Posted on 05/23/2006 8:34:45 AM PDT by Pokey78
NNow when he is at his lowest point yet in the polls is the time for those who love and admire President Bush to say so. Depending on the final success of his already successful campaign to bring the rudiments of democracy to Afghanistan and Iraq, George W. Bush, #43, may go down as a truly great president, who against fierce odds turned the entire Middle East in a new, more democratic, and more creative direction.
But I do not want to argue here the question of his greatness (I have heard voices call him the worst ever) because the question of ranking is above my pay grade and my foresight.
What I do want to argue is that, after Washington and Lincoln, Bush is the bravest of our presidents. He has faced the most intense fire, hatred, contempt, heavily moneyed and bitterly acidic partisan opposition, underhandedness, betrayal, of any president in the last hundred years. He has faced hostility over a longer time, in possibly the most dangerous period of international warfare in our national history. He has remained constant, firm, decided, and generous (to a fault) with his opponents.
He has faced almost unbroken contempt from the academy, from the mainstream press, from Democratic elites, from Moveon and all the other holders of the Democratic-party purse strings, from the Democratic Congress, from his treacherous (if not treasonous) Central Intelligence Agency, and from many levels of the permanent State Department. Almost every day, he has been pummeled and undermined by powerful forces of American power. Still, he has stayed firm, with clear arguments, and an even clearer vision.
On the number-one issue facing the nation—the war declared upon us by fascists who pretend to be religious—he has not wavered, he has not bent, he has stayed on course and true.
In Iraq, civil society, nearly comatose under Saddam Hussein, is today alive and full of vitality. Newspapers and television and magazines are full of diversity and energy, political parties multiply, private associations are functioning by the thousands, most of the country is more secure than some American cities. Iraqi exiles from around the world, far from fleeing, are coming back in droves.
In Paris, France, more cars may have been set on fire this past year than car bombings in Baghdad. In the decade of the Algerian war some time ago there may have been more bombings in France per week than there are now in Iraq. A tiny band of extremists, led by a crafty but crazed Jordanian, are still capable of impressive resourcefulness and ruthless killing, especially within camera reach of the hotels in Baghdad, where the American press is bunkered down. But they represent only a small fringe of Iraqi voters—and of course they loathe democracy with all their writhing intestines.
Despite the depredations, beheadings, and homicide bombings aimed at American public opinion, and especially elite opinion, President Bush has bravely kept his focus on eliminating one by one the dwindling band of terrorists, on the reconstruction of Iraqi civil society, and on the ability of Iraqi parties to broker and bargain and argue themselves into consensus in a political manner.
Whatever American voters may say of him to opinion pollsters—and his polls are now very low indeed—the survival of democracy in Iraq will in the future count as an enormous achievement. Moreover, the exchange in Arab minds of the "big idea" of democracy for the grand illusions of the past (Arab nationalism, Arab socialism, Baathist dictatorship, pan-Arabism), may a generation from now confer on President Bush the unmistakable honor of having been one of those presidents who actually changed the course of history. A president who changed the course of history, yes—and also one who did so against unprecedented opposition at home, bitter and hysterical opposition, even from those who were formerly of the party of democracy, human rights, and international outreach.
It takes more bravery to continue walking calmly through immense hostility at home, than to face down a foreign foe, with a united nation at one's back. This, as I say, is a very brave president.
It may also turn out that, despite currently swirling furies, the president's stout refusal to be merely partisan or to throw red meat to some of his best supporters (he knew as well as anybody what they most wanted now), alongside the five interlinked courses of action he proposed, will have empowered a much more thorough immigration reform than seemed possible even four weeks earlier.
Despite a normal diet of failures and setbacks, common to all presidents, it is also worth counting up his steady, always surprising successes in cutting taxes, in reshaping the Supreme Court, in getting personal Social Security accounts and personal medical accounts on the agenda of public discussion (the first president since Roosevelt to touch the third rail and live to tell of it), and in presiding over the most amazing economy in the world during the past six years.
Polls may be fickle. Notable accomplishments endure, as rock-solid facts. The full record of this president may yet turn out to be as highly ranked as his bravery is bound to be.
If you were in his shoes, would you not prefer the fame of 30 years from now to popularity in your own time? Being popular is neither within one's own control nor, in the larger scheme, a goal worth pursuing. Doing the right thing steadily, as best one can, is.
I like this guy. And I admire his guts, and his decency.
— Michael Novak is the winner of the 1994 Templeton Prize for progress in religion and the George Frederick Jewett Scholar in Religion, Philosophy, and Public Policy at the American Enterprise Institute. Novak's own website is www.michaelnovak.net.
Just curious, as President, what actions did Reagan take that you considered particularly brave? I loved Reagan, but he didn't have to ride the wave that Bush is riding.
"Kicking a friend..."
You've got that backwards. It's Bush who's done the kicking -- of people who elected him.
It's gotten really tiresome hasn't it? Why are people so uninterested in the rest of what goes on in the world that they vote on only one or two issues? We all have those issues that are MOST important to us. But to vote or form opinions based only on that to the exclusion of the totality of a man's record and stances is the hallmark of a true dunce.
I'm in his corner, but he'd better change his position on some things. I just won't support amnesty. And if that brings him down, tha's his fault, not mine.
Very very, true.. and the more, the democrats attack him the more the faithful rally behind him to pass(sign) socialist legislation NO democrat could possibly have passed with a republican Congress..
BRILLIANT gambit.. I'd say.. Probably Bush is the democrats most coveted and secret weapon ever devised to date.. Just like in his speech the other night he railed against amnesty as a bad thing, just before he proposed his own amnesty program(expanded).. and most/many of the idiots bought it..
This boy is GOOD, real good.. at playing the shell game..
Pea!, watch the Pea!, Now you see it now you don't..
Political buncko on a large scale..
Many Republicans watching the pea get their eyes rolling around like those on the Cookie Monster on Seseme Street.. the democrats know exactly whats happening.. more votes for Hillary in 2008.. who knows maybe even in 2006 for some elections.. Illegal and Legal Insurgents(aliens) ARE and WILL BE the democrats chief method of voter fraud from here on out.. Some republicans might see that IF EVER they can get eyes to STOP rolling around..
I am one of those who helped elect Bush. I don't feel "kicked" by him. To the contrary, I feel well-served by him as he's worked to allow me to feel safe getting on airplane and in cutting my taxes as well as allowing me to feel my job is safe in this booming economy again.
Um, you're about 80 years too late there. Our bravest president was Abraham Lincoln. Period.
I especially love the following statements from the article:
What I do want to argue is that, after Washington and Lincoln, Bush is the bravest of our presidents.It takes more bravery to continue walking calmly through immense hostility at home, than to face down a foreign foe, with a united nation at one's back. This, as I say, is a very brave president.
Polls may be fickle. Notable accomplishments endure, as rock-solid facts. The full record of this president may yet turn out to be as highly ranked as his bravery is bound to be.
I like this guy. And I admire his guts, and his decency.
Bravo, Michael Novak! Bravo!
Excellent post, Mike. Like you, I'm so pleased to see these kinds of articles starting to turn up here on FR and elsewhere.
"-- I admire and respect President Bush!! --"
I admire him less - and respect him less - than I did before the immigration problem boiled over.
Earlier in this thread someone said that the President certainly knows and understands the concerns of those of us who oppose his approach to the problem. I agree with that assessment - President Bush is OF COURSE not the buffoon portrayed by the media, and I am sure that he knows exactly what we want.
BUT... he has mischaracterized and mis-described our views - twisted them into an unrecognizable, racist, lawless vigilantism that marginalizes our side and benefits our political opponents. The easiest example was his earlier description of the Minutemen organization as "vigilantes."
In fact, the Minutemen are reminding our government of what they have forgotten - to a person, they have sworn an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. That is not just an abstraction; it is the prime directive of our Country, and "our Country" is meaningless without the ground on which it stands.
They should have been invited to the White House, awarded the Medal of Freedom for their timely warning, as well as their service. There should have been an executive order directing cooperation and coordination with the Border Patrol, and perhaps even a new volunteer service organization, like VISTA or the Peace Corps but with a real and tangible value to the public.
That is far from the only distortion, but it is the most blatant. And if my temper shows, I apologize. I promised yesterday not to overstate my disagreements with the President, or make idle threats about voting for the other side to teach our guys a lesson. But I feel ill-treated, and will not consider just being a good soldier on this issue. I certainly will not consider supporting ANYONE who votes for the current Senate bill, or anything like it, in any primary.
By the way, I called both Senators Frist and Alexander today to tell them what I think of the trashpile they call an immigration bill, and to describe the Senate as 100 oversized egos in search of a personality.
The voices of reason and thought have always been the silent majority on FR during this last year whether it was with DWP or this immigration debate. The absolutists just have their anger and noise to make them seem more numerous and more daunting than their actual numbers indicate. It's just like the story of Gideon in the Book of Judges in the Bible. The noise made by the trumpets of Gideon's army made them seem to be a larger force than they actually were.
This morning, the guy filling in for Rush presented himself as a comparative "moderate" on illegal immigration. He's not for punishing employers who hire illegals, for example. But he wants a wall across our entire southern border. He used the Berlin Wall as a positive example of such a barrier. I cringed.
It's this sort of stupid, extreme rhetoric that pushes me away from identifying myself as a conservative. I want no part of any movement that holds up as something positive the vicious Communist symbol which is the Berlin Wall.
It has been nothing compared to what Nixon faced.
So speaketh steve-b, threat assessment "genius."
World-class armchair quarterbacking, but by that logic President Bush could have avoided 9/11 by invading Afganistan three months earlier.
Agree. I don't know how old the author is, but he decidedly lacks any real historical perspective.
So do you think Blair faces greater challenges than Churchill did?
You know the future, of course. You can look down the road 20, 40, 60 years and know how it's all going to turn out. President Bush is in many ways a genuinely great man. He is all the things the Michael Novak says in his piece above. Decent, incredibly hard-working, courageous, willing to take on the toughest challenges and issues with a dignity, grace, charm and humor lesser men can only dream of attaining.
The great Rudyard Kipling poem, IF, seems almost to have been written in tribute to GWB. It describes our President to a perfect T.
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, but don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
Yep. If they get nukes, then the Islamonazis will be able to crank out just as many megadeaths as the Nazis or Communists.
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