Posted on 01/21/2005 4:27:12 AM PST by kattracks
Edited on 01/21/2005 4:28:09 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Former White House political adviser and sometime presidential speechwriter Dick Morris praised President Bush's inaugural address Thursday night as the best speech in more than 40-years - and one of the top inaugural addresses in American history."That was the greatest inaugural address since John F. Kennedy's and one of the five or six greatest of all time," Morris told the Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly. "It was beautiful. It was poetic. Those of you who didn't see it missed a lot," the one-time Clinton advisor said.
The Bush speech articulated "a bold new policy" based on the spread of freedom, he noted - much the same way Kennedy did when he pledged in his address to "pay any price, bear any burden . . . to assure the survival and success of liberty."
The White House advisor said Bush's focus on the spread freedom around the globe hit on a fundamental truth: "No democracy ever starts a war of aggression."
"That doesn't mean we stop trading with China immediately," he cautioned. "It doesn't mean we invade Iran. But it does mean that we stand up for the Ukraine, like we did. It does mean we take action in the Afghanistan and Iraq elections, like we did."
Morris said there's already compelling evidence of the power of elections to defeat aggression.
"If you want proof of how effective that is, look at Palestine," he told O'Reilly. "Ever since the elections were held the terrorists can't get the right time of day."
Former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan, however, was less impressed.
Normally a Bush booster who worked for the president's reelection campaign, Noonan told FNC's "Hannity & Colmes" that some of Bush's inauguration rhetoric was "grating."
"I found the speech today [to be] a rather startling speech . . . a big ambitious speech," she told Alan Colmes. But she warned, "history is going to play out and history is going to compare what really happened with the assertions that were made in this speech."
Noonan added, "I'll be frank, I think some of it went over the top a little bit in regards to what is possible in this world . . . I found it a little grating, in some respects."
That was worrisome...Mara and Mort being so positive about the speech. Alarm bells went off.
I agree! I almost fell out of my chair when they were talking about it so glowingly.
:) Caution is appropriate, but sometimes we are not at cross purposes. That's the fatal error that the Democrats continue to make.
Conservatives make the point that liberty (as defined by limiting the rights and responsibilities of government) is not only a political stabilizer, but a main avenue to mass prosperity.
Liberals and Middleoftheroaders have made the point that more government creates more liberty and that money brings prosperity and prosperity will trigger enlightenment and thus liberty.
In each case, both sides want liberty and prosperity. We define liberty differently and have vigorous disagreement about how to get there.
I think the problem the Left has is that it makes bad assumptions about what drives the Right.
I would not like to make the same mistake.
Thank you for the kind words.
I agree with you about her too.
I have been asking how we will live up to the contents of his speech.
I think a good portion of the speech was directed at those who will be coming of age soon and will be leaders 10 - 20 years from now. Particularly the challages to self governance and character.
Maybe that's what Peggy didn't get. He wasn't talking to the current crop, he was talking to the next.
Becki
When I was listening I thought that it will be an excellent read.....and it was.
Everyone in the media had no doubt read it before it was delivered.
I think you hit on something - that Noonan wanted to write for the President.
Now in retrospect, I wonder if the reason she took a "sabbatical" from WSJ online was to make herself "available" to the President and he never called.
I was struck by her first comments on FNC with Brit Hume when she really couldn't seem to digest the speech and didn't have any comment and I think said something to the effect that she needed to think it over.
Obviously on further reflection, she decided she didn't like what she heard and found the will to say that, but only much later in the day. Certainly Mort Kondracke, Fred Barnes and Bill Cristol heaped immediate praise on the President and his main speechwriter, and her only comments were with respect to how early the President started working on the speech - the day after the election.
"Grating" and "over the top" were certainly not the assessments I expected from Peggy. She does sound a little bitter, doesn't she?
Maybe they're on the White House payroll. Piece rate. $50 for every nice thing they say about the speech. Or else maybe it was a speech that appeals to squishy libs.
"Of all the female conservative commentators I have always liked Peggy Noonan the least. She comes down somewhere between grating and smarmy and always seems to lean toward the melodramatic. I didn't hear her comments yesterday because I turned the channel when I saw her on the screen. She's no Ann Coulter..."
Well said! You put your finger on why she is so annoying....I'd also felt like I should like her since she is a conservative writer, but as you said, she IS melodramatic and smarmy!! Thanks!
I disagree with their politics, but I like and respect Mara and Mort.
Right you are, Morris is a process guy, a tactician, not a policy maker. Watching him over the last year, I have seen a man looking to rehabilitate himself and be taken as a serious, i.e. hireable, campaign man. Much closer in that respect to, say Carville than Dean.
Not to be dismissed. Morris, as a process man, has a better track record than Bob Shrum and and Brazille combined, he actually works for winners.
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