagan faced? Well, Ron Jr. made a passing remark in his eulogy that can only be interpreted as meaning the Ron Sr. secretly converted back to being a Democrat during his last days on earth and, if he had lived but a little longer, would have endorsed John Kerry fully.
BUMP!
Kerry is left with "I'm not Bush!"
And he doesn't realize just how damaging that is as the election approaches.
I'm still laughing at how Kerry has begged McCain SEVEN TIMES to be his VP. If that isn't a damning indictment, what is?
Schroder's problem is easy to fix; all he has to do is invade France. They'll surrender in four hours or so, and this time, Germany gets to keep them.
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