Posted on 04/14/2003 12:55:25 PM PDT by TCSparkman
"President Bush: We Owe This Man!"
Posted by Fernando Oaxaca Monday, April 14, 2003
It is Day 23 of Operation Iraqi Freedom, which began on Thursday evening, March 20, 2003. Less than three weeks have sped by since the ''Decapitation Strike'' of bunker-buster bombs dropped from an American B-1 flying over Baghdad, guided to a building where Saddam Hussein, his sons, and other Iraqi leaders were supposedly meeting. The resulting Iraqi casualties of that night attack are not known yet, but the violent overthrow of Saddam¹s Iraqi Regime soon followed. Today that regime change is viewed as a good thing by eight out of ten Americans.
''What happened in the last three weeks is unprecedented in military history,'' says Dr. Victor David Hanson, the distinguished CSU Fresno professor of classics and history, writing today in ''National Review Online.'' Perhaps just as unprecedented has been the indomitable leadership of President George W. Bush and the brilliance in planning the war by his military and civilian team. Not unprecedented but almost taken for granted, however, has been the incredible courage, the professional excellence, the unexpected maturity and the continuing high morale of the armed forces of the United States, so heavily made up of barely post-teen volunteers! And, they seem to idolize their commander-in-chief.
Perhaps an unquestionable indicator of this impressive and uncommon melding of presidential leadership with youthful dedication to a difficult task is found on today¹s front page of the usually less than supportive New York Times. An article describes how an American tank shell killed two allegedly civilian Iraqis in an unidentified car speeding towards the American vehicle (only days after the suicide bombing which killed 4 GI¹s in Najaf). It then reports the anguish of Army Cpl. Jeff Mager, 22, the gunner on that Abrams tank crew, as he recounted the incident to the Times reporter
The Times notes but does not comment on Corporal Mager¹s Abrams gun turret which carried the words, ''Bush and Co.!'' What a clear demonstration of the bond between American GI¹s doing the nasty scut work in this far-away conflict and their commander-in-chief, President Bush, thousands of miles away giving the toughest, major commands. As the ''Bush and Co.'' sign speaks to us, we have also seen evidence of that bond in his tear-glistened eyes and near-cracking voice when speaking on TV of, or to, the individuals in armed service. He comes through so obviously reminded of the unavoidable cost in the lives and wounding of young, fighting Americans in armed conflict. To the cynical few, this may sound maudlin.
But, like almost all Americans, the President is not immune to the feelings of anguish and irreversible loss in the pit of our stomach when the dreaded statistics of combat deaths are made known. As one reviews the names and ages of the dead released by the Department of Defense, it is the number in their early twenties and late teens that tear at the heart and forcefully remind us of the price of freedom and what grief so many parents must be enduring.
Yesterday, accompanied by First Lady Laura Bush, Mr. Bush passed out Purple Heart Medals to wounded Marines and soldiers at the Bethesda Naval Hospital. Afterwards, when he made short remarks to the few press people there, one could not miss his apparently grayer hair and what seemed like new lines around his non-TV-prepped eyes, giving dramatic evidence of how the President too has suffered from the burden he carries as he has led, and leads in this Iraq War.
America owes this man. And like it or not, the world owes this man. Convinced of the seriousness of the dangers our nation and others face, smashed into our senses by 9/11, President Bush has been leading a war on apathy and self-interest not just here in the United States but abroad. His graying hair is not solely from age. It is from dealing with great patience and an incredible stick-to-itiveness as he has driven an American public, previously glued to TV re-runs of ''Friends'' or new ''Survivor'' episodes, to recognize that suicide-bombers in North Hollywood or Long Island are not impossible. His graying is also from searching for national unity on dealing with the menace of Saddam Hussein. It comes from not exercising his better judgment, giving way to needless acquiescence to his unyielding critics, appealing for support and being summarily rejected by ex-KGB honcho, Vladimir Putin, or greedy duo Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder or perhaps more painfully, finding no help from formerly reliable amigo Vicente Fox.
Read the entire article at http://www.chronwatch.com/featured/contentDisplay.asp?aid=2273
(Excerpt) Read more at chronwatch.com ...
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Aw, c'mon. I'm sure they would have idolized President Gore every bit as much if only a few more chads were dimpled.
</SARCASM>
I know the risk is still there, but I believe that terrorists all over the world are viewing the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns as a "wake-up call".
They'll think twice and three times before making more attacks.
He does it correctly....the way it's supposed to be done. Do we owe him extra because the eight years prior to him were a disaster.
I'll thank him, profusely...but I.... don't owe him a damn thing for doing things that are supposed to be done.
Mr. Sowell labels the competing visions "constrained" and "unconstrained." The constrained vision argues that perfection is impossible, that social policy consists of structuring incentives for self-centered men, that life is a series of trade-offs. This vision is represented by the likes of Adam Smith, Edmund Burke and Alexander Hamilton (and of course, Dick Cheney and the Bush administration mindset).
Only one Sowell book? I've read a dozen of them.The man is a genius. Where, pray tell, can one listen to Sowell on a regular basis? I saw him on C-Span once, and Brian Lamb stipulated that trying to get Sowell on the tube was nearly impossible. Sowell agreed, saying that he thought his forte was print, and he didn't want to spend much time on radio/TV appearances.
Wonder if this guy's a Freeper?
DaviS
One thing can be said of this man, he has LED and he has led us in the right path. The contrast to the previous administration only serves to highlight and emphasize the difference in character quality and honor.
There would not have been any contolling authority.
Precisely where among these seven most momentous U.S. presidencies GWB will rank in the fullness of history is still a story to be written, but it is unquestionably in this league already.
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