Buildings Fell; A Nation Rose

After leisurely dispensing with the required introductory remarks, W then switched gears and delivered a fine speech.

I was pleased when he drew parallels with the nay-sayers of the NYTimes of 1946:

18 months after the fall of Berlin to allied forces, a journalist wrote in the New York Times, "Germany is a land in an acute stage of economic, political and moral crisis. [European] capitals are frightened. In every [military] headquarters, one meets alarmed officials doing their utmost to deal with the consequences of the occupation policy that they admit has failed."

This is the very same observation made on this blog in "The Elusive Plan", about Life Magazine's pessimism in 1946...

Even more gratifying, just hours before the speech in a discussion with friends, I wrote the following about the issue of appointing new Supreme Court judges over the next few years:

My sense is that with W, one will get judges who will construe the Constitution more based on what it actually says rather than what either elite opinion, or what even they themselves, would like it to say.

And then I hear tonight Bush pledge,

I will continue to appoint federal judges who know the difference between personal opinion and the strict interpretation of the law.

Bravo!

Makes me feel almost like a personal advisor to the President. :-)

My main impression from this speech is embodied by phrases like "Liberty's Century" and "Freedom on the March". This administration will stand for ending the untenable status quo of failed dictatorial regimes by spreading Freedom, the best long-term solution for making this country safe from nuclear terrorism. Quite a classically "liberal" notion!

This is a Party with a vision and a mission. It stands for something.

And what of the Democrats? The Kerry campaign response seems to offer no coherent agenda other than to go "in a new direction."

So, that would be a direction away from spreading Freedom?

Leftists used to complaing about how terrible it was we supported dictators. Now we're eliminating the dictators and freeing millions, and they're still complaining!

There's just no pleasing these people; they seem to stand for nothing but sheer contrarianism! Or perhaps more accurately, anti-Americanism.

And oh yeah, Kerry promises to raise taxes. At least on that issue we can be confident of his position!