Free Republic

Ho Chi Minh, dead for 37 years, still shadowed President Bush practically all day. Each of Bush's meetings Friday with Vietnam's president, prime minister and Communist Party chief took place beneath huge bronze busts of the revolutionary leader who later became prime minister and then president of North Vietnam. The setting produced some striking imagery and an interesting juxtaposition for Bush, who has made it a goal to spread democracy throughout the world. At the presidential palace, Bush, his Vietnamese counterpart, Nguyen Minh Triet, and their wives sat in ornate white chairs in front of a large, red-and-yellow floral arrangement...

I. A few weeks ago, I asked Howard Dean how, given his vehement opposition to the war in Iraq, he felt he could overcome the Democrats' reputation as the antiwar party. ''I think you're still in the old paradigm, which says that they're the party of strength and we're the party of weakness,'' Dean admonished me as I sat across from him on his campaign plane. The chaos in Iraq, he said, had upended the old stereotypes. In John F. Kennedy's day, Dean pointed out, the Democrats enjoyed the reputation as the party of resolution. ''I think this may be...