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Wednesday, October 27, 2004

A Historian for Bush

Blackfive posts a letter from British Historian, Paul Johnson.

There is something grimly admirable about his stoicism in the face of reverses, which reminds me of other moments in history: the dark winter Washington faced in 1777-78, a time to "try men's souls," as Thomas Paine put it, and the long succession of military failures Lincoln had to bear and explain before he found a commander who could take the cause to victory. There is nothing glamorous about the Bush presidency and nothing exhilarating. It is all hard pounding, as Wellington said of Waterloo, adding: "Let us see who can pound the hardest.” Mastering terrorism fired by a religious fanaticism straight from the Dark Ages requires hard pounding of the dullest, most repetitious kind, in which spectacular victories are not to be looked for, and all we can expect are "blood, toil, tears, and sweat.” However, something persuades me that Bush with his grimness and doggedness, his lack of sparkle but his enviable concentration on the central issue is the president America needs at this difficult time. He has, it seems to me, the moral right to ask American voters to give him the mandate to finish the job he has started.
He has some pretty harsh words about Kerry as well.

2 Comments:

Blogger Andrew said...

I'm pretty sure Napolean, Hitler, Lee, and Custer were pretty resolved too.

Careful not to fall into the "war is hard, so let's not judge" trap. Not all wars are just, not all just wars are managed well, and not all well-managed just wars are worth the costs. I don't want to turn this into a discussion about the implicit subject; I'm just pointing out that resolve and stoicism aren't everything.

10/27/2004 09:59:00 PM  
Blogger Dave Justus said...

Resolve and Stoicism arn't everything. But without them you have nothing. Or too put in in another way, these qualities are necessary but not sufficient.

Because I think that this war is just, and worth the cost (and even if it wasn't, from the point of view of the status quo vis a vis Saddam it certainly is now) and doubt Kerry's resolve nothing else about him really matters to me.

10/28/2004 12:40:00 PM  

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