Posted on 06/05/2006 7:57:14 AM PDT by FreeKeys
Two weeks ago, I pointed out that we live in something close to the best of times, with record worldwide economic growth and at a low point in armed conflict in the world. Yet Americans are in a sour mood, a mood that may be explained by the lack of a sense of history. The military struggle in Iraq (nearly 2,500 military deaths) is spoken of in as dire terms as Vietnam (58,219), Korea (54,246) or World War II (405,399). We bemoan the cruel injustice of $3 a gallon for gas in a country where three-quarters of people classified as poor have air conditioning and microwave ovens. We complain about a tide of immigration that is, per U.S. resident, running at one-third the rate of 99 years ago.
George W. Bush has a better sense of history. Speaking last week at the commencement at West Point -- above the Hudson River, where revolutionary Americans threw a chain across the water to block British ships -- Bush noted that he was speaking to the first class to enter the U.S. Military Academy after the Sept. 11 attacks. And he put the challenge these cadets willingly undertook in perspective by looking back at the challenges America faced at the start of the Cold War 60 years ago.
"In the early years of that struggle," Bush noted, "freedom's victory was not obvious or assured." In 1946, Harry Truman accompanied Winston Churchill as he delivered his Iron Curtain speech; in 1947, communists threatened Greece and Turkey; in 1948, Czechoslovakia fell, France and Italy seemed headed the same way, and Berlin was blockaded by the Soviets, who exploded a nuclear weapon the next year; in 1950, North Korea attacked South Korea.
"All of this took place in just the first five years following World War II," Bush noted. "Fortunately, we had a president named Harry Truman, who recognized the threat, took bold action to confront it and laid the foundation for freedom's victory in the Cold War."
Bold action: the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan in 1947, the Berlin airlift in 1948, the NATO Treaty in 1949, the Korean War in 1950. None of these was uncontroversial, and none was perfectly executed. And this was only the beginning. It took 40 years -- many of them filled with angry controversy -- to win the Cold War.
The struggles against Soviet communism and Islamofascist terrorists are of course not identical. But there are similarities.
"Like the Cold War, we are fighting the followers of a murderous ideology that despises freedom, crushes all dissent, has territorial ambitions and pursues totalitarian aims," Bush said. "And like the Cold War, they're seeking weapons of mass murder that would allow them to deliver catastrophic destruction to our country."
The New Republic's Peter Beinart argues that Bush, unlike Truman, has shown no respect for international institutions. But the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan were unilateral American initiatives, and Truman used the United Nations to respond in Korea only because the Soviets were then boycotting the Security Council. Otherwise, he would have gone to war, as Bill Clinton did in Kosovo, without U.N. approval. Bush did try to use the United Nations on Iraq, but was blocked by France and Russia, both stuffed with profits from the corrupt U.N. Oil for Food program.
But as Bush pointed out, we have worked with 90-plus nations and NATO in Afghanistan and with 70-plus nations on the Proliferation Security Initiative. We're working with allies to halt Iran's nuclear program.
"We can't have lasting peace unless we work actively and vigorously to bring about conditions of freedom and justice in the world," Harry Truman told the West Point class of 1952. Which is what we're trying to do today -- in Iraq and the broader Middle East, in Afghanistan, even Africa.
Reports of Bush's West Point speech noted that Truman had low job ratings -- lower than Bush's, in fact. But does that matter now? Bush, as Yale historian John Lewis Gaddis has written, has changed American foreign policy more than any president since Truman, and like Truman he has acted on the long view.
"The war began on my watch," Bush told the class of 2006, "but it's going to end on your watch." Truman might have made the same point, accurately as it turned out, to the class of 1952. We're lucky we had then, and have now, a president who takes bold action and braves vitriolic criticism to defend our civilization against those who would destroy it.
Awesome article ... Barone never disappoints .. he GETs the BIG picture. BTTT!! I'm so GRATEFUL that George W. Bush is our president .. he is and will be historically memorable.
About 90% of elected officials belong to the Council on Foreign Relations. They are an organization that believes in elimination of the borders and establishing a one world rule.
I believe these wars that have happened are planned. They are used to get people to accept the idea of a one world government. Not that there is a real problem with a one world government in of itself, if Jesus Christ ran the world that would be fine. But when that one world government tries to push secular humanism and luciferian ideas down our throats, it isn't fine. And that's what we have today.
Republicans and Democrats continue to vote in unconstitutional and unchristian laws. Our freedoms are slowly being taken away. The public school system is dumbing our children down.
Bush is a liar. Bush has said "Christians and Muslims worship the same God." Really Mr Bush? Christians believe Jesus is God, is that what Muslims believe also? And you are trying to tell me Bush knows history, yet can't even get that simple fact straight?
And the last time I checked, giving millions of dollars in aid to katrina victims constitutes personal welfare, not general welfare. States' citizens are responsible for electing people in their state to take care of personal welfare problem, NOT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.
Last time i checked, there was never an amendment made to the constitution which allowed for anything other than SILVER AND GOLD to be used for money. Yet we have the federal reserve doing just that, breaking constitutional law every day.
Since when is going to war to establish a MUSLIM REPUBLIC constitutional? Should our soldiers really be dying in the name of building a muslim republic in Iraq?
Kerry and Bush both belong to Skull and Bones. The republic and democratic party are one entity, working together to make an illusion that there are two parties. One party cries to make the other look like it is doing something good. But in reality, things like electing Alito and Roberts was something BOTH parties favored, cause neither Alito nor Roberts favors any sort of State's rights. Alito have a very pro-abortionist background. And Alito doesn't understand the role of a judge, or else he corrupts the role of a judge. Just cause the SUpreme court might have overruled a decision he made in his circuit court, does not mean he had the right to give a decision that went contrary to justice. Judges are suppose to give fair, just decisions, regardless of whether it may get taken to the supreme court and overturned.
I stil have trouble beliving a bunch of guys that could barely speak english and couldn't really pass flight school, was able to fly a plane into the world trade center. And not just one but TWO planes. And how did the thrid building fall? Prior to this building falling, NO such building had collasped do to fire. It's od how the fire unilaterally heated all the abestoes covered steele beams at the same temperature at the same time so the building would fall inward and straight down.
We continue to have these free trade agreements with foreign countries that take jobs out of our country and ruin our economy.
When I'm making 17.50 an hour, and i still have trouble feeding a family, I think there is something wrong. $3 for 4 tomatoes is ridiculous. $3 for a gallon of gas is ridicuolous. I have to drive alot to take care of my grandmother. I use to spend $15 a week on gas to drive her around. Now it's $45. I'm short on time as it is, now i have to put in 3 more hours at work. I can't take it. We have unlimited oil in Alaska. AND IT ISN"T THE DEMOCRATS PREVENTING DRILLING! The republicans just use that as an excuse. The Democrats and Republicans are one party. And that's how they run their games. They same the other won't let them do that. But in reality, this is what both parties want. And they fool the little people in both parties into believing it is either the evil Democrats or Evil Republicans preventing such and such from happening.
The citizens are like a dog chasing its own tail.
sorry aboput the typos:
They "say" the other won't let them do that.
Maybe we could start referring to them as the "RAT-Socialist" Party.
Not only is Pres. Bush taking flak from the usual leftist suspects...he is now being viciously attacked from the right who knee-jerk to the latest news story.
I agree with Michael Barone. Thank God for Pres. Bush's long view of history. We have a real leader in the White House.
One reason we see a lot of the "what have you done for me today" mentality on FR is that we have a significant amount of libs posing as conservatives posting comments in order to stir up trouble, create division and Bush hate.
They've had a fair amount of success...
And as my dad always said, there are those who would gripe if you hung them with a new rope.
And the media and the left has their fingers in the ears, and is louding singing la-la-la-la instead of acknowleging this.
One of Mrs Truman's friends mentioned tha Harry used the word "manure" too often and she should bring it up to him. Bess Just replyed, "No, it took ten years to get him to use that word."
I believe President Bush recently used the erroneous total in the commencement speech he gave at West Point.
"Former Congressman Prentiss Walker dropped in on a farm and introduced himself as a Republican candidate. And as he tells it, the farmer's eyes lit up, and then he said, 'Wait 'til I get my wife. We've never seen a Republican before.' And a few minutes later he was back with his wife, and they asked Prentiss if he wouldn't give them a speech.
"Well, he looked around for a kind of a podium, something to stand on, and then the only thing available was a pile of that stuff that the late Mrs. Truman said it had taken her 35 years to get Harry to call 'fertilizer.' So, he stepped up on that and made his speech. And apparently he won them over. And they told him it was the first time they'd ever heard a Republican. And he says, 'That's okay. That's the first time I've ever given a speech from a Democratic platform.'"
That would be truly valuable and TOTALLY cool!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"This war will take many turns we cannot predict. Yet I am certain of this: Wherever we carry it, the American flag will stand not only for our power, but for freedom. (Applause.)
Our nation's cause has always been larger than our nation's defense. We fight, as we always fight, for a just peace -- a peace that favors human liberty. We will defend the peace against threats from terrorists and tyrants. We will preserve the peace by building good relations among the great powers. And we will extend the peace by encouraging free and open societies on every continent.
Building this just peace is America's opportunity, and America's duty. From this day forward, it is your challenge, as well, and we will meet this challenge together. (Applause.)
You will wear the uniform of a great and unique country. America has no empire to extend or utopia to establish. We wish for others only what we wish for ourselves -- safety from violence, the rewards of liberty, and the hope for a better life.
In defending the peace, we face a threat with no precedent. Enemies in the past needed great armies and great industrial capabilities to endanger the American people and our nation. The attacks of September the 11th required a few hundred thousand dollars in the hands of a few dozen evil and deluded men.
All of the chaos and suffering they caused came at much less than the cost of a single tank. The dangers have not passed. This government and the American people are on watch, we are ready, because we know the terrorists have more money and more men and more plans.
The gravest danger to freedom lies at the perilous crossroads of radicalism and technology. When the spread of chemical and biological and nuclear weapons, along with ballistic missile technology -- when that occurs, even weak states and small groups could attain a catastrophic power to strike great nations.
Our enemies have declared this very intention, and have been caught seeking these terrible weapons. They want the capability to blackmail us, or to harm us, or to harm our friends -- and we will oppose them with all our power. (Applause.)
For much of the last century, America's defense relied on the Cold War doctrines of deterrence and containment. In some cases, those strategies still apply. But new threats also require new thinking. Deterrence -- the promise of massive retaliation against nations -- means nothing against shadowy terrorist networks with no nation or citizens to defend.
Containment is not possible when unbalanced dictators with weapons of mass destruction can deliver those weapons on missiles or secretly provide them to terrorist allies.
We cannot defend America and our friends by hoping for the best. We cannot put our faith in the word of tyrants, who solemnly sign non-proliferation treaties, and then systemically break them. If we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long. (Applause.)
Homeland defense and missile defense are part of stronger security, and they're essential priorities for America. Yet the war on terror will not be won on the defensive. We must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans, and confront the worst threats before they emerge. (Applause.) In the world we have entered, the only path to safety is the path of action. And this nation will act. (Applause.)"
THIS is exactly what's wrong with the momurdotes on FREE REPUBLIC!!
Errr... uhhh... YEAH! What you said!!
In 1906 anyone could show up at Ellis Island and get a fair chance to be allowed to enter as an immigrant. There were very few restrictions. Possibly only a health check and you needed to know someone who lived here. We were still trying to fill up the west with workers.
My own family arrived in the 1720's when there were no restrictions. Thankfully the family had bought land fron William Penn.
There were also NO welfare or government programs. The only rule was "ROOT HOG OR DIE"
He's supposed to take care of them, just like their Mommies and Daddies and their nice self-esteem teachers did.
It's flabby thinking, and it's obvious from reading posts here of known conservatives that even those on the right are infected with flower power, self-centered thinking.
"Momurdote" is an obsolete word meaning "the sulks"...............or those who are constantly moaning or murmuring and saying stupid things.
I think it fits a number of freepers to a 't.' :)
So why did the other get locked by the Admin?
Bump!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.